Can India Trust Trump’s America Again? US-India Ties Face New Strain | The Hard Facts | News18

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]Viewers, US Ambassador to India Sergio Go and his friend US Secretary of State are attempting the impossible.

[00:00:09]Convincing a fallank of suspicious Delhi foreign policy mandarins that DC is serious about its renewed outreach to India. The convincing is required because Washington has treated its supposed natural ally as it refers to India with unprecedented condescension verging viewers on disdain. At the lowest point of the relationship, Rubio's deputy Christopher Landau raised eyebrows by remarking a few months ago that the US will not willingly pave the way for India to emerge as another economic competitor that could later rival American industries.

[00:00:53]Now with the less than effusive nature of India's reaction to the overtures being made by Rubio and Gore, the duo perhaps realizing that their diplomatic administrations were going to get them nowhere. They literally phoned in their trump card at a packed Bharat Mandapam event to celebrate America's 250th birth anniversary. The cavernous hall crackled with Trump's voice as God held up the phone to the microphone to broadcast the US president's live message. Silver tonged Trump did not disappoint. He praised Modi saying quote I love the prime minister. Prime Minister Modi is great. He's my friend. Unquote before describing India US ties as stronger than ever before. assuring that Delhi, assuring all of Delhi that it can count on him 100%.

[00:01:52]Yes, viewers, that's what he said.

[00:01:54]Listen in.

[00:01:57]>> I just got a call from a special guest who's on the line.

[00:02:02]>> Can you hear us, Mr. President?

[00:02:05]>> I can't hear you. I love India. I love India. So, I know you're there and I hope you're making a good speech. You have to be representative of our country. Sir, I just want to say hello to everybody. I love the prime minister, my friend. And I just want to say I'm very very to everybody. It's morning here and it's evening represent everybody. Enjoy your evening and it's an honor to talk and say hello to Prime Minister Mod and let him know I'm a big fan.

[00:02:40]>> Thank you, sir. Have a great day. Thank you. We appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you.

[00:02:46]>> While Trump's praise and guarantees are to be welcomed, Delhi needn't get swept up by the proclamations. Instead, it should judge Trump singularly by his actions. And here's what DC needs to do.

[00:02:58]Commit the quad summit instead of deprioritizing the grouping meant to balance China in the Indoacific. As of now, Trump hasn't indicated that he is in any hurry to attend a summit level conversation of the quad.

[00:03:14]Then there is of course the Pakistan question. The Trump administration needs to stop hyphenating India and Pakistan.

[00:03:22]Constantly heaping lavish praise on both Shabbash Sharif and General Ashimir and extending major concessions to Pakistan sends the wrong signal. We can run all those graphics on your screens, viewers.

[00:03:35]It'll give you an idea of what he needs to be doing. Besides viewers, the third point, the US under Trump needs to respect India's long-standing position against equivalence with Pakistan.

[00:03:49]Unfortunately, Trump's line during operation Synindhur reinforced precisely that equivalence. Trump needs to recognize India's energy compulsions.

[00:03:59]Trump says India is buying quote massive amounts of oil from Russia unquote and financing Putin's war. But India has consistently argued energy security requires diversified sourcing during a war it did not start.

[00:04:15]Trump needs to understand this and back off from stopping India's Russian or Iranian oil purchases. While Trump has moved beyond the tariff king rhetoric, thankfully used primarily to demonize India, he has not signaled any intent to gouge out a deal that places India on the same pedestal as other allies like Japan and the United Kingdom. Viewers, as I said, Donald Trump really needs to be walking the talk. Otherwise viewers, it's empty rhetoric which amounts to very little as far as India is concerned.

[00:04:58]Till the US stops being a difficult, insensitive and transactional partner at odds with India's core interests, it cannot be trusted 100%. And that's viewers the bottom line. Maybe there are people who will disagree with me. Let's open this up. Let's have a honest and open conversation tonight with people who have great insight. Susan Sarin, senior fellow of the RF is here with us. We also have Jeffrey Ross Gunter, former United States ambassador to Iceland.

