US officials wondering what effect President Donald Trump’s move to slap 50% tariffs on India might have need look no further than Prime Minister Modi’s travel schedule. This week, the Indian leader was in Beijing, standing shoulder to shoulder with China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Modi’s first trip to the Chinese capital in seven years is giving the push for a less US-centric multipolar world greater urgency. The optics of the overt displays of camaraderie sent a message of defiance to a Trump White House trying to pound China and India into economic submission. Yet neither Xi nor Modi is assuming the position that Trump expected. Instead, Trump’s trade war is breathing new life into a BRICS economic bloc that, prior to January, seemed on the ropes.
