The recent diplomatic, military and trade signals show that President Donald Trump’s second administration is “titling towards Pakistan” and away from India, says a top international security expert.
In an interview to news agency ANI, Max Abrahms claims he is not surprised by the nuclear threats made by Pakistan Army Chief Asim Munir against India from the American soil.
"What we had not heard before is this sort of nuclear threat from American soil. And if this was the only incident, I would find it rather unremarkable. But what we are currently witnessing is a trend where it appears that this second Trump administration is tilting towards Pakistan and away from India. We've actually seen it throughout this whole summer,” Abrahms says.
The expert, however, admits he cannot fully understand the approach being adopted by the Trump administration as deepening trade and military ties with New Delhi was central to Washington’s Indo-Pacific strategy to contain China.
He terms Trump’s current tariff policy towards India as “unfair, offensive and destabilising”.
However, given the unpredictability of Trump, Abrahms says, a reversal of the tariff hike is not unlikely. “It is possible that Trump will end up massively alleviating the threatened tariffs against India... especially if there is some progress in that big Alaska meeting between Trump and Putin,” he feels.
But, he warns that even such a reversal would not immediately repair the diplomatic damage.
“Even if some of the tariffs, a substantial amount of the tariffs like that 25% I mentioned, are lifted, I still think that the US-India relationship may not fully recover for quite some time under this administration,” says the expert.
Meanwhile, another military expert, Tom Cooper, says the renewed warmth in the US-Pakistan relationship after Operation Sindoor is “silly”.
Cooper tells ANI that the recent action of Islamabad are aimed at making US President Donald Trump look like a peacemaker.
"So this is actually a statement for the White House, on behalf of the White House, so that the Trump administration, Trump in particular, can present himself as a peace broker and deal-maker and deal-broker and say look, 'Pakistanis have threatened to attack India with nuclear weapons and it was I who has prevented this from happening. So I am the peacemaker in this conflict as well, not only regarding the war between Cambodia and Thailand or in Ukraine or in wherever else, but I made peace in this case as well,' so this is real," he says.