The US will be India’s biggest foreign policy challenge this year far more than it was in 2025. This, when a strategic option has been available to India for the US to woo it instead of the present pathetic state where president Trump openly ridicules prime minister Modi. He has done this regularly since India denied Trump the credit of the ceasefire in Operation Sindoor.The strategic option is for India to turn the table on the US by normalising its ties with China. This will strengthen the Russia-India-China (RIC) format that grew into Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa (BRICS) which Trump fears since it has the potential to displace (not replace) the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency. To recall, the now famous picture frame of the smiling trio: Putin (President Putin), Xi (President Xi Jinping), and Modi, taken at the SCO summit in Tianjin (China) on September 1, 2025 had sent shock waves across Washington DC with many US Senators blaming the Trump administration for having lost India to China, described as the US’s peer competitor in this century.But, for India to do this requires more than courage and wisdom, which itself is a challenge. It requires intellectual honesty to accept that in the present multipolar world, China is a great power whose geo-economics and technology rise manifested in Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is both unstoppable and uncatchable. Given this, instead of competing with China in South Asia where except for Bhutan all nations have joined the BRI, India would be better served by working with China for mutually beneficial outcomes. This, of course, will not happen as India, with a colonial mindset, would prefer to be photographed with the US leadership, never mind the cost for doing this.And the cost has been huge. Conscious that US could not sustain global military dominance, Trump, describing himself as the ‘President for Peace’, decided in his first year to minimise the security competition with China in west Pacific and downgrade the QUAD (Quadrilateral security dialogue between US, Japan, Australia and India for free and open Indo-Pacific region). This robbed India of the strategic role of being the US’s military bulwark against China in the Indian Ocean Region (IOR). Interestingly, this role was formally given to India by the first Trump administration in May 2018 when it re-named the US’ Pacific Command (responsible for Asia Pacific region) as the US’ Indo-Pacific Command to give centrality to India.Now, Trump, the maverick president, talks too much, and thus shares his thoughts to whoever is willing to listen. Given that, since his inauguration on January 20, 2025, Trump started talking about getting Greenland, making Canada the 51st American state and so on, prudence should have guided the Modi government to wait and watch to understand his foreign policy priorities. But, in the rush to be amongst the earliest to please Trump, Modi, on his first visit to the White House, signed the February 13, 2025 joint statement which gave US far more than it expected.India committed to raise the present bilateral trade at USD 132 billion (2024-25) to USD 500 billion by 2030. With this, India agreed to buy energy (including nuclear), military equipment, green and big (Artificial Intelligence infrastructure) technologies, space cooperation and so on. Moreover, India renewed the 10-year defence framework till 2035 with US aeon 31 October 2025 for joint production and interoperability with the US military. All this was done to demonstrate India’s total commitment to Trump’s foreign policy called Make America Great Again (MAGA). This is no more than an illusion that the US could once again become the superpower.With no card left to play, the Modi government’s problems with the US started with Operation Sindoor. Trump was livid at being denied his peacemaking role in Operation Sindoor by India. Interestingly, there is enough evidence in support of Trump’s claim. For example, he put on his social media account on May 10, 2025 that India and Pakistan had agreed to ‘full and immediate ceasefire’. This was confirmed by India the same evening. Then, The Hindu newspaper reported on January 7, 2026 that the Indian embassy had hired a US lobby firm to fix meetings with top US officials on May 10 to discuss ‘media coverage’ on Operation Sindoor. Instead of assuaging Trump, India’s actions incited him to publicly say over 60 times that he ended the India-Pakistan war. Trump’s tirade, especially on Modi, has continued unabated. He recently said that India has decreased purchase of oil from Russia since Modi knows it is important to keep him happy.On the one hand, Trump’s outbursts demeaning Modi should be unacceptable to India. On the other hand, it will be difficult for Modi to meet Trump in person as he can insult him on his face. Given the political angst, it will be difficult to continue business as usual between the two nations.To add to India’s anxiety, Trump, after Operation Sindoor, has given a strategic role to Pakistan in the Middle East to share its assessments on Iran, which the US regards as its main enemy.Despite the choices the multipolar world offers to India, the Modi government remains a prisoner of its archaic foreign policy, condemned to bear Trump’s hubris.The writer can be reached at pravin@forceindia.net.This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.