New Delhi, March 10 -- When you make a pact with the devil, he always comes back to get his due. I wish Volodymyr Zelensky had remembered this before getting into a confrontation with Russia. Had that been the case, his country would have saved itself from ruin. What the Ukrainians are subject to today is the result of a double-cross by the US. The 180 degree shift in US attitude towards Ukraine has rattled the world.

On 5 March, in his address to the nation, US president Donald Trump asserted that after Mexico, Canada and China, he would slap tariffs on other countries, including India and Brazil, that are equal to what they have put on US products in their respective countries. As expected, the countries retaliated and the share market...