[00:05:33]Brahma Cheni, strategic affairs expert.

[00:05:37]And viewers, we have with us Dr. Anan Ranganatan.

[00:05:41]So let me begin first with the former US ambassador to Iceland, Mr. Gunter. Mr. Gunter, thank you very much for joining us. Um, the fundamental question, yes, Donald Trump has said the right things, but can he be trusted? Can India actually count on his support 100%.

[00:06:06]Well, first of all, thank you for having me on your panel with your esteemed guests. And I would be remiss if I didn't mention the great sacrifices the American military in our Memorial Day that we're celebrating uh here in the United States. But remember, they were fighting for America, but also they were preserving democracy. And that is exactly what America and India are bound together by our great belief in democracy. If you're concerned about President Trump being 100% for India, why don't you focus a little bit more on Russia? Is Putin 100% for India? Why don't you focus on China? You've had a skirmish at the border with them and great disagreements with China for a very long time. President Trump named Ambassador Sergio Gore, I would say, and without a doubt, one of the most influential ambassadors we've seen, and this includes Trump 1.0, which I was a part of, including Trump 2.0. He um you're looking at Secretary Rubio who's probably the greatest Secretary of State we've ever had. And where are they right now? They're in India, not rebuilding, building upon a phenomenal relationship.

[00:07:10]And I've said all along, President Trump has great respect for your great Prime Minister Modi. He's actually an individual who's incredibly responsible for bringing India further and higher on the international stage where you are a superpower, you are an influence in the region. And I think it's phenomenal. And I agree, the Quad is an important element and I'm sure President Trump will get to it. But right now, he's navigating Iran, the greatest state sponsor of terror. And there are good things to happen in the relationship.

[00:07:37]We've talked about a 500 billion dollar deal. There's more to come with military cooperation, maritime cooperation, um you know, various technology uh things going on and a reset of the tariff relationship. So, it's reciprocal this time around. So, there's great things happening. I think it doesn't really fit the narrative that oh there's trouble in the relationship between India and America. Americans love India, India loves America. Just look when our great vice president JD Vance came to India. So there's great things going on guys. Let's celebrate it. Let's not beat it down. We don't have to beat the negative drum here. There's all great things and uh there's not great things going on Iran. There's not great things going on in Russia. And there's certainly not great things going on in China.

[00:08:21]>> Let me open this up further. Let's bring in Kenneth R. Weinstein, American foreign policy expert and former president of the Hudson Institute. Thank you, sir. Thank you very much for joining us. Mr. Stein, Mr. Weinstein, simple question.

[00:08:36]Can India once again take Trump at face value? Trump has come out and said that you can trust me 100%.

[00:08:46]Yes, we've had some wrinkles in the relationship, but he's indicating that we need to put them all behind us because we're rebooting, reloading this relationship. As I said, can we take him at face value?

[00:09:00]>> I think you can. Look, this is a very critical relationship for the president.

[00:09:05]He has sent the secretary of state who just spending four days in India. That's a big trip for the secretary of state.

[00:09:12]It's a big trip uh amidst the international turmoil that we see u in Europe obviously uh the war in Iran.

[00:09:20]That's a big commitment of time from a secretary of state who almost never leaves the president's side as both the secretary of state and the national security adviser. So this is a big sign that the administration takes India very seriously wants the relationship uh to be back where it was and I think that uh we're going to see some very positive steps not only out of this visit but out of further uh upcoming relations between the two countries. So I I am optimistic and uh I get the sense that uh this is high on the president's agenda given the importance he has ascribed to sending the secretary of state national security adviser for such a long trip.

[00:09:58]>> Brahma Cheleni where do you come in on this?

[00:10:03]The relationship with the US remains vital to Indian interests and for the US the relationship with India is central to a stable Asian power balance and given the deterioration in the relationship which began under Biden and has accelerated under Trump. Rubio's visit can be seen as an effort to repair the damage.

