Growing Relations with the United States

• From post-Cold War suspicion to close cooperation — the US is among India’s largest trade and investment partners.
• Maritime and defence anchor: the Malabar exercise grew from bilateral to a quadrilateral with Japan and Australia; the QUAD and the institutional 2+2 dialogue.
• The India–US Civil Nuclear Agreement reshaped the strategic equation (India gave up the IPI pipeline for it).

India’s Indo-Pacific concept

SAGAR — “Security and Growth for All in the Region” — and the Indo-Pacific Oceans’ Initiative (IPOI, 2019), built on seven pillars, anchored on “Act East” and “Act West.”

The partnership coexists with strategic autonomy: India rejected US mediation on Kashmir and refused to criticise Russia over Ukraine, becoming the second-largest importer of Russian oil. The wider web runs through Japan, Vietnam, Australia and France, with ASEAN centrality at its core.

Relations in the Modi Years

Kashish Parpiani and Harsh V. Pant

Under PM Narendra Modi, India has moved from its historical fixation with ‘strategic autonomy’ — a ghost of its non-aligned past — to ‘strategic alignment’. Autonomy has been redefined “as an objective that is attainable through strengthened partnerships instead of avoiding partnerships.” The shift reflects pragmatism and realism based on ‘enlightened self-interest’. India therefore has no hesitation in finding common ground with China to defend globalisation against America First protectionism, while embracing the United States on other issues.

The doctrinal move that most 15-markers now turn on

• Growing convergence on a “free and open” Indo-Pacific, with consensus in India’s strategic community that the U.S. is India’s “most important partner”. The alignment also has realpolitik relevance: even amid relative economic decline, the United States is positioned to dominate militarily.
• 2014 — Modi’s vision statement, ‘chalein saath saath, forward together we go’.
• Jan 2015 — Obama’s visit adopts the Joint Strategic Vision for the Asia-Pacific and the Indian Ocean Region, the first joint articulation of regional challenges.
• 2016 — address to Congress; relations have overcome the “hesitations of history”.
• 2017 — Modi’s visit covers Afghanistan, North Korea, West Asia, Pakistan, the Indo-Pacific, export control regimes, the UNSC, cyberspace, reaffirmation of Major Defence Partner status, and US observer membership of the Indian Ocean Naval Symposium.
• Biden years — Biden opposed sanctions after 1998, urged their removal in 2001, and helped seal the nuclear deal in 2008. As President he upgraded the Quad to summit level and launched I2U2 (India, Israel, UAE, United States). A framework on critical and emerging technologies followed the July 2022 joint statement.
• 2022 — the U.S. National Defense Strategy recognises the importance of partnership with India. India does not join US condemnation or sanctions on Russia; the U.S. shows understanding of India’s compulsions and expresses interest in being ‘partner of choice’ in virtually any field.
• Feb 2023 — Air India–Boeing deal for over 200 American-made aircraft. Sept 2023 — the U.S. response to the Canadian allegations against India is restrained despite Canada being a critical ally. Oct 2023 onward — the Israel-Hamas conflict may delay the proposed Middle East-India transport corridor and I2U2 initiatives.
• Nov 2023 2+2 — countering China through military and non-military tools; strengthening India’s military; reducing technological dependence on China; trade, clean energy, higher education and health; the long-run viability of India’s Russia ties.
• Gautam Chikermane → Modi inherited a US$2 trillion economy and strategic goodwill from nuclear cooperation, and used both. This convergence of size, strategy and policy has been timely for the U.S. as it seeks a partner of trust, disengages from Pakistan and de-risks from China.

Trump 2.0 — Tariffs, Repair and the Hemispheric Turn

Within months of 2025 Washington placed a cumulative 50 per cent tariff on Indian goods, part of it a penalty for buying Russian oil, and claimed a mediating role in the India–Pakistan clash of May 2025. The question that runs through the episode: a passing crisis that multi-alignment could absorb, or a strain on strategic autonomy itself?

Tariff escalation and India’s restraint

• Legal basis — the penalty invoked IEEPA and a “national emergency” first declared in EO 14066 (2022). EO 14329 found India “directly or indirectly importing Russian Federation oil.”
• India’s rebuttal — the MEA (6 August 2025) called the tariffs “unfair, unjustified and unreasonable” and framed oil imports as energy security for 1.4 billion people. India did not retaliate, and issued no further statement after the second tariff round.

The February 2026 settlement — contested and unfinished

• 2 Feb 2026 — Trump and Modi announced a framework for an Interim Agreement; the reciprocal rate was cut to 18% from the 50% peak, and India signalled intent to buy $500 billion of US goods over five years. An executive order of 6 February 2026 removed the Russian-oil penalty, effective 7 February.
• The Joint Statement carried no explicit Indian commitment on Russian oil, even as Washington claimed one.
• 20 Feb 2026 — the US Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA “reciprocal” tariff authority. On 24 February the US imposed a temporary 10% blanket tariff on all partners for 150 days, expiring 24 July 2026. As of mid-2026 the interim pact remained unsigned. Modi and Trump met at the G7 in France on 17 June 2026, their first meeting in over a year.

