Did Trump just push India into China's arms?

Not long ago, the United States cultivated India as a potential bulwark against China. Then President Donald Trump imposed 50% tariffs on Indian goods as retaliation for that country’s purchases of Russian oil. Now, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is meeting this weekend with Chinese leader Xi Jinping amid signs of warming relations between the Asian rivals.

That improvement was "spurred on in no small part by Trump's global trade war," said The Washington Post. Modi is one of 20 world leaders — including Russia's Vladimir Putin and Iran's Masoud Pezeshkian — who will attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting. But the Indian leader's appearance particularly "underscores the way Trump's approach has alienated some friends" who, until recently, had a "warm diplomatic and trade relationship" with America.

Trump is the "great peacemaker" who deserves "all the credit" for the possibility of a China-India alliance, said Ashley Tellis of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace to The Times of India. The tariffs "due to India's Russia oil purchases" are "causing considerable distress" to Modi's government. India and China have a history of fractiousness, but "Trump is a good incentive" for both countries to put aside their differences, said Antara Ghosal Singh at the Observer Research Foundation.

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What did the commentators say?

Trump has "dealt a heavy blow to efforts" by American leaders to align with India against "Chinese domination of the Indo-Pacific," said the Financial Times editorial board. During his first term in 2020, Trump told a crowd that "America will always be faithful and loyal friends to the Indian people." But his "U-turn" will help Beijing "portray itself as a more reliable international interlocutor," said the Times. India and China are "unlikely partners" who will need "nimble footwork" to make their relationship last. But Trump's stumble is clear. "By alienating its friends, Washington is playing into Beijing's hands."

A burgeoning "Russia-India-China alliance" is "unlikely to endure," said Karishma Vaswani at Bloomberg. There are "inherent tensions" in the India-China relationship that make a solid partnership difficult. One of the biggest sticking points is their "long-running border dispute" in the Himalayan region. Those disputes have caused bloody clashes in the past and the "risk of future standoffs can't be discounted." The partnership could "unravel" if "American pressure diminishes."

Trump's actions "may have accelerated the Sino-Indian engagement," but the process was already underway, said Harsh V. Pant at Time. The two countries reached a deal in October to "de-escalate tensions" along the border. That makes Trump a "marginal" factor in this weekend's meeting, which may be less than meets the eye: "There have been too many false starts in the past."

What next?

The Xi-Modi summit is "unlikely to usher in a fundamental realignment," said CNN. The big test is whether the meeting translates into "de-escalation on the ground" at the border. If that happens, the two countries can look forward to a "more stable relationship, where competition isn't necessarily over, but conflict is at bay," said Tanvi Madan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.