As 2026 rolls in, the jauntiness and confidence in the country’s foreign policy on display just a year ago is nowhere in evidence. Then, Donald J Trump had been re-elected to a second term, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, egged on by his minister for external affairs with skin in the game, S Jaishankar, who had doubled down on centering India’s foreign policy on the United States and riding it’s coattails, felt they had hit jackpot. They acted as if Trump was the answer to their fervent prayers and they had four years to capitalise on the Howdy-doody spirit they hoped would propel bilateral relations to another level and pitch India into the big league. They plainly did not expect the cratering of ties that happened instead.
Op Sindoor was supposed to benchmark the convergence of interests. Of India and America reaffirming their interest in dealing squarely with terrorism in the process of stamping it out. Delhi had given Washington notice of the retaliatory action in the works for the ISI-managed Pahalgam massacre in April. Washington waited with interest. Except, Trump saw it as an easy occasion to claim a supernumerary role for himself as peacemaker in an operation Delhi had assured him would be so limited as to end before anything really started. And was genuinely surprised when the Modi regime in high dudgeon rejected any such role, putting a crick in his campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize —which Trump thought was his by right because his bête noire and predecessor, Barack Obama had won one in 2009 for doing even less!
But why was Trump surprised? Because he read Modi as another Third World hanger-on and anticipated he’d fall in line with the Trumpian charade of a great peacemaker let loose on an unwary world. The reaction to show Modi and India their place in his scheme of things swiftly followed. The foolish-sounding Asim Munir — replay his silly speech to a bunch of startled NRPs, comfortably settled in the West, getting an earful of jihad when all they sought was a photo op with the new Emir of Pakistan, suddenly was given audience at the White House he had been hankering for. Not to miss out on the main chance, he applied the grease on thickly for the gilded Trump to slide in on. And just as suddenly, Munir found himself anointed Trump’s man in S Asia and Pakistan as US’ go-to friend in the region. To fit his newly exalted station, he elevated himself to Field Marshal!
More importantly, Munir is now installed as the guardian of Trump Family’s billion dollar crypto interests and newly developed interest in that country’s gold and copper reserves in Reko Diq. Depending on how willing Trump is to protect his mining concessions, American secret forces — courtesy private armies run by Blackwater, a company controlled by Eric Prince, ex-US SEAL, for the Pentagon, will be deployed in Baluchistan and get into a fight with the hardy Baloch fighters, perhaps the doughtiest in the world. It’ll involve the Baloch gangs lording it over Karachi — these are not Dhurandhar fiction, turning fully against the intruder-invader Americans, and the facilitator Pakistani state, and then THE GAME will be on! Hopefully, India will have a say in what transpires. Because Russia and China will certainly be there and active, doing their utmost to make life immensely difficult for Washington, and putting the future of the state of Pakistan in serious jeopardy.
For the nonce, it has left Modi and Jaishankar baffled, seeing their foreign policy edifice of cards come crashing down around them. But, when in doubt, they reverted to what they consider safe — carrying on with the US on American terms. Thus, even as Trump has left Indian foreign policy in a shambles, Jaishankar continues with the country’s Indo-Pacific policy as Secretary of State Marco Rubio has decreed it as if nothing’s amiss, nothing has happened to push relations southward. It is Jaishankar’s touching belief in a policy of being more loyal than the king, nursing the fond hope that things will be back to normal. But when the new normal is less forgiving India should be more prepared, not less as is the case now.
Lacking any show of guts, will, and wiles by India, China is seemingly the master of all it surveys in Asia, daily offering not just Japan but also America provocations as an indecisive Trump recedes with tail between his legs, talking up a big ship navy one moment, and displaying readiness to cut a separate deal with Xi the next, leaving Delhi in particular up the proverbial creek.
Alas, these facts staring the Modi government in the face cannot be long ignored. Trumpian Washington has moved on from Modi, and India has to wean itself away from the chimeric comforts of a one-sided never-never relationship. The sooner it does so the better for the country and for Modi to save what face he is still left with. Rather than gear up for the challenge, the Indian government is choosing to show its rump to Beijing — more trade, more visas for Chinese businessmen, and more talk about more talks, as a gesture of submission.
Security Wise 
@BharatKarnad
Professor You argue that India’s excessive bet on a Trump-centric United States has backfired, with Washington now rehabilitating Pakistan and sidelining Delhi after Op Sindoor.
But given America’s long history of tactical swings toward Pakistan whenever immediate interests dictate, was this outcome truly the result of Modi Jaishankar miscalculation or was it structurally inevitable regardless of who governed India?
More importantly, if Trump’s ego politics and transactional instincts make any durable alignment illusory, what realistic strategic alternatives does India have in the near term?
Can genuine strategic autonomy be rebuilt without either drifting into Chinese economic accommodation or reverting to a weakened form of non-alignment—especially when both the US and China appear increasingly unreliable as long-term partners?
