Yves here. It really is remarkable to see Trump double down with his effort to bring India into submission. John Helmer some time ago described how the Russians had taken note of Trump’s propensity for violence and fostering of a personality cult. Even though Trump might make nice in private, it’s meaningless in light of actions like this.
By Andrew Korybko, a Moscow-based American political analyst who specializes in the global systemic transition to multipolarity in the New Cold War. He has a PhD from MGIMO, which is under the umbrella of the Russian Foreign Ministry. Originally published at his website
Trump finally went through with February’s threat to rescind his first term’s sanctions waiver for Iran’s Chabahar Port that was promulgated to help India aid Afghanistan’s reconstruction. That facility is partially run by India, which relies on it as the North-South Transport Corridor’s point of entry for connecting with the Central Asian Republics (CARs) and Russia. The US was hitherto pleased with India’s thrust into the CARs, however, since it was considered a gentle means of balancing Chinese influence.
Those calculations have since changed as a result of Trump’s fury at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s refusal to emulate the EU’s lopsided trade deal with the US by removing all or at least most tariffs on American imports. Revoking this waiver is meant to put India in a strategic dilemma. It can either defy the US’ anti-Iranian sanctions at the cost of secondary sanctions on top of the 50% tariffs he already imposed or comply with them at the expense of ceding influence in the CARs to China.
Coming amidst the nascent Sino-Indo rapprochement, the US’ goal appears to be to exacerbate Indian hawks’ threat assessment of China in the hopes that they’ll then persuade their leadership to capitulate to its demands, which would turn India into the US’ largest-ever vassal state. In parallel, Trump recently reaffirmed his goal of returning US troops to Afghanistan’s Bagram Airbase, which would reshape South Asian geopolitics by restoring Pakistan’s position as the US’ top regional ally due to its facilitation of this.
These back-to-back moves discomfit India and conform to fears that the US is hellbent on derailing its rise as a Great Power. The Chabahar sanctions waiver revocation could be a followed by the revocation of its S-400 sanctions waiver, some worry, while Pakistan’s restoration of its traditional status as the US’ top regional ally could see it purchase state-of-the-art American arms paid for by their shared Saudi ally. These credible scenarios could intensify the US’ attempted containment of India if they materialize.
Even if India capitulated to American demands to essentially become its largest-ever vassal state, however, the US-Pak rapprochement would probably remain on track since both have an interest in re-establishing their influence over Afghanistan. Returning troops to Bagram Airbase would enable the US to simultaneously threaten Russia, China, and Iran, while Pakistan could connect with the new TRIPP Corridor to turbocharge their shared Turkish ally’s regional influence at those three’s expense.
This insight reduces the chances that India will give into the US’ blackmail, which were already low even before these latest developments since removing all or at least most tariffs on American imports – especially agricultural ones – would spike unemployment and inevitably lead to socio-political unrest. Likewise, dumping Russian oil and arms (the official pretexts for Trump’s 50% tariffs) would make India dependent on the US, which could then “sell it out” to China as part of a “G2”/“Chimerica” grand deal.
The US is therefore expected to continue trying to subordinate India as a vassal. Whether it capitulates or resists, the outcome will be the same, and it’s that the US-Pak rapprochement would remain on track in order to tighten the containment noose around India all while all efforts are made to destabilize it from within by exploiting displeasure over the economy to provoke socio-political unrest. The US decided that India’s rise as a Great Power must be derailed and it’ll pursue this by all possible means.
It is important to remember the big picture – this is about forcing India to give up Russian oil.
No doubt the H1-B visa fee is related. But India is winning. Every day they resist, the Russians take more territory in Ukraine. Russia has the initiative across the front line, and all NATO can do is whine and have hysterical fits about incursions into Estonian airspace. Pokrovsk will fall by X-mas, and so will the rest of the Donbas by early winter 2026.
Time is of the essence, and Orange Julius is running out of it.
Isn’t it true that the USA cannot supply enough oil to India to meet its demand without raising domestic prices for Nat Gas and gasoline beyond affordability for most?
“Trump recently reaffirmed his goal of returning US troops to Afghanistan’s Bagram Airbase”
This is something that leaves me mystified. Does anybody think the USA could pull it off in practice, and does anybody take those swaggering pronouncements by Trump seriously?
I think the CIA sorely misses their opium income and wants to get that back.
I speculated to Rev Kev about how that desire could ebb and flow.
🛎️ 🛎️ 🛎️
A new word is needed for Trump’s verbal droppings.
Trumpism sounds too noble. Trumprhea?
It’s unclear why Korbykov grasps at Trumprheas (Baghram) to support his argument—it weakens the article. Vassal’s writing style demands all the talking points.