[00:10:26]The US and India may be partners on the global stage, but I think the lofty talk about US India strategic convergence should not obscure two profound developments that have unfolded.

[00:10:39]The first is America's cold commercial bargaining with India.

[00:10:44]The trade war against India that Trump launched last year was more than just a trade related dispute. It was a political signal that India is now viewed less by Washington as a strategic partner and more as an economic rival to be constrained. After all, didn't the US Deputy Secretary of State recently warned from Indian soil that the US quote unquote will not allow India's market to grow so large that India can compete with the US in the future as an economic rival?

[00:11:18]And and this shift is underscored by Trump's latest national security strategy which unlike its 2017 predecessor barely mentions India or the Quad. In fact, it frames the relationship with New Delhi in narrowly transactional terms of quote unquote improving commercial relations. This is the only reference to India in the national security strategy report.

[00:11:46]And the second development is that although the US and India may be partners on the global stage, their interests in India's own neighborhood are increasingly at odds.

[00:11:59]This became apparent in the last two years of the Biden administration.

[00:12:04]We all know what happened in Bangladesh.

[00:12:06]how Mouhammad Ununus was parachuted to take over the reigns of power in Bangladesh which resulted both in Bangladesh's slide into Islamist chaos and a sharp deteration in its relations with India >> in Myanmar which is an important and large neighbor of India Biden imposed hard sanctions and supplied quote unquote non-lethal military aid to help topple the military regime there >> now despite the spillover effects of on India's internal security. The Trump administration has largely kept the Biden era, Bangladesh and Myanmar policies and Washington's current Pakistan policy is a throwback to the cold war era. You know, you mentioned Pakistan, but there's also the shift in the US policy on China under Trump.

[00:12:59]>> Okay. We saw we saw during his visit to Beijing uh recently you know in Beijing he adopted a a strikingly differential uh posture towards China. The shift has been from confrontation to selective accommodation of China. So uh he has moved closer to both of India's regional adversaries. And then there was a recent remarks by in Kathmandu by the US assistant secretary of state for South Asia and Central Asia Samir Paul Kapoor who in a way pointed to an overshift in US policy saying that a primary US objective is to >> prevent the dominance of any single power in South Asia. In other words, in India's own strategic backyard, the US is seeking to prevent the dominance of any single power which is which means India's India's clout in India's backyard.

[00:14:01]>> Okay. So, so you believe that fundamentally this relationship has very few touch points of convergence at least in the in the immediate. That's what you're suggesting. Okay. Okay, let me let me >> No, I'm not I'm not I'm not suggesting that there are only a few um areas of convergence. The areas of convergence are several. The problems the problems are twofold. The divergences on on two fundamental issues uh looking at India as a potential economic rival, >> right?

[00:14:33]>> And two being at odds with India's interests in India's own strategic backyard.

[00:14:41]Okay, let me just widen this up even further. Susan Serin, why don't you weigh in? We have also with us Mr. Kougalman and Dr. Anan Ranganatan. Yes, Susan Serin, over to you.

[00:14:52]So, Rahul, when you say should we take President Trump at face value, I want to know which face you are talking about because his face keeps changing every second day, right? And we really don't know which face we are dealing with at what point of time. That is a that is a significant problem. He says one thing one day, another thing another day. And frankly speaking, I'm beyond this business of you know going or being swayed by sweet nothings and sweet words being said by somebody. We have to see what are the hard actions taking place on ground. What exactly uh are the things that we are doing together? How exactly are we able to help each other out? And on that I think that over the last year and a half uh or so uh things have deteriorated alarmingly. Uh frankly there's very little trust in the United States among many of us. Uh and frankly that is also being reflected by public perception. We've just done a survey in RF a youth survey. the US which had about 83 84% uh you know uh positive perceptions two years back is down to 56% and this is last year's thing is 56% 25 I suspect 26 will be even lower and that is not a good thing to happen because if the young people in India now do not look positively at the US which we have done at a time when the US had negative perceptions all over the world I think one of the one few countries ries which had amazingly uh positive perceptions of the US was India and today you've destroyed that relationship as well. So clearly there are problems at that level. Secondly, I think some of the steps which the Americans are taking, they seem to be directed at us.

