Robert D. Blackwill and Ashley J. Tellis
182 μ¢¤³£ ¬μμ¬
many other states in trying to keep elements o the agreement alive
and ¿nd ways to avoid U.S. sanctions against Iran, especially on oil.
When the United States reimposed oil sanctions in November 2018,
India was one o eight countries to secure a six-month waiver from
Washington. Subsequently, in an eort to appease Washington, India
reduced its oil imports from Iran drastically, despite the importance
New Delhi places on its partnership with Tehran (in part because Iran
gives India land access to Afghanistan that circumvents Pakistani terri-
tory). The Trump administration wants Indian cooperation in its con-
frontation with Iran, but New Delhi is reluctant to clash with Tehran
at a time when it has already gone beyond the original U.S. demands
to minimize its Iranian energy imports. Iran is thus likely to remain a
source o irritation in U.S.-Indian relations for the foreseeable future.
Relations with Russia form another stumbling block. India worries
that despite Trump’s apparent desire to improve relations with Russian
President Vladimir Putin, the U.S. administration is pushing Russia
into an ever-closer relationship with China, including intensi¿ed military-
to-military cooperation. New Delhi is at the same time determined to
protect its ties with Moscow, including its decades-long defense col-
laboration. In October 2018, India announced a deal to purchase a
$6 billion S-400 air defense system from Russia, and the two countries
rearmed their military partnership. Unless the Trump administration
issues a waiver for the sale, the deal will trigger secondary sanctions
against India under the 2017 Countering America’s Adversaries Through
Sanctions Act, or ¬¬¡¬. Yet Nirmala Sitharaman, at the time India’s
defense minister, stated in July 2018 that India would not change its
long-held position on the S-400 based on U.S. domestic laws alone.
(Senior administration ocials apparently promised India a waiver for
the S-400 purchase i New Delhi cooperated by reducing its Iranian oil
purchases—which it did—but the administration now seems to have
changed its mind.) So far, neither side seems to be budging, and i the
issue remains unresolved, there will be signi¿cant collateral damage.PARTNERS, NOT ALLIES
On all these issues, Washington has taken a hard line, at least in pub-
lic. This is because under Trump, strategic altruism toward India has
taken a back seat to demands for speci¿c acts o reciprocity. Yet this
American expectation, which even U.S. treaty allies have trouble sat-
isfying, is several bridges too far for what is nevertheless a U.S.-