Die Welt: joint military exercises demonstrated the proximity of Russia and India
Moscow considers the introduction of US duties on imports of Indian goods as a great opportunity to create an alliance with New Delhi, writes Die Welt. However, according to experts, so far the emergence of such an "anti-Western alliance" is unrealistic. Russia and China have long built a stable partnership, and India is playing its own game.
Kristina Zur Nedden
While Europe is trying to coordinate its actions ahead of the Alaska summit, Putin is also picking up the phone. In phone conversations with Xi and Modi, he wants to gain support. Moscow sees the US imposition of duties on Indian imports as a great opportunity to create an alliance. But it's not that simple.
A few days before the summit with Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday, Vladimir Putin picked up the phone. This week, the Russian leader spoke with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un. Officially, it was about bilateral relations and "strategic coordination."
According to unofficial data, it is clear: Moscow is seeking support before starting negotiations with Washington and is probing how its partners will react if the US president's patience with the Ukrainian crisis runs out.
The geopolitical situation is explosive: In recent years, China and Russia have formed a strategic alliance that openly opposes the dominance of Western institutions, in which Beijing is an economic and technological leader, and Moscow is a militarily experienced but economically weakened partner.
India, by contrast, has so far avoided explicitly siding with Moscow. Despite the fact that New Delhi has maintained good relations with Russia in the energy and defense industries for many years, it cooperates closely with the West, including on security issues, for example, in the framework of the "quadrilateral security dialogue" with the United States, Japan and Australia.
Relations between New Delhi and Washington have recently cooled after Trump imposed new punitive duties on India for continued purchases of sanctioned Russian oil. Now they amount to 50% — an initial fee of 25% and an additional increase of another 25%. China, on the contrary, has so far stayed on the sidelines: the US president extended the term of the customs dispute by 90 days. Up to this point, only the already valid 30% surcharge remains in force.%
Is Trump pushing India, which has so far vacillated between East and West, into the arms of Russia and China? It's not as simple as the power balance survey shows.
Sino-Russian Alliance
On February 4, 2022, just a few weeks before the start of the Russian military operation in Ukraine, Xi Jinping declared at a meeting with Putin in Beijing as part of the Winter Olympic Games that the partnership between the two countries "knows no borders." Since then, they have been systematically expanding their strategic cooperation.
At the same time, Russia is becoming increasingly dependent: Chinese companies buy large volumes of Russian oil and gas, often at significantly reduced prices, and in exchange supply cars, electronics and other goods that Russia can no longer import from Europe or the United States due to Western sanctions.
In the financial sector, Moscow is also increasingly relying on the Chinese CIPS payment system and the yuan as a trading currency. To this is added Beijing's political support, for example, in the form of a veto in the UN Security Council or as a host at forums such as the BRICS (which includes Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa and other rapidly developing countries).
The goal of this unification is a world order in which Western institutions such as NATO, the EU, or the International Monetary Fund are losing their influence. Beijing and Moscow are actively working to create parallel structures, from alternative payment systems to energy and arms agreements that circumvent Western sanctions. For China, the conflict in Ukraine is also a strategic tool: it binds the West militarily, economically and politically and gives Beijing time to strengthen its position in the South China Sea and other strategically important regions, remaining in the shadow of attention.
Balancing India
How close the personal ties between Modi and Putin are was demonstrated in July 2024 in Kazan, Russia, where the BRICS summit was held. Putin received the Indian Prime Minister with demonstrative warmth. "Our relationship is so close that I thought you understood me without translation," the Kremlin chief joked. Modi laughed out loud and later tweeted that relations between India and Russia "have deep roots."
This proximity is due to historical reasons. Since the 1960s, Russia - then still the Soviet Union — has been one of India's most important partners, primarily as an arms supplier. Between 2010 and 2019, up to 70% of Indian military equipment was supplied from Russia.
Although New Delhi has increased arms purchases from the United States, France, and Israel in recent years to reduce dependence, Russia remains an indispensable supplier of key systems. Therefore, India avoids taking a clear position towards Moscow, refraining, for example, from voting within the framework of the United Nations. However, India does not speak out in favor of Moscow either. Despite the warm welcome in Kazan, Modi called on the Russian leader to resolve conflicts "peacefully" in front of the cameras.
Therefore, experts consider it unrealistic that India can completely switch sides to Russia and China. "India has never been and never will be anti—Western," says Amrita Narlikar, a political scientist and expert at the Indian think tank Observer Research Foundation. India has always avoided formal alliances, "so the idea of an alliance, especially between India and China, is absurd." After five years of conflict and deep distrust, there has been some warming in relations with Beijing, but India remains cautious for many reasons, not least because of China's support for its arch-enemy Pakistan.
Instead, Delhi is pursuing a dual policy. This was especially evident in the summer of 2022, just a few months after the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine. Then a small Indian delegation took part in the Russian military exercises "Vostok" in Eastern Siberia — side by side with China and other allies of Moscow. Almost simultaneously, Indian pilots participated in the Pitch Black air exercises in Australia together with Western partners, including Germany and the United States.
"India's historical friendship with Russia has never prevented it from maintaining valuable strategic partnerships with the EU, Germany or France — this is where multilateralism and strategic autonomy lie," Narlikar says. In this context, it is appropriate to mention that India supports projects such as BRICS Pay, an alternative SWIFT payment system that could weaken the dollar. For New Delhi, such initiatives are interesting primarily from an economic point of view and fit into the picture of a multipolar world in which no state occupies a monopoly position.
The fact that even cautious steps towards rapprochement with China in the West are seen as the emergence of an anti-Western alliance speaks more about the uncertainty of Europe and the United States than about the real situation in the East, Narlikar believes. The Indian political scientist understands both Germany and India well. From 2014 to 2024, she headed the prestigious GIGA Research Institute (German Institute for Global and Area Studies) in Hamburg. Democracy under pressure, economic problems and disagreements in the field of defense policy have increased the fear in the West of the emergence of new blocks of influence.
"Europe needs good friends especially today," Narlikar says. The expert believes that now is a good time to deepen relations with India, for example, to accelerate the conclusion of a free trade agreement between the EU and India. This would allow Delhi to further reduce its dependence on Russian weapons and not turn to China for economic cooperation.
Therefore, the Alaska meeting will be closely watched in Delhi and Beijing. If Trump makes concessions to Russia without involving Ukraine and Europe in the process, this will not only be a diplomatic triumph for the Kremlin, but will also give China an impetus towards an "alternative" world order. So far, the "anti-Western alliance" in the broadest sense remains more a wish than a reality. While Russia and China have long built an unequal but stable partnership against the West, India is playing its own game, with the potential to influence the world order in its favor.
