Through a landmark agreement, America once again had to eat humble pie, which appears to have become the new normal for Washington.
This time it is over a humble, yet critically important hydrocarbon resource—diesel.
The Diesel Agreement
In a landmark supply agreement, the American administration has argued that Russia will be supplying the US and other countries with over 300,000 tonnes of diesel, another 500,000 tonnes in November, and one million tonnes immediately thereafter. Over and above that, Russia will be supplying another three million tonnes of diesel within a short span of time.
The rationale Uncle Sam provided was to not only relieve pressure from the global oil markets but to also bring about a semblance of calm as far as Washington’s frayed relations with Moscow are concerned. But when read between the lines, it becomes discernible that America’s real concerns lie elsewhere.
For Americans, diesel is highly important. It is not only used in cars, but also in long-haul trucks, construction equipment, agricultural machinery and other heavy industrial equipment. In that context, given that the price of this hydrocarbon has risen to $6.5 per gallon, the ordinary American consumer is experiencing the economic pain from the Trump administration’s faraway misadventures.
Therefore, to prevent the sinking of the political fortunes of the Republican Party in the upcoming mid-term elections where all seats of the US House of Representatives and 35 seats of the Senate go to polls, Trump is making a desperate bid to salvage his already tanking reputation.
This brings us to another key issue that America seems to be dismally failing at—diplomacy.
How not to conduct diplomacy
Diplomacy can be defined as the process of negotiating with different actors to resolve a knotty issue, finding a mutually acceptable solution so that it can lead to a win-win situation for the sides involved. But it appears that the world’s “oldest democracy” has forgotten how to conduct diplomacy.
For a country that boasts of one of the world’s most “robust diplomatic corps”, the nature of their recent actions is reflective of how not to conduct diplomacy. The particular matter in question is Washington’s step-motherly treatment of New Delhi. While Washington considers India to be a “valued strategic partner”, its actions are increasingly alienating India.
Despite knowing that Delhi is dependent on oil imports to meet its energy needs and that it holds a truly special relationship with Moscow, Washington unfairly blamed India for the ongoing conflict in Eurasia. Instead of holding the diabolical neo-Nazi regime of Ukraine to account for its blatant violation of Russian sovereignty and endangering the Black Sea region, Washington sought to impose pressure on New Delhi via the imposition of sanctions on Russian state-owned oil companies and then pass the controversial Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Iran and Russia Act, 2026 that empowers Washington to impose tariffs of up to 100% on countries that buy oil from these two countries.
In his second term in office, Trump has managed to tear asunder the relationship previous American administrations had worked on cultivating. This further sends a message to all like-minded countries that you simply cannot trust Washington to keep its promises and be a good partner.
Ultimately, the supply agreement with Moscow exposes a glaring geopolitical truth for Washington: braggadocio works well only on the campaign trail, but it collapses the moment it confronts physical reality. By threatening allies like India with punitive tariffs on one hand, while aggressively cutting supply lines with Russia on the other, Washington has weaponized diplomacy into an instrument of coercion. But hubris has a punitive cost. As the midterm elections loom large and elevated fuel prices squeeze the economic life out of the ordinary American voter, Uncle Sam has been forced to swallow a humble pie of its own making.
Pranay Kumar Shome, a research analyst who is a PhD candidate at Mahatma Gandhi Central University, Bihar, India
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