USA, India and Pakistan

The way President Donald Trump is currently governing the United States and dealing with the world at large has resulted in a significant reorientation of its approach to South Asia, in particular to India and Pakistan. Pakistan was deeply involved in helping Washington reach an understanding with Iran. According to newspaper reports, Field Marshal Asim Munir was engaged in what is best described as shuttle diplomacy, traveling between Iran and the United States. He was also in touch with President Trump through the telephone. The role Munir played has resulted in a significant improvement in Washington's relations with Islamabad. This development has not pleased the rulers in New Delhi. The Washington-New Delhi relationship is also under pressure as the American leadership is working hard to ease tensions with the ruling elite in China. Also troubling the Indian leadership is the way the Americans are treating Indians living in the United States.

To deal with this situation, the Americans sent Secretary of State Marco Rubio to New Delhi. "The United States-India relationship has not lost any momentum," he said in a news conference in New Delhi on May 25, 2026. That was on the second day of his four-day visit to India. "The relationship continues to be strong." He explained that Trump's efforts to impose tariffs on Indian imports to the United States ¬— 50 per cent in the initial salvos in the summer of 2025 - were not aimed at India specifically but were part of a global effort to create balances of trade for the United States.

"There is a huge imbalance that's built up and needs to be addressed. This is not about India." According to Edward Wong writing for The New York Times, "the high tariffs came after Mr Modi refused to nominate the American President for a Nobel Peace Prize. Mr Trump has insisted that he played a crucial role in getting India and Pakistan to reach a ceasefire after each country carried out deadly military strikes against the other." Continued Wong: "Mr Trump's actions have upended more than two decades of US policy toward India. From the early 2000s until now, Republican and Democratic administrations, including Mr Trump's first one, sought to forge closer ties with India."

Rubio said that commercial partnerships between India and the United States were a cornerstone of their relationship which he called a "strategic alliance". Standing next to Rubio at the press conference was Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, the Indian Foreign Minister who said that "the Trump administration has been very forthright in putting forward its foreign policy as 'America First'. We have a view of 'India First'." When asked about ties between Washington and Islamabad, Rubio said, "I don't view our relationship with any country in the world as coming at the expense of strategic alliance with India." For many Indians, what is really troubling is Donald Trump's praise of Pakistani leaders who have been mediators in the Iran war. They also worry about close ties developing between Washington and Beijing. Early in the year, Trump went to Beijing for a two-day summit with Xi Jinping, the Chinese President.

In May, Trump posted a transcript from a right-wing podcast in which the host, Michael Savage, referred to China and India as "hellhole" places and said recent immigrants from these countries had not "integrated" into the United States as "European Americans" had. There is a growing sentiment in the United States that they would like to have the country remain white and Christian. The arrival of non-white people belonging to faiths other than Christianity was troubling a sizeable section of the American population. Without naming Donald Trump, the Indian government took the rare step of rebuking the White House on social media, calling the comments "obviously uninformed, inappropriate and in poor taste." While both were in France for the G7 meeting, they had a one-on-one meeting. Commenting on the meeting, several analysts said it might behove India to swallow its pride and be more flexible, mainly because it doesn't yet have the kind of leverage that China or the United States have to reshape the global economy. Despite the souring of relations on trade and geopolitics, the performative theatre of the two men - both strongman-style leaders - remains. In the middle of June, Trump congratulated Modi on becoming the longest-serving Prime Minister, having overtaken Jawaharlal Nehru, the country's first Prime Minister.

Indians are also concerned over recent anti-immigration moves by President Trump, and in particular new efforts aimed at broadly restricting legal immigration. The significant demographic changes in the West, including the United States, have resulted in reducing the size of the population. With this has come the aging of the population. The United States along with the countries of Western Europe needs young people to keep the local economies dynamic. The only way this can be done is to allow large immigration from the parts of the world where populations are large and young. This means admitting more people from Africa and South Asia. Demographic slide and increased immigration came up for discussion during the recent G7 meeting. The Group meets annually, going from one member country to another.

The G7 group is made up of large industrial economies. The members in alphabetical order are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. At one point G7 was G8 but Russia was expelled from membership when it invaded Ukraine. President Trump has tried hard to get Russia readmitted, but other members are not prepared to reverse their decision to exclude Moscow.

The group meets every year with the site of the meeting rotating among the members. While India is not a member of the group, the Indian Prime Minister was invited to attend the meeting as an observer. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was present at the meeting this time held in France on June 15 and 16, 2026. It was hosted by Emmanuel Macron, the French President. The most important item on the agenda was the US war in Iran.