The US military today is not the US military of 2001, and it’s a multipolar world where Afghanistan’s Taliban has support from China and Russia. An “analyst” who is “trying to analyze” would recognize this (in the writing).
Hard to see the Indian-vassalization strategy working, particularly given China’s example, causing Trump to look for a weaker victim to bully.
For giggles, I asked Deepseek if it could have been the product of a large language model. Deepseek argued it was written by a human with an agenda. Ok, rather obvious.
It did acknowledge it could be easily produced by a LLM with slight human guidance, and argued that the “punchy terminology” (at least) is probably of human origin.
Ad for the origin it guessed one of three sources: niche geopolitical blog, or think tank, or influence operation.
Trumprolite?
Agree. He also glosses over the Chinese and Pakistan alliance by saying Pakistan will leverage the TRIPP to the detriment of China among other countries.
Yes, Pakistan has recently started forging closer ties with Turkiye but the Chinese alliance goes back decades. I highly doubt Pakistan would purposely make any moves that could jeopardize relations with China.
I’ve enjoyed Korbykov insights over the years, especially in regards to Russian foreign relations in South Asia. But lately his analysis comes off more as personal opinion with fairly weak evidence to back up his assertions.
Make sure to not insult him in his comments. He is as prickly as a cactus. Maybe because has some Polish traits?
Do they take Trump seriously? Very important point. Even very cool-headed, objective, diplomatic veterans like Alistair Crooke, can not help but openly laugh when asked a similar question on Judge Nap yesterday the laughter is at the 27:20 marker. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_urhZglaz4&ab_channel=JudgeNapolitano-JudgingFreedom
The tragic humor is available in spades, but it is tragic.
The Orange Emperor (a term used recently by Craig Murray, and a term I have used for a while now) has clearly lost his marbles. George Galloway used those very words on his Sunday MOATS show.
Scott Ritter has called the DT a “madman”. Andrei Martyanov has called DT insane and his discourse “gibberish”. John Helmer and other serious analysts have said similar things.
Is it time to admit the emperor has some serious mental-health issues? The mass media pretend not to notice, just like they covered for Genocide Joe’s obvious symptoms of dementia and cognitive issues.
I can’t see India agreeing to buckle down to US demands to become a vassal simply because the US has a laundry list of what they expect India to do for the US but without much in return. India can see how this is working out for the EU and if India followed US demands, it would cause internal chaos and would end further development of India’s advancement. India can be a volatile country and those demands would be enough to push India over the edge. The US may revoke permission for India to use Russian S-400s but since they were just in a recent war with Pakistan and the waiting list for the less effective Patriot batteries is several years long, India would have to tell the US to blow it.
In my opinion, India will soon kneel to USA. Modi’s visit to China had nothing to do with India moving closer to China it was merely a bluff aimed at the United States. But you don’t bluff USA with geopolitics, that was what many African countries did with Soviets and look what happen to them.The truth is, Indians love West, and their government is neoliberal at its core. They prefer India to remain as it is and have no real intention of partnering with China to develop the country.
I agree that Modi is just looking for photo ops to feed his domestic audience. But China isn’t exactly an ideal partner either. Forget the border issue. Just as an economic partner the relationship remains unbalanced. China is running out of external markets and instead of stimulating internal consumption just keeps looking for other large markets for export. And it’s not just India, South East Asian countries have a similar issue with China as Yves and other commentators have pointed out.
Also it’s not like China is very different than India with regards to the West. The Chinese still favor the West as a partner, wish to keep the existing unequal and oft derided Western made order intact (as do all of BRICS as alluded to an earlier article), and continue supporting Israel economically and are even profiting from building projects in the Occupied West Bank. Diplomatically they come off great with their platitudes about the shared future for humanity etc. but the reality so far has been quite different.
China is starting to master the art of saying one thing and doing another. Kissinger would be proud.
With the recent Trump discourse at the UN in mind, and all his previous actions including those mentioned here, it should be clear by now that becoming vassal of the US for a couple of bucks (or billions, trillions of the same) bears an unsurmountable price for everyone and won’t provide you any kind of guarantee that your vassal state will be further downgraded by the caprices of the superpower. Those who might be favourable to surrender to Trump demands here face themselves the very same threats and the argument to follow an unreliable empire is weakening by the day.
Who knows where all this idiocy will take us. Trump is bringing chaos at warp speed everywhere including the US of course.
Also it’s not like China is very different than India with regards to the West. The Chinese still favor the West as a partner, wish to keep the existing unequal and oft derided Western made order intact (as do all of BRICS as alluded to an earlier article),