Trump 2.0 has unsettled many of the assumptions that shaped India’s strategic choices over the past two decades. As tariffs, US–Pakistan engagement, questions over America’s regional role, and the intensifying China challenge reshape the strategic landscape, India’s policy community is divided over whether the country should de-Americanise its grand strategy or continue working closely with Washington while charting an independent course. Here is a selection of views from across the strategic community.
India must ‘de-Americanise’ its grand strategy
“Our trouble is that while we kept our own counsel in the backyard, we borrowed Washington’s eyes for the wider world, and for China above all…It is the borrowed sight that is now failing… The lesson is simple: we must stop needing a patron to make our strategic calls, whichever patron it happens to be, whether the Soviet Union once, the United States now, or another power in future”.
Happymon Jacob, India’s World, 22 June 2026.
“A much more mercenary US—worried about its own relative decline—won’t have the bandwidth or patience to provide the stable international order needed for India’s rise, much less ensure global public goods such as a stable financial system, freedom of navigation or security umbrella that great power aspirants rely upon”.
Sreemoy Talukdar, Firstpost, 27 June 2026.
“The US now views India less as a strategic partner to be nurtured than as a regional and economic rival to be contained… India can no longer count on its close relationship with the US to sustain its influence across South Asia and beyond.”
Brahma Chellaney, Project Syndicate, 3 June 2026.
“Trump’s coercive tariffs and warnings over de-dollarisation in BRICS have made India compliant…Strategic autonomy is indeed in need of a reset…To become a Viksit Bharat, India must play a more proactive role and truly avoid bowing to anyone”.
Maj Gen Ashok K. Mehta (Retd), The Pioneer, 27 May, 2026.
The answer is not de-Americanisation but strategic self-definition
“Where I agree is that India should think with Indian eyes. No major power can outsource its worldview to another country. Where I disagree is the suggestion that India merely ‘borrowed’ America’s China threat perception…The real lesson is neither to adopt Washington’s view of China nor Beijing’s view of America. It is to begin with India’s interests…The answer is not de-Americanisation. It is strategic self-definition”.
Amb. Nirupama Rao, X (formerly Twitter), 23 June, 2026.
“India confronts a different but equally durable set of contradictions…This is why the logic of India–US strategic cooperation is likely to outlast periodic fluctuations in either country’s policy toward China. Neither a G-2 between Washington and Beijing nor a reset between New Delhi and Beijing can eliminate the structural interests that draw India and the United States together”.
C. Raja Mohan, Foreign Policy, 1 July 2026.
“Despite all that is being said about the United States, one will be very clear that America remains the fastest growing economy in the world…It will be impossible for us to grow at very high rates without penetrating the US economy. All countries in the world which grew rapidly, Japan, Korea, China, all did it by collaborative partnership with the US. So our FTA with the US is critical. But that FTA has to be a win-win for both India and the US.
Amitabh Kant, Moneycontrol.com, 21 July 2026.
“Capacity is fundamental to Strategic Autonomy. But, till we build the same, we have to be close to one of the two—USA or China… Strategic Cunning may be a good resort for now.”
Lt Gen Raj Shukla (Retd), X (formerly Twitter), 25 June 2026.