The hemispheric turn — NSS 2025

• The National Security Strategy (December 2025) named the Western Hemisphere the top priority and America’s “strategic rear”, reviving the Monroe Doctrine through a “Trump Corollary”; US actions over Venezuela and Greenland followed.
• India was named four times — against seven in 2022 and eight in 2017 — described as a Quad partner for balancing China. The 2026 National Defense Strategy made no mention of India or the Quad.
• India’s diversification — a trade agreement with the United Kingdom (July 2025); an FTA with the European Union announced (January 2026) alongside a security and defence partnership with the EU; Modi at the SCO summit (September 2025); Putin in Delhi (December 2025); and a renewed ten-year India–US defence framework (October 2025).

The argument — autonomy eroded or vindicated?

“India’s response to Trump 2.0 has been characterized less by strategic rupture than by tactical adjustment.”

Milan Vaishnav (ed.), Carnegie Endowment

“The key lesson for India from the recent downturn in relations with the United States is that it needs to develop a more proactive rather than passive approach towards its strategic autonomy.”

Chietigj Bajpaee

India · Israel

Overview

• A deep, expanding partnership built on shared democracy and pluralism and two knowledge-based economies.
• Michael Walzer, in The Paradox of Liberation (2015), observes that both India and Israel underwent similar transitions — beginning with secular nationalist movements that later gave way to religiously influenced ideologies.
• The 30th anniversary of full ties (from 1992) was marked with a commemorative logo pairing the Star of David and the Ashoka Chakra.

Evolution of India’s approach

• India recognised Israel in 1950 and allowed a Mumbai consulate, but withheld full ties until 1992 (established under P.V. Narasimha Rao), given anti-colonial alignment and Arab ties.
• Shift markers: President Pranab Mukherjee’s 2015 visit; Modi’s 2017 visit (the first by an Indian PM); Netanyahu’s reciprocal 2018 visit → widening the relationship beyond military cooperation into economy and technology.

Cooperation and divergence

Sectors of cooperation

• Energy — Israel’s Mediterranean gas reserves.
• Space — India has launched Israeli spy satellites; the alignment of Israel’s Beresheet and India’s Chandrayaan-2 programmes.
• Defence — Spyder missile, Barak-8, AWACS.
• Intelligence — RAW–Mossad counter-terrorism cooperation.
• Agriculture — dryland-farming and drip-irrigation know-how; 27 Centres of Excellence across 21 Indian states.

Points of divergence

• The Palestinian issue — support for self-determination and a two-state solution; UN votes critical of Israeli settlements (2016, 2018).
• Continued dealings with Iran and resistance to US-backed sanctions.
• Posture — India’s stress on peaceful coexistence and non-interference vs a more aggressive security posture (India sought a ceasefire in the 2014 Gaza conflict).
• Domestic politics — since the 1920s Khilafat movement, some nationalist opinion has read Palestine through an Islamic prism.

On Barak-8, its success has “emboldened the hopes … of both these countries in the field of defense research.”

Deeksha Singh

Current — the Special Strategic Partnership & Sudarshan Chakra

• Ties were elevated to a Special Strategic Partnership on 26 February 2026. India’s planned air-defence shield, Mission Sudarshan Chakra (announced 15 August 2025, with a 2035 target), draws on Israeli systems — MRSAM, SPYDER, Harop, Rampage and the Phalcon AWACS (Sukhbir Kaur Minhas, MP-IDSA); Kabir Taneja likens Israel to a one-stop shop for advanced military technology.
• The Gaza ceiling — the convergence still has limits. Taneja reports that even Israel’s admirers in India recoiled at the scale of destruction in Gaza and that New Delhi has privately conveyed concern; India declined Israeli requests to ban Hamas, citing legal grounds and a large domestic Muslim population.
• The Israel–Lebanon front — a November 2024 ceasefire followed the killing of Hassan Nasrallah and Hezbollah’s retreat north of the Litani; a US-brokered Framework Agreement in June 2026 opened the first direct Israel–Lebanon talks since 1983.

Beyond defence — connectivity and geo-economics

• IMEC links India to Europe via the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel — rail, road, port, energy and data — bypassing Suez as an alternative to the Belt and Road.
• I2U2 (India, Israel, UAE, US) broadens cooperation to water, energy, transport, space, health and food security. Sameena Hameed reads I2U2 and IMEC together as India’s shift from bilateral dealings to minilateral connectivity.
• India’s acquisition of Haifa Port gives a logistics foothold on IMEC’s Mediterranean end; Indian firms now run the Haifa container terminal once managed by China.
• Trade climbed from US$200 million (1992) to US$4.82 billion — India Israel’s seventh-largest trading partner and third-largest in Asia.

Assessment

Israel is “in many ways as perhaps our most trusted and innovative partner.”

S. Jaishankar (2021)

A “marriage made in heaven being implemented here on Earth.”

Benjamin Netanyahu

The idea of I2T2 — India’s talent and Israel’s technology — points to its future orientation; Vasudhaiv Kutumbakam in India mirrors ‘Tikun Olam’ (“heal the world”) in Israel. Kanchi Gupta cautions that India will not abandon its traditional support for Palestinian statehood — domestic politics and ideology still shape the policy.