India, Aug. 23 -- There was always a feudal warlord element to US President Donald Trump's recent outbursts against India. As he lashed out from behind the protective gear of tariffs and penalties, the US president's rants smacked of the arrogance that only imperialists permit themselves. Russian oil is a bogey. This is the 2025 version of the East India Company, at least insofar as a colonialist mindset goes. The Americans may not be physically arriving to vanquish India like the British invaders did. But the entitled way with which the Trump administration is talking down to India smacks of the same attitude. And if you had even the slightest doubt that this was about some genuine disagreement over India's supposed protectionism in farming, dairy and fishing, the language used by Peter Navarro, trade adviser to Trump, should shut that down. With the use of the phrase "Maharaja tariffs", Navarro has displayed an inherent orientalism and cliched racism in how the Trump administration views us. What's he going to do next - use the metaphor of snake-charmers? Navarro - whose Financial Times op-ed pretty much warned India to pick a side, strategic autonomy be damned - has made it all much worse with his newest utterances. He's called India a laundromat for the Kremlin, while it's his boss who laid out the proverbial red carpet for Vladimir Putin at the Alaska Summit just days ago. US treasury secretary Scott Bessent accused India of "profiteering" from the purchase of Russian oil, which, after being refined, is also bought by Europe. But guess who is really profiteering from the Ukraine war? America! Bessent, in a separate interview, conceded that the Trump administration was taking a 10% mark up on all weapons sold to the Europeans who in turn are selling them to Ukraine. Trump, who wants a Nobel Peace Prize for "ending wars", is actually set on making some money from this one. In August, The Wall Street Journal reported that four European countries were buying weapons valued at roughly $1 billion, which were to be delivered to Kyiv. Bessent justified the mark-up in prices arguing that it might pay for air cover over Ukraine. But Trump reveals himself to be a profit-minded businessman right to the last dime. If India sees benefit for her people and interests in buying oil from Russia, we are accused by the same folks of fueling Putin's war machine. The hypocrisy is staggering; none of it makes any sense. Even humbugs need an internally consistent argument. I actually agree with those who argue that the India-US relationship is longer and deeper than the whims of an individual president. And while I understand the need for short-term transactionalism to play a move against Trump in a language he will understand, I am not a big believer in the assumption that China will deliver what Washington has not. And I am no America-hater. On the contrary, I grew up in New York and studied in public school there. I graduated from a journalism school in New York. And have done countless other fellowships at American universities across the length of the East Coast. I see and appreciate the intersections in our democracies and the cultural commonalities created by globalisation and technology. Trump has been imperious; China has been militarily adversarial. Trump's fallibilities play out in the public domain; Xi Jinping's are shrouded in opacity. Trump has either been flattered or incentivised to treat Pakistan with kid gloves. China has actually worked with Pakistan in Operation Sindoor. So yes, there is merit in the fact that the American-Indian relationship has to be protected against and beyond Trump. If anything, the American response will now be embedded in India's muscle memory. India has been warned against the perils of investing too much in one country or one corner of the globe. There is much debate over why India is unable to get through to Trump. Is this about credit for Operation Sindoor, his giant ego being slighted, the Pakistanis purportedly hiring his former bodyguard among their lobbyists or our formal, restrained way of conducting diplomacy? Your guess is as good as mine. But I do wonder, where the much-vaunted heroes of the Indian diaspora are. The five-million strong Indian-American diaspora has often been called a model immigrant community. Its leaders run Big Tech, financial institutions, hold key positions in academia and policy making and cheer for Indian cricket while being proud Americans. Many of them are products of excellent - and highly subsidised - Indian higher education. Even with their hyphenated identity, does their blood not boil at the way India is being treated? Is their love for India only limited to Virat Kohli and Jaspreet Bumrah? Or is everyone terrified of being turfed out like an Elon Musk? There are no immediate answers to the mountain of questions around Trump's decision to torch the bridge with India. But if the Trump administration is unable to understand that in the end this is about India's sovereignty to take her own decisions, there may be little left to salvage by the time this president exits the White House....