South Asia Investor Review

Since the dawn of the 21st century, the US strategy has been to woo India and to build it up as a counterweight to rising China in the Indo-Pacific region. Most beltway analysts agree with this policy. However, the current Trump administration has taken significant actions, such as the imposition of 50% tariffs on India's exports to the US, that appear to defy this conventional wisdom widely shared in the West. Does President Trump have a grand strategy guiding these actions?  George Friedman, the founder of Geopolitical Futures, believes the answer is Yes.  George Friedman George Friedman is an American futurologist, political scientist, and writer. He writes about international relations. He is the founder and chairman of Geopolitical Futures. Prior to founding Geopolitical Futures, he was chairman of the publishing company Stratfor In a recent  podcast , Friedman said "India is not an essential country from the American standpoint". "They (Indians) are a useful al...

In a piece titled "The India Dividend: New Delhi Remains Washington’s Best Hope in Asia" published in Foreign Affairs journal, authors Robert Blackwill and Ashley Tellis argue that the Trump Administration should continue the US policy of "strategic altruism" with India that began with US-India nuclear agreement. They want President Trump to ignore the fact that the US companies and economy have only marginally benefited from this policy. They see India as a "superpower in waiting" and urge Washington to focus on the goal of having India as an ally to check China's rise. They see Chinese support for India's archrival Pakistan and China’s growing weight in South Asia and beyond as threat to India. Who is Ashley Tellis: Ashley Tellis was born and raised in Mumbai, India. Back in 1999 as a “researcher” at RAND Corp, he contributed to a report for US Department of Defense (DoD) that forecast  Pakistan would “disappear”  by 2015. It proved to be wis...