The TRUMP doctrine meets Modi’s multialignment
The economic posture of Donald Trump is often described as chaotic, transactional, and irrational. In reality, it is not random. It follows a recognizable pattern: governance without diplomacy, leverage without reassurance, and pressure tactics as policy tools.
That character can be captured in five letters. For the United States under Trump and for India under Modi, the framework looks like this:
Taken together, these pairs reveal two distinct governing philosophies.
One prioritizes domestic leverage and short-term transactional advantage. The other emphasizes steady transformation, institutional reform, and long-term global credibility.
Trump’s approach has quietly complicated relations with key strategic partners, including India. Under Narendra Modi, India has instead accelerated diversification toward Europe, Russia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and multilateral groupings such as BRICS.
Ironically, policies meant to project American strength are encouraging partners to depend less on Washington. For example, Trump’s demand for Greenland and pointing an economic or military cannon at friendly governments in Europe have left foreign governments wondering if Washington may no longer be a dependable partner.
T — Tariffs | Transform
Tariffs have become Trump’s primary instrument of negotiation. They are weaponized rather than deployed surgically — imposed quickly, lifted conditionally, and often reintroduced. If the intent is to raise costs to force concessions, it has not worked well.
But for trading partners, tariffs injected friction into what should be stable commercial relationships. Instead of planning for growth, companies had to confront volatility. With tariffs inducing anxiety for the Indian exporters, from steel and auto components to pharmaceuticals and digital services, market access became contingent on politics and not sound policy.
India’s response has not been retaliation, but transformation: upgrading manufacturing, investing in digital public infrastructure, expanding domestic capacity, and broadening markets.
The stark reality: tariffs coercing change externally led India to build strength internally.
R — Reshoring | Reform
If tariffs are the tool, reshoring is the objective. Trump always argued that supply chains must return home, framing overseas production as vulnerable. The implicit message is that what benefits partners harms the United States.
This logic clashed with today’s U.S.–India relationship. Trump’s White House ignored that the new India is not merely a low-cost production site. It is a technology and talent engine, a pharmaceutical backbone, a services powerhouse, and a strategic Indo-Pacific partner.
The U.S.’s reshoring led to contraction rather than collaboration.
India’s answer has been reform: tax modernization, infrastructure expansion, logistics upgrades, manufacturing incentives, and digital governance. The goal is not only Atmanirbhar Bharat but to increasingly become indispensable to global supply chains.
While Reshoring pulled America inward, Reform prepared India to move outward.
U — Uncertainty | Uplift
Perhaps the most damaging feature of the TRUMP framework is uncertainty. Tariffs appeared and disappeared, causing uncertainty. Abrupt tightening of immigration rules rather than structured reforms added even more to uncertainty. The United States diplomacy, or lack thereof, oscillated between partnership and pressure globally.
One must wonder how a successful businessman like Trump failed to understand that businesses can adapt to tough rules but not cope with unpredictable ones.
For India, the uncertainty in the United States slowed investment and encouraged strategic autonomy. Rather, India’s approach of upliftment focused on broad-based development that strengthened domestic resilience. It has focused on digital inclusion, infrastructure scale-up, small enterprise growth, and positioning India as a growth engine for the Global South. While uncertainty eroded America’s trust, India’s Upliftment strengthened its confidence. One destabilized relationships; the other deepened them.
M — MAGA | Multialignment
Trump’s “Make America Great Again” doctrine prioritizes domestic symbolism over multilateral cooperation. Trade negotiations, ridden with pressure and not sound policy, became a matter of winning versus losing.
Under Donald Trump, Washington has leaned toward unilateralism. Under Modi, India has pursued multialignment: engaging the United States, Europe, Russia, and the Global South simultaneously without over-dependence on any single power.
India’s worldview is structurally different. It is neither aligned nor non-aligned, but strategically flexible. Where MAGA emphasized exclusivity, India emphasized inclusivity and optionality. A hyper-nationalist posture from Washington reinforced India’s instinct to diversify rather than bind itself too tightly to a single partner.
P — Protectionism | Perform
Protectionism under Trump now extends beyond goods into people.
For decades, Indian talent has been the human bridge between the two economies, with millions of engineers, doctors, researchers, and entrepreneurs powering American innovation. Suddenly, tighter H-1B rules and “American jobs first” rhetoric weakened that bridge. Limiting talent flow from India and other countries did not merely restrict immigration; it reduced trust, exchange, and innovation.
India’s strategic answer has been to perform, i.e., build its domestic ecosystems strong enough that talent can thrive at home. The rise of Startup India, digital infrastructure, advanced services exports, and growing investment in AI signal a country determined to compete at the first tier. India must manage its talent pool with expanded opportunities, investments, and incentives in strategic growth areas like AI technology, chip manufacturing, and health infrastructure.
Clearly, America’s protectionism is a narrowing movement; India’s performance is expanding its capability.
A case study: Pressure vs Patience
A recent trade negotiation illustrates the contrast. After months of escalating rhetoric and tariff threats, Washington sought to force quick concessions. India responded differently with patience. Rather than reacting to each escalation, New Delhi strengthened alternative partnerships and signaled that its market could not be rushed or coerced.
The eventual stabilization of nearly 18% tariffs, far below earlier threats, looked less like an American breakthrough and more like a negotiated equilibrium.
Strategically, the lesson is clear: Trump’s leverage depended on urgency, but Modi’s patience with time favored India with options. In the end, patience, not pressure, carried the day.
The larger shift: A Paradox
The paradox of the TRUMP approach is consistent: Tariffs meant to project strength created hedging by India and other nations. Reshoring is meant to consolidate supply chains, disperses them. Uncertainty meant to preserve leverage eroded trust. Protectionism meant to save jobs, but restricted innovation. Finally, influence comes from integration, not isolation.
The United States and India remain natural strategic partners. But partnership thrives on predictability, openness, and mutual respect and growth, not transactional pressure. If Washington continues to govern through the TRUMP framework, India will not disengage but continue to diversify, the quiet language of reduced dependence on just one partner.
The recent 18% tariff settlement is neither a victory nor a defeat. It is diplomacy preserving India’s dignity, democracy, and development trajectory toward Viksit Bharat 2047.
In geopolitics, strength comes not from coercion, but from credibility.
Note:
1. Text in Blue points to additional data on the topic.
2. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of PGurus.
For all the latest updates, download PGurus App.
Formerly, a researcher in Italy, Japan, and France, he has widely travelled and came to the US in 1978. He was a faculty and academic administrator in several different universities in PA, TX, NJ, MN, WI, and NY, and an Executive Fellow in the White House S&T Policy during the Clinton administration.
- TRUMP’s one year and U.S.–India trade relations - February 6, 2026
- Human dignity under attack: From the persecution of Hindus in Bangladesh to the Minneapolis community living in fear - February 2, 2026
- Vande Mataram @ 150: Culture, constitution, and a confident India - January 27, 2026
