For a man who claims to “tell it like it is”, Donald Trump seems remarkably incapable of deciding what India actually is.
One week, India is apparently some dystopian “hellhole”, a convenient punching bag in America’s endless culture wars. The next, Trump is dialling into a glitzy diplomatic event in New Delhi declaring he “loves India” and “loves Modi”, while assuring Indians they can “count on me 100 per cent”.
Trump’s latest performance at the US Embassy’s Independence Day event in Delhi was classic Trumpian theatre. The flattery was overflowing. India and the United States had “never been closer”. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was suddenly a “great friend”. India could supposedly get “anything it wants”.
Remarkable turnaround for a man who only weeks earlier amplified rhetoric describing India in grotesque terms while ranting about immigrants and birthright citizenship. India’s ministry of external affairs described those remarks as “uninformed, inappropriate and in poor taste.”
And rightly so.
Because here lies the core problem with Trump’s approach to India: it is entirely transactional, emotionally impulsive and built around applause lines rather than policy consistency.
President Trump called me tonight. He had a clear message: “𝐈 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐌𝐨𝐝𝐢. 𝐖𝐞’𝐯𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐨 𝐈𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐚. 𝐈’𝐦 𝐚 𝐛𝐢𝐠, 𝐛𝐢𝐠 𝐟𝐚𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐌𝐨𝐝𝐢…” pic.twitter.com/jJBLhKdZhL
— Ambassador Sergio Gor (@USAmbIndia) May 24, 2026
India, in Trump’s worldview, oscillates between indispensable partner and disposable prop depending on the audience in front of him. When he wants to woo strategic allies against China, India becomes the world’s largest democracy, a civilisational ally and a trusted Indo-Pacific partner. When he wants to energise sections of his anti-immigration base, India abruptly morphs into a caricature deployed for cheap outrage.
And when he wants to posture as the global strongman, out comes the tariff bludgeon.
Trump has repeatedly threatened India with punitive trade measures, including the extraordinary proposal of imposing tariffs of up to 50 per cent on countries buying Russian oil.
Never mind that India’s energy purchases are driven by economic necessity and national interest. Never mind that Europe itself spent years funding Moscow through vastly larger energy imports before discovering moral outrage after Ukraine.
For Trump, nuance is irrelevant. Everything is leverage. Everything is coercion. Diplomacy, in his world, resembles a protection racket dressed up as foreign policy.
The hypocrisy is staggering.
Washington lectures India about strategic alignment while simultaneously threatening economic punishment if New Delhi refuses to obey American geopolitical preferences.
It demands India act as a sovereign counterweight to China, but reacts with fury the moment India behaves like an actually sovereign power pursuing its own interests.
This is the imperial reflex that much of the Global South has grown tired of. America speaks the language of partnership but often defaults to the instincts of dominance.
And Trump strips away even the pretence.
There is no doctrine here. No coherent worldview. Only performance.
What makes this especially absurd is that Washington simultaneously keeps reminding the world how vital India supposedly is.
Senior American officials continue to court New Delhi on defence, technology, trade and Indo-Pacific strategy. Yet Trump’s own rhetoric periodically detonates that carefully constructed diplomacy like a bulldozer driven through a glass showroom.
It exposes the uncomfortable truth many in Delhi already understand but rarely say openly: America’s India policy increasingly survives despite Trump’s antics, not because of them.
Personal chemistry between Trump and Modi, however theatrically marketed, cannot substitute for reliability. International relationships are not reality television friendships. Nations do not run on compliments shouted over embassy speakerphones.
Today Trump says he “loves India”. Tomorrow, if domestic politics demands it, he could just as easily repost another tirade portraying Indians as economic invaders ruining America. Or threaten punishing tariffs because India refuses to fall in line with Washington’s sanctions agenda. Both versions of Trump are politically useful to him.
This endless flip-flop also reveals something deeper about modern American politics.
India is no longer viewed consistently as a sovereign strategic actor. It is increasingly dragged into America’s own internal identity wars. Indian professionals become targets in immigration debates. Indian trade practices become campaign slogans. India itself becomes a rhetorical prop that can be praised at a diplomatic banquet and insulted in a social media frenzy within the same news cycle.
And yet Washington expects New Delhi to interpret all this as mature global leadership.
The irony is almost comical.
Trump wants the prestige of a strong India partnership without the discipline required to sustain one. He wants the optics of statesmanship while indulging the impulses of a talk-radio provocateur. He wants Modi photo-ops and MAGA applause at the same time, even when those objectives collide head-on.
But major powers notice inconsistency. India certainly does.
New Delhi has learned over decades that American foreign policy often swings wildly with electoral moods. Trump merely amplifies that instability into spectacle. One moment he is offering bear hugs and praise. The next he is circulating insults and threatening tariff punishment that force Indian diplomats into public rebukes.
Perhaps Trump believes that old adage that public memory is very short.
But India, like the elephant it is so often portrayed as, doesn’t forget so easily.
