As India-US ties deteriorate, Western media reports claim China has been doing its best to fill the gap. A Bloomberg report said Beijing has been conducting a “quiet outreach” since March this year. Quoting a Ministry of External Affairs source, the report claimed President Xi wrote an “undisclosed” letter to President Draupadi Murmu that was then passed on to PM Modi.
“The letter expressed concern about any US deals that would harm China’s interests and named a provincial official who would steer Beijing’s efforts,” Bloomberg quoted the MEA official as saying.
The timing of this letter was interesting, as it coincided with the release of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) annual report on March 31 this year. Entitled the 2025 National Trade Estimate Report on Foreign Trade Barriers, the report attacked India for its high tariffs, stating. “India’s average Most-Favored-Nation (MFN) applied tariff rate was 17.0 percent in 2023 (latest data available), which was the highest of any major world economy,” the report said. The Bloomberg report comes on the heels of a German media report claiming Prime Minister Modi had refused to pick up President Trump’s calls. There has been no comment so far by either India or the US on the seemingly ignored calls, but for the letter, it is a different story.
China’s ambassador to India, Xu Feihong, confirmed a letter had been written by President Xi to President Murmu. Tweeting on X, the Chinese envoy wrote on April 1, that President Xi had congratulated the Indian president on the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and India. The Chinese president expressed his readiness to work with President Murmu to “deepen communication and coordination on major international affairs, jointly safeguard peace and tranquillity in China-India border regions, advance China-India relations on the track of sound and stable development.”
“The development of China-India relations demonstrates that it is the right choice for the two countries to be partners of mutual achievement and realize the “Dragon-Elephant Tango," which fully serves the fundamental interests of both countries and their peoples,” a Chinese statement said post the letter by President Xi. The Bloomberg report claims that India did not respond to these Chinese overtures till June, when ties between India and the US began fraying.
One of the key breaking points at this time was after a phone conversation between President Trump and Prime Minister Modi on June 17. Briefing the media on the call on June 18, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri said. “Prime Minister Modi clearly conveyed to President Trump that at no point during this entire sequence of events was there any discussion, at any level, on an India-U.S. Trade Deal, or any proposal for a mediation by the U.S. between India and Pakistan.”
India’s insistence that there was no mediation, coupled with Trump’s insistence on imposing the highest percentage of tariffs on New Delhi in the world, has frayed ties. However, some Indian diplomats do not believe the anger New Delhi has with the US will translate into warmth and goodwill for China. In fact, some believe both countries have faced such problems before and overcome them.
US sanctions on India post the nuclear tests in 1974 and 1998, the unilateral snapping of the 1963 Tarapur agreement by the US in 1980, and Trump’s insistence on India not buying oil from Iran were major irritants, point out diplomats. But both countries were able to move on.
Ambassador Mohan Kumar is one of the optimists. Codifying the India-US relationship today, he cites three major reasons for the problems facing both countries: Trump’s pique, the buying of Russian oil today by India, and the US ignoring India’s red lines. The first two problems, he believes, India has some “wriggle room,” especially as the “price differential” between Brent crude oil and Russian oil is narrowing. For the third problem, he believes creative restructuring of offers made to the US may lead to a solution. Meanwhile, he said, India must make it amply clear to the US the damage that tariffs are doing to livelihoods in the country.
“The next few weeks and months are crucial for India-US ties. Painstaking backchannel talks may already be happening, but if they are not, they should. That alone will prepare the ground for a summit-level meeting between the two leaders at some point,” Dr Kumar wrote in a social media post. Speaking about the recently concluded 2+2 dialogue conducted between both nations at the Additional Secretary level (Americas) level in the MEA between Ambassador Nagaraj Naidu and the US Senior Official of the State Department Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs Bethany P. Morrison, he wrote. “It is an open secret that Ms. Bethany P. Morrison is powerful beyond her pay grade and has worked with Secretary Marco Rubio for a long time. Talks appear to have continued in other areas, including on intelligence cooperation and nuclear matters, so that is a good thing too,” he added.
