When Russian President Vladimir Putin visits India at the end of this or the beginning of next year, his meetings will come against the backdrop of New Delhi’s principled neutrality on the war in and near Ukraine.
India has always abstained from anti-Russian resolutions tabled at multilateral fora like the United Nations and has refused to comply with the West’s sanctions against Russia. At the same time, India has also called for respecting international law and ending the Ukraine war as soon as possible.
Behind the rhetoric, India has served as a release valve for Western pressure on Russia, providing Moscow with a big power alternative to becoming overly dependent on China.
India has become the second-largest buyer of discounted Russian oil behind China, which resulted in bilateral trade exploding to US$65 billion last year from just $12 billion in 2021.
Cheaper oil has fueled India’s robust economic growth, which averaged 8.2% last year and is on track to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2027, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Although the Indian government doesn’t abide by Western sanctions against Russia, some of its private financial institutions still do, which has made transferring some of these funds difficult. Russia has thus agreed to invest some of its rupee stockpile in India, which has helped to diversify and rebalance the two sides’ trade.
At the same time, India and Russia have prioritized the development of three logistics corridors, none of which has reached its full potential. These include:
- the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) through Iran with branches across Azerbaijan, the Caspian Sea and Central Asia;
- the Vladivostok-Chennai Maritime Corridor between those cities, which is also known as the Eastern Maritime Corridor; and
- the Northern Sea Route in the Arctic.
Of these three, the INSTC is the most promising but also the most vulnerable due to reports that returning US President Donald Trump plans to renew his “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran.
India already secured a waiver from the US for using Iran’s Chabahar Port for trading with Afghanistan. Trump might tighten sanctions on Iran to the point of coercing India into cutting off its trade with Russia via the INSTC, which could reduce the availability of Indian products – including pharmaceuticals on Russian shelves, thus ceding market share to and consequently raising Russia’s already high dependence on China.
The same could happen if the covert tech channel that India reportedly set up with Russia is targeted. That would seemingly work against the incoming Trump administration’s own grand strategic interests given the number of China hawks in his cabinet.
Trump said right before the presidential election that he wants to “un-unite” Russia and China, but he’ll only inadvertently push them closer together if he imposes new limits on Russian-Indian trade to punish Iran.
Trump also said he will prioritize ending the Ukraine war. It remains unclear exactly how he plans to do this but few observers expect him to allow Russia to achieve its maximum territorial and other goals in a ceasefire deal. The possible terms of a proposed compromise are still unknown.
Trump and Russia are forbidden from communicating on a deal under America’s Logan Act, which criminalizes the negotiation of a dispute between the US and a foreign government by an unauthorized American citizen. Trump will be inaugurated on January 20, from when negotiations can begin.
That puts India, which shares strong ties with the US and Russia, in a potential position to prepare the ground for talks. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Putin could discuss the possible military and economic parameters of a deal, including phased sanctions relief for Russia and/or a sanctions waiver for Indian trade with Russia via Iran.
India could then privately convey these Russian negotiating points to the Trump administration, which if the president-elect’s first term is any indication, will be especially friendly towards Modi’s government.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed on Tuesday that the dates for Putin’s India trip will be announced soon. It will follow Modi’s trip to Russia in June, which was his first to the country since attending the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok in September 2019 as Putin’s guest of honor at the time. Their last meeting over the summer saw the leaders sign nine agreements and release a detailed joint statement.
Trump is also close to Modi, as is his nominee for director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard. Trump’s national security advisor pick, Mike Waltz, is co-chair of the India caucus and his nominee for secretary of state, Senator Marco Rubio, introduced the US-India Defense Cooperation Act in July.
With those personages and stars aligned, the path to peace in Ukraine might run through India more than through former mediator Turkey or aspiring go-between China. That’s why it’s likely Putin and Modi will discuss a Ukraine deal during his upcoming trip, although the details of their discussions won’t likely be fully disclosed.
Putin is no doubt fully aware of how eager Trump is to “pivot” back to Asia, which requires a quick resolution of the Ukraine war. And Putin is also aware of the indispensable role that India plays in managing the Eurasian balance of power vis-à-vis China.
Thus, Modi is well-placed to avoid US sanctions for its trade with Russia through Iran, which, if imposed, would lead to more Chinese influence in and over Russia. Based on his close ties to Putin since 2014, Modi may also make pragmatic suggestions on the best path to a compromise in Ukraine that would be acceptable to Russia.
To be sure, Putin would not overtly approve of or encourage Trump to pivot back to Asia to more muscularly contain China. Rather, Putin understands Trump’s grand strategic interests and will seek to leverage them to Russia’s advantage.
One way to reach a compromise on Ukraine that’s acceptable to Russia, which is what Putin wants most of all, may be for Modi to explain to Trump how this would advance his goals vis-à-vis China.
Modi might also seek to convince Trump that escalating the Ukraine conflict (even if for the purpose of then de-escalating on better terms for the US) could backfire into a brinksmanship crisis that spirals out of control.
All the while, Russia would be pushed closer to China as its increasingly junior partner, which could disrupt the Eurasian balance of power in ways that harm both US and Indian interests.
None of this, beyond vague references to Ukraine, is likely to figure into the readout of the next Putin-Modi meeting or phone call, whether later this year or early next. Nevertheless, it’s important to appreciate the role that India plays in US and Russian grand strategies, in the Eurasian balance of power and thus, accordingly, also in the Ukraine war.
