India In A Fragmenting World: Rethinking Neighbourhood Strategy As The US Retreats |
As US President Donald Trump’s revived interpretation of the ‘Monroe Doctrine’ accelerates American strategic retreat from its pre-eminent position as the global ‘Uber-lord’, the global order is fragmenting into a more openly multipolar system.
In this emerging landscape, India, China, Russia and Europe will increasingly be compelled to carve out autonomous spheres of influence and selectively cooperate with one another to safeguard their interests amid declining US engagement.
For Indian policymakers, this shift poses a fundamental question: how should India manage its immediate neighbourhood when external guarantees can no longer be taken for granted?
Risks and opportunities for India
The answer contains both risk and opportunity. Strategic uncertainty heightens insecurity and opens up the prospect of facing multiple threats simultaneously in a fast-changing world. However, it also allows India far greater room to shape outcomes in South Asia and in the Indian Ocean arena on its own terms.
When India confronts China in the high Himalayas or counters Beijing’s “string of pearls” strategy across the Indian Ocean, where commercial ports acquired by the northern neighbour can rapidly acquire military utility, it can no longer assume the Quad will function as a near-military alliance.
As Washington signals reluctance to underwrite regional security indefinitely, India must increasingly rely on its own capabilities. This reality makes higher and sustained defence expenditure unavoidable, not as an act of militarisation but as a prerequisite for strategic autonomy.
Reassessing ties with the US
Equally important is the erosion of India’s confidence in the United States as a ‘principal ally’, a belief which was borne out of the way the US and India came closer to each other in the first........