[00:16:37]uh whether it's on the oil purchases, whether it's on our energy security, whe whether it's on a range of other issues and there is an element uh of bullying uh that as long as you can bully India and get something out of it and there is this acquisitive behavior among the Americans this very power kind of an attitude that grab whatever you can but give nothing in the past it was not as though the Americans were always a very benign power but it was a much more equal kind of a thing that bell the Americans got something out of you and you got something out of them. Now it's not now it's a one-way street. I don't see how this can survive for very long and that's that's going to become a serious problem. Again when Brahma and Brahma is right that there are enormous areas of convergences but I think those areas of divergences are going to be deal breakers because those are very very critical areas for India whether it's our national security our our our regional security if you're going to be propping up regimes like the one which you had in Bangladesh which was which was giving a free hand to the most despicable jihadist terrorists and releasing them from jail. If that is how you are going to promote democracy in Bangladesh or you are going to promote better relationship India and the United States, I don't see how it works or for that matter if you are going to be molly coddling a terrorist state like Pakistan. I don't see how that works for us. It does not it does not work in our favor. It's not in our national interest. It's not in our national security. And if you're not even sensitive to that, then I don't see how we can, you know, talk about all the other big big stuff because I don't I I have a trust deficit now. How do I how can I trust you when I can't trust you in my neighborhood? How the hell do I trust you on China? How the hell do I trust you on a range of other issues?

[00:18:28]>> So, I think that is a deal breakaker and we really need to fix that if we want to put this relationship back on the rates.

[00:18:35]>> Mr. Gun, let me just quickly bring you in for 30 seconds. uh Susan Serin says that look if you're going to prop up Pakistan that becomes a bit of a problem. It's a deal breaker. I think he's sort of making a bit of an understatement but the way the Trump regime has bent over backward to basically facilitate and uh normalize these ties and facilitate uh the person who orchestrates terror attacks on Indian soil. It's a bit like perhaps um the US engaging Iran at the cost of an Israeli veto.

[00:19:15]That's that's what we're looking at here.

[00:19:18]How do we then square that? How do we square that?

[00:19:22]>> It's two words. It's called the Abraham Accords. It's called peace in the Middle East. If you look at President Trump's latest comments, we are looking to bring a broad broad coalition of countries into the existing Abraham Accords which Kurtley has four or five countries.

[00:19:39]Imagine the benefit the benefit that India will have when we have multiple countries including Pakistan signing the Abraham Accords and having vast peace in the Middle East. That will pay huge dividends for India. India will be a beneficiary of that. So you watch and see what happens when we have peace in the Middle East. We have countries that we never sought. The Saudis, Pakistan, Turkey signing on to the Abraham Accords. The beneficiary will be India.

[00:20:09]The beneficiary will be your great prime minister Modi. But most importantly, the beneficiary will be the Indian people with peace in the Middle East. So sit tight. These are all temporary blips and they will lead to greatness for both countries.

[00:20:21]>> What viewers, Mr. Gunther is trying to tell us is that if Pakistan and all these other Middle Eastern countries sign on to the Abraham Accords, they will be forced to basically validate and recognize Israel. However, what he hasn't told you is in that same >> no bringing peace in the Middle East.

[00:20:40]Let's quote me properly. I'm saying the Abraham Accords will bring peace to the Middle East. This is not exclusively about Israel.

[00:20:47]>> Yeah. Okay. But that would require for a number of countries to recognize the state of Israel and that could be problematic. Now what he hasn't told you is that in that statement that Mr. Trump has released he said there will be two or three countries that we can make an exception for. Basically viewers it could well be that Pakistan will say we don't want to join these Abraham Accords. Pakistan viewers doesn't recognize Israel and then Trump is okay with that. So we'll create another exception for whom viewers for Pakistan.

