The US-Indian negotiations at the highest level held on February 13-14, 2025, in Washington notably deepened the strategic partnership of the two countries and raised relations to a new and more advanced level.
It is notable that Modi was also among the first to have a telephone conversation with the US president-elect after his inauguration and confirmed his coming visit. On the eve of his arrival in the United States, on the side-lines of an artificial intelligence summit in Paris, he met with Vice President J. D. Vance. Having arrived in Washington, he first spoke with Tulsi Gabbard, the director of US national intelligence, Michael Waltz, the president’s national security adviser, billionaire Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, a major entrepreneur of Indian origin.
Agenda of the negotiations
As expected, the agenda of the summit itself turned out to be extensive and covered a diverse range of topics, from tariff, trade, economic and migration issues to military-technical, atomic, nuclear, scientific-technological and strategic foreign policy cooperation.
When discussing mutual trade, Trump expressed concern about the significant imbalance in favour of India, which amounts to more than $30 billion, with the total trade turnover amounting to about $120 billion. Washington is dissatisfied with the clearly excessive Indian tariffs on numerous US goods, reaching 70% or more, which negatively affects US export. Trump welcomed the reduction of these tariffs and said that the US would take into account these steps of the Indian government in its tariff policy. In general, the parties agreed to reduce duties and tariffs on Indian and US goods and to ease policy in this area overall. The mutual flexibility shown essentially made it possible to avoid a tariff war and the corresponding pressure from the United States.
Following discussions, a very ambitious, but quite realistic, goal was set, namely to increase the volume of bilateral trade and bring it to $500 billion by 2030. Along with the expansion of the range of US goods supplied to India, Washington expressed its readiness to become the main supplier to the Indian oil and LNG market, thus mainly displacing Russia and Iran. Such American plans directly affect Russian interests, as India is now the second-largest importer of Russian oil (up to 40%, as a result of which the trade turnover between the two countries is approaching a record $70 billion).
During the negotiations, another ambitious American plan to create one of the largest trade routes through many countries from India to the United States, connecting partners with ports, railways and underwater cables, was discussed. It is clear that such a new large-scale logistics route is being developed by the Americans as an alternative to the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative. New Delhi, however, agreed to the US plans and expressed its readiness to actively contribute to their implementation.
On military-technical and energy cooperation
Along with the emphasis on expanding the trade and economic aspects of bilateral cooperation, Washington persistently emphasised the need for a significant increase in military-technical and defence partnership. The Americans are clearly dissatisfied with the fact that their share of military equipment and weapons supplied to India is only about 12%, while Russia’s is about 40% (by the way, there was a time when Russian military supplies to India exceeded 70%). This situation is the result of New Delhi’s policy of diversifying foreign arms purchases, and in addition to Russia, India actively cooperates in this sphere with the United States, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Israel and others.
Following the summit, the leaders agreed on the joint production in India of Javelin anti-tank missile systems, Stryker armoured personnel carriers and components for F-16 fighter jets with a view to concluding a contract for the supply of upgraded F-21s, as well as the purchase of an additional six Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, engines for jet fighters and a large the number of modern drones. The Americans are also making efforts to sell new-generation F-35 fighter jets to India, likely instead of the Russian Su-57E. However, the Indians have not yet made a decision on this issue and everything will be determined as a result of planned tenders.
The next area discussed at the White House was cooperation in the nuclear, technological and energy fields. Washington has expressed its willingness to aid India more actively in developing nuclear technologies. It was agreed to cooperate in the field of small modular (nuclear) reactors, localisation of the production of US nuclear reactors in India and possible technology transfer, as well as on a number of other nuclear energy projects.
Illegal Indian migrants will be deported to India
Along with the difficult issues of trade, economic, tariff and defence issues, Trump raised his favourite topic of combating illegal migration in talks with Modi. At the same time, the US president, in a friendly manner, tried to eliminate disagreements on the matter and smooth out the subject. It must be said that he succeeded in doing so, and the Indian Prime Minister was sympathetic, including to the deportation of numerous illegal Indian migrants back to India, the number of whom settled in the United States, according to some reports, is about 700,000 people. According to this indicator, India ranks third among foreign illegal migrants after Mexico and El Salvador. The wisdom of Modi, who decided not to bicker with Trump on this issue, which is sensitive for India, and managed to handle the situation, is applaudable.
Considering the growing number of Indian specialists and engineers coming to the United States, a bilateral agreement was signed during the visit – at the initiative of New Delhi – to liberalise the visa regime between the countries and thereby facilitate the stay of qualified personnel from India who have found work in the United States.
Issues of global and regional politics were significant during the negotiations. In addition to the situation in the Middle East, taking into account the interest shown by the Indian Prime Minister, Trump focused on assessments of the situation in Afghanistan, Pakistan and especially in Bangladesh. At the same time, he noted that the United States, so to say, has nothing to do with last year’s events in the country and takes a neutral stand. The US President also touched upon the normalisation of Indian-Chinese relations and confirmed his readiness to assist in the settlement of territorial problems between the two countries. Having thanked his counterpart, Modi politely replied that New Delhi prefers to resolve issues with its neighbours, including China, on its own and on a bilateral basis. When discussing the Ukrainian issue, the Indian leader welcomed Donald Trump’s determination to contribute to the soon end to the conflict in Ukraine and reaffirmed New Delhi’s commitment to resolving the situation through negotiations and peaceful means.
Donald Trump did not fail to address the issues of strengthening security in the Indo-Pacific region, emphasising the importance of activating the QUAD format, a quadrilateral dialogue platform with the participation of the United States, Australia, Japan and India. Delhi will host the next QUAD summit this year and, unlike some, is not inclined to consider this format a kind of military or allied association – just like its participation in BRICS and SCO. New Delhi is also opposed to attempts to give the activities of the Pacific foursome an anti-Chinese orientation and to involve it in a confrontation with Beijing. It is clear that Washington is not happy with this position of New Delhi, as well as its active participation in BRICS and SCO, as well as its constant policy of strengthening special ties with Russia.
Such is the outcome of the highly successful US-India summit, which significantly advanced the entire range of bilateral relations. However, this circumstance is unlikely to affect the main distinguishing feature of Indian foreign policy, i.e. its independence, multi-vector nature and its rejection of any pressure and attempts to destabilise on the neutral status of this powerful global power.
Anvar Azimov, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, PhD in History, Senior Research Fellow at the Eurasian Studies Institute of MGIMO
