Peter Navarro told a blunt truth that too many in Washington won’t say: India cannot keep cozying up to Russia and China while expecting American goodwill. Navarro has publicly demanded that New Delhi stop buying discounted Russian crude, arguing those purchases help bankroll Moscow’s war machine and jeopardize strategic ties with the United States.
The trade adviser didn’t whisper his message — he went public in an opinion piece and on TV, calling India an opportunistic middleman that has become a “global clearinghouse” for embargoed Russian oil and accusing New Delhi of converting cheap crude into high-value exports that funnel dollars back to Moscow. That kind of language is raw, necessary, and exactly the sort of wake-up call our country needs when partners act like freeloaders on the global stage.
Washington has followed words with action: the administration slapped additional tariffs on Indian goods, doubling levies and signaling that trade privileges are not guaranteed for nations that enable adversaries. Those tariff moves and the cancellation of high-level trade talks underscore a simple conservative principle — we don’t reward behavior that undermines American security and taxpayers.
Navarro’s tough posture mirrors a long-held conservative view that strength, leverage, and clear consequences secure peace more reliably than platitudes or wishful thinking. He’s right to call out the BRICS flirtation with authoritarian regimes; when countries line up with Beijing and Moscow, they are choosing a sphere of influence that ultimately counters American interests and the liberty-loving order we stand for.
Of course New Delhi protests that it’s buying oil out of necessity and accuses the U.S. of hypocrisy, pointing to other Western energy ties with Russia. That argument rings hollow when the practical effect of India’s purchases is to prop up a bad actor whose aggression destabilizes Europe and forces American taxpayers to pick up the bill for the fallout. The world cannot be managed with moral relativism.
Navarro has even taken his case to social media, labeling some of India’s imports “blood money” and refusing to let polite euphemisms obscure the moral dimension of the problem. Conservatives should welcome that clarity: foreign policy isn’t a counseling session, it’s a ledger of interests and consequences, and the United States must insist that partners earn our support.
Patriotic Americans want allies who trade with us and stand with us, not ones who hedge their bets with our enemies. It’s time for leaders to stop treating strategic partnership as convenience and start treating it like what it is — a commitment. If that means tariffs, tough talk, and economic pressure to defend our freedoms and our balance of power, so be it; that’s the kind of leadership that keeps America strong.