[00:21:23]But India says that look we have to buy Russian oil because you people have started a war somewhere. There are no exceptions. We get slapped with a sanction. That's the kind of equivalence viewers that is being drawn here. And that's the reason why India has this basic problem of trusting DC under Trump and some people would say it goes back to Biden but I don't want to jump in there. Uh Dr. Ranganatan very quickly and Mr. Krugman. Yes. Uh good evening Rahul and good evening to my fellow panelists all of whom are experts so I speak here purely as a lay man. When you talk of trusting Donald Trump I would trust Trump as much as you would trust Dracula at a blood donation camp. What are we talking about here? Look at how he's dealt with us over the past, leave alone one year, the last 6 months. Do friends slap unfair, hypocritical, selective tariffs, especially on account of us buying buying Russian energy when America, Europe, and China have been buying more Russian oil and energy than India. But he did not slap 25% tariffs on them. He slapped it on us. Do friends do that? Number two, do do friends selectively restrict H1B visa knowing that it is going to hurt Indians a friend most? Do friends call us hell hole, hole or whatever other expletive is called dead economy? You can go wherever you want. I don't care.

[00:22:57]And number third, do friends entertain at their home an arch enemy of India who's just perpetrated one of the most dastardly terror attacks?

[00:23:08]Friends don't do that. But here is the thing. I actually like this because we don't want Trump as friend. What Trump has done is opened our eyes and eyes of every country around the world that let all countries be transactional in nature. This friend was bit propped up to begin with when we said that Arab neighbors were all Arab countries are our friends. We saw what happened in 1971. Each one of them with the exception of Ira Iraq actually ditched us sided with Pakistan. It was only Israel that we considered an enemy that actually came to our rescue. So who are friends? Who are enemies? In my layman's estimate, I think Trump has done us a favor. We do not and should not consider Trump as a friend. we should consider America as purely transactional and because he's been made to sit at a stool at the high chair in China, he's come running to India hoping that he'll get some crumbs. Well, we might give some to him, but at the same time, let us not be under any illusion that Trump is our friend.

[00:24:08]>> Okay, Mr. Kubelman, let me bring you in.

[00:24:10]Let's for a moment believe that Marco Rubio is here to repair quote unquote repair this relationship. Reboot it, reload it, call it what you want to.

[00:24:20]Have DC and Delhi after this conversation been able to close the gap?

[00:24:30]>> Uh well the the short answer is no. Um and when I was with you uh on the show the other day, I indicated that you know the relationship has stabilized a bit uh given how bad the tensions were in previous months. Um but there's still a lot of work to do and I think that um your your Indian guests here have laid out uh ju just how deep the the challenges are. Uh whether we're talking about the Pakistan question or whether we're talking about the issue of Trump's unpredictability, you know, those are not issues that could be fixed so to speak with one visit from uh from the Secretary of State. So I think that it's important to acknowledge that. And I would also note that um there might be a disconnect I think in terms of how Washington or I should say how official Washington how the Trump administration and perhaps some analysts in Washington view the challenges and how they're viewed in India when it comes to this relationship. I think that uh in Washington there's a tendency to maybe not understand just how significant the challenges remain uh and perhaps not recognizing just how deep the tensions had been some months ago and perhaps believing that it will be easier than it actually will be to repair the rift or the rifts uh in in the relationship. So every you know there have been elements of what we heard from both our American and Indian guests have been accurate.

[00:25:47]There's there's a lot of reason to be optimism. There are ample convergences in the relationship. things have improved but significant significant uh trust gaps and I hate to use the term trust gap. It sounds like a cliche but I think that's the proper way to express the uh the reality and the trust gap is mainly coming from the Indian side less so from the American side. I think as I said before there's a view in Washington that things are going to be okay with India. We understand each other. Um so that's that's a bit of an issue and again to get to your question this this trip alone by Rubio to India even though it's a longer trip than expected uh than than typical for these types of cases that's not going to solve um the issues that's not going to solve the the the major problems ahead but you know to leave it on a positive note I do think things are better now uh than they were some months ago and you know this has been noted by myself and others we do have a US ambassador in India that seems to genu genuinely want to repair this relationship. He wants to make the relationship um work again. So the fact that he's injected a positive tone into the relationship, that's very important.

