'Trump won't budge' : US says Russia-Ukraine conflict is 'Modi's war'

TOI correspondent from Washington: The Trump administration on Wednesday ramped up attacks on India for buying Russian oil, with the President's Trade counselor Peter Navarro characterizing the Russia-Ukraine conflict as "Modi's war," and cautioning New Delhi about getting close to Beijing and Moscow.

Separately, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent doubled down on the stand-off, saying if New Delhi does not budge, "then I don't think President Trump will either."

Hours after Washington's punitive 50 percent tariff on most imports from India kicked in at Tuesday midnight, Navarro told Bloomberg TV that it is "real easy" for New Delhi to get the 25 percent penalty removed if it stops buying Russian oil, but India was being "arrogant" in not making that choice and insisting it was their sovereign right to buy Russian oil.

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"India, you're the biggest democracy in the world, okay? Act like one... side with the democracies...(instead) you're getting in bed with the authoritarians," Navarro said, eyeing the camera and seeming to address New Delhi. He reminded India that it had been in a "quiet war' with China for decades and they had "invaded Aksai Chin and all your territory "

"These are not your friends folks, okay? And the Russians. I mean, come on!" Navarro scoffed, amid some fervid reports in the western media about India, Russia, and China getting into a clinch at the SCO meeting in Tianjin, China later this week.


The gathering has clearly annoyed, if not unnerved Washington, with many analysts warning that the Trump White House playing hardball with New Delhi on the tariff issue is simply pushing it closer to China and Russia, although the SCO meeting was planned well before the precipitous trade spat with India. An increasingly isolated US has itself been happy to summit with Russia and has been pawing the ground for a meeting with China while wanting India to have an adversarial relationship with both.

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Navarro laced his comments with praise for Modi ("a great leader) and India ("a mature democracy with intelligent people running it"), but maintained it was wrong in buying Russian oil, making his familiar -- and largely discredited -- case that revenues from India purchase is fueling what he dubbed as "Modi's war." When the anchor corrected him saying "you mean Putin's war," Navarro insisted it was "Modi's war."

Widely regarded as an outlier in trade policy circles, Navarro's thesis that India is funding Russia's war has been trashed by sections of the US commentariat, which has questioned why Trump is not punishing China and the European Union, which buy large quantities of Russian energy, and instead is squeezing an ally like India. The US itself buys Russian nuclear fuel and precious metals that, by the Trump administration's logic, is funding Moscow.

Navarro himself once implicitly conceded the US could not punish China because it had leverage. Trump has treated Putin with such reverence that he's been called a Russian stooge by some US commentators, inviting the US President's ire because he regards them as warmongers seeking constant strife, not peace, with Moscow.

Indian partisans deconstructed Navarro's thesis on social media, pointing out that it was the US and European countries that have fueled the war by attempting to draft Ukraine into NATO and then going on to arm Kiev. They also called out Navarro's claim that US taxpayers are having to foot the bill for Ukraine's defence to counter India's purported funding of Russia, pointing out that the US is selling arms to Ukraine via Europe, and not giving it as aid or charity.

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