THERE are no permanent friends, only permanent interests, in geopolitics. And today, those interests have forced India to make the most consequential choice in decades: to bow before Beijing鈥檚 economic and strategic dominance, and to distance itself from an increasingly hostile Washington. What began as a cautious re-balancing in late 2024 has now hardened into a reality. India has no other option but to accept China鈥檚 upper hand.
For years, India managed to walk a diplomatic tightrope, maintaining cordial ties with Washington while keeping an uneasy peace with Beijing. That balancing act has now been jolted by the unpredictability of US policy under president Donald Trump. What was once a cautious partnership with the United States has begun to feel like a liability.
The flashpoint came when Trump, irritated by India鈥檚 continued purchase of Russian oil and commodities, decided to impose a 25 per cent tariff on Indian goods in July, followed, astonishingly, by an additional 25 per cent just a month later. For New Delhi, the message was unmistakable: defiance would be punished; loyalty would not be rewarded. This was not a trade policy. It was economic coercion.
India鈥檚 leaders did the maths. They understood that while tariffs could be dialled up at a moment鈥檚 notice, supply chains take years to rebuild. The United States was turning into a moving target, transactional, erratic and no longer the reliable strategic partner it had been billed as. A country that had invested decades in cultivating US ties suddenly found itself treated no differently than America鈥檚 adversaries.
It was not always this way. Since the end of the cold war, India had drawn steadily closer to Washington, sharing concern about China鈥檚 rise and Beijing鈥檚 aggressive posturing along the disputed Himalayan border. The 2020 Galwan Valley clash, when Chinese and Indian soldiers engaged in a deadly hand-to-hand combat, cemented this alignment. India banned more than 300 Chinese apps, restricted Chinese investment and slowed down cross-border exchanges. The mood was one of confrontation, not conciliation.
But history teaches that animosity is not immutable. In October 2024, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi met Chinese president Xi Jinping for the first time in five years. The meeting did not erase memories of Galwan, but it did mark the start of a thaw. Chinese authorities reopened pilgrimage routes, restored tourist visas and restarted limited civil-society exchanges. Indian troops quietly resumed patrols along certain contested stretches of the border.
This was not a sentimental embrace. It was a calculated risk. China controls roughly 60 per cent of global electronics manufacturing, a reality India cannot ignore if it intends to become the world鈥檚 third-largest economy. Indian companies had already lost an estimated $15 billion from supply disruption caused by post-Galwan restrictions. Completely cutting Beijing out of the equation was economically suicidal.
Western commentators call this 鈥榗aving in.鈥� In reality, it is surrendered under economic duress. The United States has not only failed to shield India from harm, it has also become the source of that harm. Tariffs, threats of secondary sanctions over Russian energy import and humiliating comparisons between India and Pakistan have shattered the illusion of partnership.
At some point, the realisation dawned: Washington was not going to treat India as an indispensable partner, but as another pawn in its great power competition with China. That left New Delhi with two options 鈥� clinging to an increasingly capricious ally or re-calibrating towards a more predictable, if still adversarial, China.
Predictability is not to be underestimated in geopolitics. The US-China rivalry may dominate headlines, but Beijing鈥檚 behaviour towards India has certain constants. It may press its territorial claims, but it does so within a framework of calculated escalation. China is not prone to the kind of sudden, whiplash-inducing policy swings that Trump has made a routine. For Indian planners, that matters.
India鈥檚 pivot is also informed by a longer historical memory. In 1971, during Bangladesh鈥檚 independence war, Washington sided openly with Pakistan, sending the USS Enterprise to the Bay of Bengal in an ill-fated attempt to intimidate India. The lesson was clear: the American support could vanish the moment its global priorities shifted. Fast forward to today and that same suspicion is back, fuelled by a US foreign policy that appears increasingly driven by short-term political theatre rather than long-term strategic commitments.
To be sure, the India-China relationship remains deeply asymmetrical. China鈥檚 economy is five times larger. Its military is more technologically advanced. The Himalayan border remains tense and mutual suspicion runs deep. But for New Delhi, the goal is not to embrace Beijing, but to manage the relationship in a way that buys time to strengthen domestic manufacturing, secure energy supplies and diversify economic partnerships beyond the binary choice of Washington or Beijing.
In practical terms, symbolic gestures now replace confrontation. Reopening pilgrimage routes, resuming cultural exchanges and keeping military tensions low are all steps towards a grudging coexistence. This means quietly aligning with China鈥檚 economic agenda while avoiding direct challenges to its strategic ambitions.
Meanwhile, India can still quietly deepen ties with other regional players such as Japan, Australia and ASEAN states that share concern about China鈥檚 ambitions but are equally wary of becoming dependent on an erratic United States. This is strategic autonomy in action: hedging bets, keeping options open and refusing to be anyone鈥檚 client state.
The larger point is this: alliances today come with fewer guarantees than at any point since the cold war. The United States is locked in a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine and is bankrolling Israel鈥檚 military campaign in the Middle East. Its diplomatic bandwidth is stretched thin. Its willingness to impose punitive measures, even on friendly nations, suggests that Washington now views foreign policy less as a system of mutual commitments and more as a series of transactional deals.
For India, the pivot towards China is not an ideological statement. It is a recognition that in a global chess game. Survival depends on flexibility. Yield when it costs little, stand firm when it matters and always keep one鈥檚 own national interest at the center of the board.
In the new great game of Asia, India鈥檚 handshake with the dragon is not one of equals, it is but a handshake of necessity, from a weaker power to a stronger one. Washington has made this surrender inevitable. The test lies in how high Beijing is willing to take this relationship.
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MA Hossain is a political and defence analyst.