[00:26:51]You know, we don't hear the criticism, the harsh criticism from the White House directed at India's economy at its quote unquote fueling the uh the Russian war.

[00:26:59]That's good. That's an improvement and I think we can credit Gore for those changes.

[00:27:04]>> Yeah, Gore has brought a huge change. He is a change agent. I described him as one in a piece that I wrote. But I need to ask you this, Mr. Kelman.

[00:27:13]Why are ties better? Is it because the Americans themselves find themselves a little isolated, a little friendless?

[00:27:21]>> Well, I mean, there was a trade deal.

[00:27:23]The tra it's a bit unclear what's going to come of that because of the Supreme Court decisions and and other factors, but the trade deal, I think, was a confidence building measure. I mean, it lowered uh as you know, it reduced tariffs for India significantly. As I said before, the tone of the relationship has changed. The fact that you don't hear this relentless criticism from the White House directed at India anymore, that's an improvement. Though, of course, there have been some exceptions such as what was mentioned before about the post that Trump put out there. And I think that Gore himself has has improved the relationship. I mean, even if that doesn't address the trust gap completely, I mean, he's been very engaged. He's been meeting with with uh interlocators across the board, not just in New Delhi, but across uh India, meeting with with leaders uh with with chief ministers and so on in the states.

[00:28:06]So, I think that's all um important, but again, I don't want to sugarcoat this.

[00:28:11]There there's a lot of work that still has to be done, and it might not be done. It might not be possible to repair this relationship before the end of the Trump administration. I do think that once we have an election in the United States, whoever the next leader is, whether it's Marco Rubio or a Democrat or another Republican or whatever the case might be, I think we will see some significant reversions to the norm, so to speak, because I think that these challenges the relationship faces are you can be uniquely attributed to the uh the vagaries of of the president himself and this aggressively transactional approach and and so on. So, I think that things could change, but it might take they have to wait until the the change the next change of government in the United States to see this relationship truly regain its footing.

[00:28:52]>> Mr. Weinstein, before I wrap this up, I want to hear your point of view because you've been a champion of the relationship and you believe that we're on a more solid track. So, I'm going to ask you a couple of questions. Why would President Trump engage so deeply with Pakistan, put it on such a big pedestal and bring it into a kind of uh sphere where perhaps it doesn't deserve to be.

[00:29:27]Well, I think the president has a sense that there's something to be gained from a tighter relationship with Pakistan.

[00:29:35]This went back to his friendship with Imran Khan in his first term which led to tensions with India then. Uh it also there were obviously tensions in India when the administration floated the notion of withdrawing from Afghanistan.

[00:29:48]Uh way back uh something that Biden did and did in a awful haphazard manner that Trump would never have done. It would have been much more focused and uh orderly. Bottom line is the president believes there's something to be gotten out of it and he seems to believe in particular in the relationship with uh trying to resolve the situation in Iran that Pakistan is a is a useful ch channel. Uh there are a number of us who are deeply skeptical of that I should note and we'll see where that ends up.

[00:30:16]uh and at the same time should be noted though Pakistan and Afghanistan have been having massive tensions which is something that uh strategists in India including those close to Prime Minister Modi would not have predicted uh when the criticism came down of when the president had the idea of withdrawing from Afghanistan. So uh we'll see where things go but I think it is certainly paradoxical and the president enjoys popularity in Pakistan that uh one would not have guessed uh at the beginning of this term. Certainly >> right. Thank you very much gentlemen.

[00:30:50]Thank you very much for putting this into perspective for us viewers. You've heard a plethora of views and I leave it to you to frame an opinion on what you've heard. But uh I think we can all agree on one small point that sometimes it's best to let actions speak louder than words. I leave it to that viewers.