Modi-Xi-Putin

By Poonam I Kaushish

Phew! India heaved a sigh of relief as an expanded BRICS concluded Sunday, but all eyes were on the piece de resistance: India-China-Russia triangle, exposing contradictions in our foreign policy: China, Russia and US may be strategic partners, competitors and occasional adversaries, but India needs all three.

The question isn’t: Is India playing three chessboards simultaneously or has Modi managed to get Xi closer? It is: Can India concurrently deepen ties with Russia and China while remaining strategically close to US and West?

And nowhere is this diplomatic tightrope more visible than in the extraordinary thaw between Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping. Seven years after his last bilateral visit, Xi is back in New Delhi. The optics are striking: Suddenly there are smiles and talk of normalization, reviving economic ties and ensuring differences don’t become disputes post Galwan confrontation 2020.

Xi now describes India-China as “partners, not rivals.” Really? This is where smiles must meet reality. The Modi-Xi embrace is not friendship suddenly rediscovered. It is strategic necessity and utility of each other rediscovered.

For Delhi, an adversarial Beijing is an expensive luxury. For China, a permanently hostile India is an inconvenient obstacle to its ambitions for a larger Global South and a more multi-polar world. India wants China stable because it doesn’t want a hostile northern neighbour while simultaneously managing Pakistan, Russia, US and a turbulent West Asia. Both countries have enough problems without adding another front to the list.

But the border issue remains unresolved. Diplomacy can thaw relations; it cannot redraw borders. Galwan left deep scars in New Delhi’s strategic thinking. Peace along LoAC remains the foundation for normalisation. Modi-Xi acknowledge need for a mutually acceptable boundary settlement, amidst talks on trade, connectivity and visas gather momentum. Flights have resumed, Kailash Mansarovar pilgrimage ongoing and institutional dialogue is being rebuilt.

Yet, economic relationship remains profoundly unequal. China is an enormous trading partner but India continues to run a massive trade deficit. Market access remains a sore point. Chinese support for Pakistan remains another.

So what is Modi buying into? Peace, perhaps. Normalisation, certainly. Trust? Don’t know. Because Beijing does not do sentimentality. Neither should Delhi.

Amidst this India’s oldest strategic partner Russia remains steadfast. Modi-Putin are pushing bilateral trade towards $100 billion by 2030. Russia is important for India’s energy and defence security. But it is tied to China. Consequently, the old India-Russia equation cannot be viewed in isolation from Moscow-Beijing relationship.

And then there’s Washington. India has invested heavily in its strategic partnership with US but relations are transactional and abrasive under Trump. Thereby, demonstrating limits of friendship when national interests collide. Meanwhile, Washington’s pressure over Russian oil makes India’s old strategic autonomy harder, not easier. Teaching an uncomfortable lesson: Strategic partnerships are not charity. They come with strategic expectations.

US wants India to be a counterweight to China. Russia wants India to resist Western pressure. China wants India to participate in a new multi-polar order without becoming an American ally. And India wants the right to be India. That is the essence of strategic autonomy.

And then there is Iran, the fourth corner of India’s diplomatic tightrope. Tehran is a strategic partner Delhi cannot casually discard: Connectivity through Chabahar gives India an important gateway to Afghanistan and Central Asia, while Iran’s geography matters to its wider West Asian interests.

Yet India’s deepening relationship with Israel and America sits uneasily alongside its traditional ties with Tehran. The Iran question therefore demands the same calibrated diplomacy: Engage without endorsing everything, cooperate without becoming captive and keep channels open even when Washington wants them closed. India cannot afford to choose between its geography and its geopolitics.

For decades, Delhi resisted being boxed into one camp. During Cold War it refused to become a member of either superpower bloc. Today, the vocabulary has changed, but instinct remains. Difference is today’s world is infinitely more complicated. America is India’s indispensable technology and investment partner. Russia remains deeply embedded in defence, energy and strategic cooperation. China is its largest strategic competitor and one of its important economic partners.

Undoubtedly, a diplomatic Rubik’s cube. Move one side and the others shift. For Modi, repairing relations with China does not mean abandoning America. Nor does maintaining Russia ties mean joining Moscow against West. India is attempting something more difficult: Extracting strategic space from competing great powers without becoming subordinate to any.

But it’s easier said than done. A rising India will be courted and pressured by all sides. Temptation for Washington is to see India through China’s lens. Beijing wants India to resist Western “containment”. Moscow wants India to remain a reliable strategic and energy partner. India wants the luxury of having everyone as a friend and nobody as an enemy. Geopolitics rarely offers such a generous bargain.

Hence, Delhi must resist becoming anybody’s proxy. This is where Modi’s diplomacy will be judged, not by number of hugs, handshakes or photographs, but whether India can turn its strategic autonomy into strategic advantage. The danger lies in allowing rhetoric of a “new world order” to turn into another confrontation. The world has suffered enough from choices.

India’s strength is its ability to talk to everybody. Modi can sit with Trump, Putin and Xi because he is not anybody’s satellite. But strategic autonomy is not the same as strategic ambiguity. It demands clarity about India’s red lines: Border with China, sovereignty, security and economic interests.

So, should India trust Xi? Trust is not the currency of geopolitics. Interests are. If China wants stable relations, let it demonstrate stability on the border. If Beijing wants deeper economic ties, let market access become reciprocal. If it wants India to believe they are partners not rivals, it must recognise partnership cannot coexist indefinitely with strategic coercion.

Modi, should remember a thaw is not a settlement. Smiles are welcome, dialogue is essential and economic engagement makes sense. But history has taught India one thing repeatedly: Never confuse warmth at a summit table with warmth on the border.

The old world demanded India chose sides. The emerging world offers something more valuable and dangerous: Freedom to choose its interests. Modi’s greatest foreign-policy test now is not keeping America close, Russia closer and China at bay. Its’ knowing when to embrace, bargain and say no. As in geopolitics, there are no permanent friends or permanent enemies. Only permanent interests.

India cannot afford to choose between its geography and its geopolitics. If China is our strategic competitor, Russia old strategic friend, America indispensable new partner and Iran its unavoidable West Asian interlocutor, New Delhi is juggling lots of balls. Drop one the consequences could travel beyond the diplomatic table. Hence, its tightrope walking all around with China, Russia and America pulling from different ends.

Undeniably, India’s moment has arrived, but so also the price of great-power politics. Modi can shake Xi’s hand, embrace Putin, partner with Washington and keep Tehran within reach but every handshake carries a calculation. The real test of Indian diplomacy is not how many camps it can straddle, but whether it can walk the tightrope without losing its balance, its interests or its strategic independence. In a world increasingly divided into camps, India’s greatest strength may be its refusal to belong to one. — INFA