Navigating Trump's truths and tariffs

India's self-restraint and quiet diplomacy can pay off.

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There is little that India can do to check President Donald Trump's almost daily posts on his own social media app, Truth Social.

Through the random thoughts, threats, and occasional executive orders put up there, the site has become the virtual mouthpiece of the Trump 2.0 Administration. Like a new toy in the hands of a child, the President seems to obsessively relish playing with it regularly, unmindful of the underlying inappropriateness of conducting matters of state so informally and ignoring all diplomatic and protocol niceties. In any case, it is not just matters concerning India—which seem to have unwittingly fallen out of favor with the world's most prosperous and strong nation—but almost the entire comity of nations and global institutions that need to stay on top of these posts in order to remain abreast of Trump's rapidly evolving state of mind.

Of much greater significance than this "Trumpian" mode of communication are the actual contents of his mostly stray, half-baked, and only occasionally considered posts. A common characteristic of almost all of them is the reeking mercantilism—the kind that says, "you tell me what you can do for me, and then I will offer what I can do." Every resultant deal, irrespective of how it is arrived at, is lauded publicly by Trump or his minions. More often than not, thereafter, the heads of the governments involved get praised disproportionately and enter Trump's good books. No doubt, such reconciliatory acts do, somewhat, soothe their earlier belittling at the hands of the President of the USA. But unfortunately, the entire process of deal-making rarely brings satisfaction or credit to the parties involved.