Nikki Haley warned the Trump administration’s relations with India are at a critical point, stressing the need to strengthen ties to counter China.
Former US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley has warned that the Donald Trump administration’s ties with India are at a “troubling inflexion point”, cautioning against allowing trade tensions to derail a partnership critical to countering China.
In an opinion piece along with Bill Drexel, a fellow at the Hudson Institute, for Newsweek, Nikki Haley wrote that strengthening relations with India is vital to America’s Asia strategy, warning that “scuttling 25 years of momentum with the only country that can serve as a counterweight to Chinese dominance in Asia would be a “strategic disaster”.
US President Donald Trump on August 6 signed an executive order imposing an additional 25 per cent tariff on imports from India, in response to India “directly or indirectly” importing oil from Russia. This is over and above the 25 per cent tariff on Indian imports that Trump approved on July 31.
What Nikki Haley wrote: 5 key takeaways
- Tariff tensions: Nikki Haley criticised the Trump administration’s 25 per cent tariff threat on Indian goods and Russian oil imports, calling it counterproductive. “Trump is right to target India’s massive Russian oil purchases,” she noted, but warned that treating India like an adversary instead of a partner would be “a massive—and preventable—mistake.”
- India versus China: Haley argued that India must not be bracketed with Beijing. “India must be treated like the prized free and democratic partner that it is—not an adversary like China,” Haley wrote, pointing out that China has escaped similar sanctions despite being a top buyer of Russian oil.
- Strategic importance: On supply chains, Haley stressed on India’s scale and potential: “India stands alone in its potential to manufacture at China-like scale for products that can’t be quickly or efficiently produced here, like textiles, inexpensive phones, and solar panels.”
- Defence and security ties: The former US envoy to the United Nations underlined India’s growing role in global security, saying its expanding defence cooperation with the US and allies makes it “a crucial asset to the free world’s security”.
