Indian Foreign office is still silent on Deputy Secretary of State Landau’s comment
By Satyaki Chakraborty
Amidst Trump-Modi bonhomie and the continuation of India-US trade talks, former Indian intelligence chief Vikram Sood said on Sunday in an interview to a British network that the present U.S. deputy secretary of state Christopher Landau told Indian officials during his visit to India in March 2026 that Washington would use tariffs, sanctions and other tools to curb India’s rapid economic growth and would not allow it to emerge as a major power competing with USA.
According to Sood, Landau said in that New Delhi meeting” We made a mistake by helping China become a major economic power. We are not going to do that with India. We will not make that mistake again”. Sood gave the interview in a British current affairs programme New Order which the host shared on social media along with the original video of Landau’s comments. The interview has created a furore in diplomatic circles
Landau is still the deputy secretary of state and he is known to be close to the Trump led MAGA lobby along with his boss secretary of state Marco Rubio. Rubio is most visible U.S. official as far as the India-US relations are concerned, but Landau speaks the mind of the Trump administration He was frank about U.S. perception of future of bilateral relations.
In the recent days, Trump administration is taking less interest in its old idea about Indo-Pacific security involving India. India’s importance has declined in Trump administration’s broader Asia strategy. All these have taken place following Trump-Xi Jinping summit in Beijing in May this year. As a result, the focus is now more on extracting maximum concessions from India in trade and in defence purchases while ensuring that India’s growth momentum does not pose any threat to the U.S. economic power.
While other foreign offices are also assessing the real import of the comments made by the deputy secretary of U.S. Christopher Landau, China has reacted instantly as Landau cited the example of China to say that the US would not make that type of mistake in the case of India.
Chinese observers described Washington’s approach toward New Delhi as a dual strategy of “limited engagement and ceiling control.” They argued that deep-rooted structural contradictions arising from differing national ambitions, visions of global order, geopolitical interests, industrial competition and diplomatic traditions could not be fundamentally resolved through diplomatic engagement or economic cooperation between India and the US.
Qian Feng, director of the Research Department at Tsinghua University’s National Strategy Institute, told the Global Times on Monday that the rapid expansion of US-India relations over the past two decades is reaching a ceiling, as the two countries face structural contradictions that are difficult to reconcile. These differences stem from their differing stages of development, strategic cultures, geopolitical positions, diplomatic traditions and the foreign policy orientations of their leadership.
Qian said India’s long-standing commitment to strategic autonomy fundamentally differs from Washington’s alliance-based approach. New Delhi has consistently pursued an independent foreign policy based on its own national interests rather than aligning fully with US strategic objectives. Even within frameworks such as the Quad and the Indo-Pacific Strategy, India seeks to engage the US as an equal partner rather than as a formal ally or subordinate security partner
This observation by the Chinese expert in the official media indicates that China now is seeking to woo India for improving India-China bilateral relations and toned down its earlier stance that the US has got India as a partner in its Indo-Pacific strategy, primarily meant against China. The emphasis of the Chinese analysts is that PM Narendra Modi was seeking to follow an independent policy defying the American pressure.
According to Chinese experts, Landau’s remarks reflected Washington’s broader approach toward India – seeking New Delhi’s support in geopolitical competition while locking it at a lower end of the industrial chain. Such a strategy, they argued, runs counter to India’s strategic goals.
According to Qian Feng, “Industrialization is a legitimate right of all developing countries. Guided by a zero-sum mindset, the US seeks to impose a ceiling on other countries’ development. By carving up global supply chains through tariffs and technical barriers, it will only push India to deepen cooperation within the BRICS framework as well as with China and Russia, accelerating the diversification of industrial chains”,
Right now, India and the United States appear to be racing towards concluding the trade deal much before the end of 2026. Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said that 99 per cent of the issues had been sorted out in the negotiations.. U.S. officials also underlined that the bilateral trade framework is nearly complete. But even in the last phase of India-US trade negotiations, the U.S. talked of imposing sanctions under section 301. This meant an imposition of 12.5 per cent duty on countries including India which are under investigations.
The details of the proposed India-US trade deal are not known, but the tenor of the senior official Landau’s statement vindicates the apprehensions being expressed by many trade experts that the US is imposing a trade deal on India in a hurry protecting only the interests of USA and not India. It is time, the Narendra Modi government shows some guts and protects the interests of the Indian farmers and the other sections just as the US negotiators are defending their own farmers and industry’s interests.
India is the largest populated country of the world with a growing economy. Its growth depends on its resources human capital and many other assets. The country certainly needs trade agreement with the USA. But it has to be on an equal footing. No country, however powerful , can be allowed to suppress the growth of the Indian economy. The assertion of India’s strategic autonomy during negotiations with the U.S. will be the fittest reply to the U.S. deputy secretary of state Christopher Landau. China has shown that. India also can do the same by dealing with the U.S. on an equal footing. (IPA Service)