What a sad state of affairs, even with a government full of good intentions and good works to show. But as they say the path to disaster is laden with good intentions.
It is indeed easy to criticize not because the necessary is tough but because it required fortitude. Iterative and small reforms alone but not transformative ones necessarily leads to evolution of the economic and security ladders instead of leaps. An example is the latest bill on labor codes, A welcome step but did not go far enough to resolve two critical aspects. One of scale to let go of labor as business needs change and the other of not providing individuals the choice to manage their own retirement funds – necessarily invested into governments back again. IMO: An immoral use of hard earnings of employees.
Not having enough leverage and the inability to use the little leverage India does have against the US is telling. Both on its ability and willingness and India’s cards have shown very poorly.
The question now is where do we go from here? I personally would always want those transformations necessary (will not go into the laundry list but for those interested, please read “India’s Long Road” – Vijay Joshi on economics and of course Bharat Karnad on security) But instead, there is the embedded belief on pigging on the white man’s shoulder, a mental colonization that continues to fester and block an independent path coupled with a strange embrace of the worst that western political systems have to offer applied in stranger ways to stifle our own population.
At a certain level, Trump should be thanked for he exposed the janus faced international system for what it truly was – One rooted in hard real power politics. Will India finally rise to meet the challenge?
On that depressing note, Happy New Year and may Shri Hanuman provide to India the courage to do the needful.
@BharatKarnad Is it true that Asim Munir’s wife and their children are now US citizens?
If yes, does this make him beholden to Trump and the USA and thereby him and by extension Pakistan vulnerable to manipulation by them?
That’s what is rumoured
@BharatKarnad If any New Year is to be good for India, it will be only when India learns to stand-up for itself, stops taking things lying down and starts doing to others [both good and bad] what others do to it.
@BharatKarnad Why is it that India has never targeted the ISI and the ISPR when these two are equally responsible for the problems created for India by Pakistan?
All intel agencies target each other. But some have advantages others don’t. Like the CIA has the green card
@BharatKarnad I think I didn’t make my comment about India targeting ISI and ISPR clearly.
What I meant was, I think during Operation Sindoor, we, India targeted Islamabad, so, why didn’t we target the ISI HQ which is said to be in Islamabad’s Aabpara area [and we, India should have targeted their Parliament in Islamabad too, even, if it was a retaliation after 24 years for the 2001 attack on our Parliament]?
Similarly, during Operation Sindoor, if we, India targeted the Pakistani Army GHQ in Rawalpindi, what stopped us, India from targeting the ISPR [whose HQ is said to be in Rawalpindi]?
We could have done this, targeted that. But we did nothing of note by way of followup
@V.Ganesh
India gains more by exposing and isolating ISI’s terror infrastructure quietly while Pakistan increasingly suffers blowback from the very jihad ecosystem it built.
Strategic restraint here isn’t weakness; it’s calculated statecraft
And BTW all intel agencies target each other as sir said. If you ask the pakistani decision makers they say that RAW is responsible for insurgencies in balochistan and sindh
@V.Ganesh
Even if India struck islamabad/Rawalpindi during Operation Sindoor, there’s a crucial distinction between signalling strikes and decapitation strikes.
First of all we are not sure whether ISI HQ are at Aabpara and ISPR HQ or whatever it is these are political strategic nerve centres, not battlefield enablers. Hitting them or Parliament would cross from retaliation into state-to-state war, forcing Pakistan to respond symmetrically and internationally framing India as escalating against sovereign institutions.
GHQ-related targeting (if any) would have been calibrated and limited, meant to signal vulnerability not to dismantle command or propaganda arms.
India’s doctrine has been: punish,deter and signal
@AdityaMishra When it comes to dealing with enemies of India, irrespective of whether it is Pakistan, China or any other nation, India shouldn’t differentiate between the respective targets there. I believe these/the nation concerned there as a whole are targets in themselves.
Not just this, India’s retaliation or response, even when initiated by India on its own should be overwhelming/disproportionate.
Obliteration of the enemy should be the aim.
Regarding international views, India should live its life as a nation for itself and not live based on what the world says and thinks about India.
Because, in the end/at the end of the day, India has to look after itself, fight its war[s] and deal with its enemies on its own.
@BharatKarnad Would you consider this https://www.theweek.in/news/defence/2025/12/31/indian-army-to-be-worlds-first-to-use-ramjet-powered-155-mm-artillery-shells.html to be a good way for India to start the New Year of 2026 and truly Atma Nirbhar Bharat?
Yes
When the fault is with us, why are we looking at Lord Hanuman to help us? PM Modi is in his 11th year. He wasted all his time fighting imaginary battles with Babur, Aurangazeb, playing the role of a poojari in the Ram Temple ceremony and later claimed he is not biological. Shall we test that?
Modi met Gen Secy Xi Jinping a record 11 times, yet he could not size him up. In the Corps Commanders’ Conference held in his first term, he advised Army Commanders” now is not the time of war, but we need to be ready to fight terrorism.” The PM gave this advice to this country which has border disputes on both its Eastern and Western borders”
We belong in BRICS. We live in South Asia . Even China said India had a rough year in 2025 and quickly added, he (Trump) didn’t spare them either till they found leverage (in supplying rare earths) Russia is willing to transfer technology with the source code for the SU-57E. The new engine 177 is ready and being flight tested. They want to form a JV with India to manufacture civilian aircraft including the engines!
India will only buy Rafales. France is officially bankrupt. The Russians have developed a whole family engines which can be used to upgrade SU-30 MKI. Their hypersonic missiles are unmatched but we will buy Rafale only whether it works or not paying inflated prices, all the while dreaming of the good time you had with French girls on your factory visit to France!
@BharatKarnad I don’t know what good it does for India to exchange the list of its nuclear installations at the beginning of a new year with Pakistan every year, https://www.mea.gov.in/press-releases.htm?dtl/38877/India+and+Pakistan+exchange+list+of+Nuclear+Installations
This too should be stopped including all ties with Pakistan.
@V.Ganesh
Confidence building measure. That we shall not attack certain sites in a conflict.
but the fact is no nation gives a fk about such rules
@NuclearGeneral I think more than Confidence-Building Measures [CBM], these are Chaos-Building Measures [CBM].
The late Rajiv Gandhi and the then-GOI headed by him as the PM in his and their wisdom, started this, but, it doesn’t mean that Narendra Modi and the GOI headed by him now should continue this.
I’m of the firm belief that India shouldn’t have any relationship with nations inimical to it, in this case, Pakistan.
Therefore, such annual exchanges of lists of nuclear installations is a wild goose chase.
And on top of it, it incentivises enemies of India like Pakistan and China, that such things can expected to be continued with India, even while they harm India in other ways.
Happy New Year Professor
In my viewpoint the ship will shink by 2035 with all the radicalisation unleased in Hindu, Muslim and Sikh communities . The weaponisation of radicalistaion by means of terrorism has been successful for Indian muslim and sikh community whereas Hindu radicalisation seems to be in full swing , the next step being some foreign intelligence agency exploiting and arming it to create new terror outfits within next 5 years.
It is Specialisation of ISI to spread terror by religion ; IM,SIMI,Lashkar,Babbar khalsa whereas RAW has taken the approach of regional communalism ; LTTE , baloch or fiji .
I would quote Nehru “post-dated cheque drawn on a crashing bank ” , for this country with increasing communal divisions day in day out . Personally ,only goal this year is to move for masters to israel , if lord blesses everything will work out .
“Post-dated cheque” is MK Gandhi’s phrase Uttered with regard to Stafford Cripps’ offer during WW2 of dominion status to india
My bad , still idea/dream of developed India seems to be a post dated cheque .
we can see around India people are still subjects and not citizens , they don’t understand their responsibilities towards the nation or their inherent rights, because freedom was received in alms.
In China the citizens fought but still found themselves in a ditch with politico-bureacrats overlords(CCP) exploiting them.
All of these things points towards the fundamental weakness in modern Eastern/oriental philosophy: to be non-participatory and passive, which can be seen what happened all these years named strategic silence or what jaishankar and his cohorts are doing now. There seems to be more hope for decisiveness from religions zealots like yogi adityanath
which course and uni in Israel are you applying to ?
i am also interested but given the Israel gaza situation not sure whether their economy is doing well.
Cybersecurity and AI devops
@AdityaMishra I want India to not have any kind of relationship with Pakistan and China.
India should be giving them tit-for-tat, so that both know the immediate consequences/retaliation of everything that they to India.
@BharatKarnad
professor what are your views on the recent ongoing US air force strikes on venezuela.
Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves and it will be getting getting american democracy and freedom as per the present situation
Gerald r ford aircraft carrier armada has surrounded the helpless nation.Chinook helicopters are flying over the capital and american boots and special forces are on ground.
and the bloody hypocricy of this country to act as the “dada” of the world
would like to know your views
@BharatKarnad
https://x.com/i/status/2007382604065251620
And the american military has succesfully abducted the President of Venezuela and his wife and have flown them out of the country.
That is how you do it , Deep strike an enemy and capture its leadership
Jaishankar is sucking up to even Bangladesh .At the end of the day the buck stops with Modi he is the one who appointed Jaishankar and if he is still persisting with this foolish policy of sucking upto Washington than its Modi who is responsible.
If Modi is not able to leverage our strategic location & market access than who can help.Maybe Modi should watch Putin and learn instead of giving him stupid advice about futility of war.What a fall for a nation rooted in the Bhagavad Gita, where Krishna imparts divine wisdom on a battlefield and urges Arjuna to fight even his own blood, yet today hesitates in the face of conflict.
Surely US, China are no brotherly countries than why the hesitation