Geopolitical Analysis: How the 2025

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🌍 Geopolitical Analysis: How the 2025 India–Russia Breakthrough Affects India–US, India–China & BRICS

🇮🇳🤝🇺🇸 1. Impact on India–US Relations: More Strategic Balancing, Not Alignment Shift

a) Russia promises uninterrupted oil “in defiance of US pressure”

President Putin assured India that Russian oil shipments would remain uninterrupted despite U.S. attempts to curb India’s energy ties with Moscow. This underscores India’s resolve to follow an independent energy policy and resist external pressure.

b) India signals “strategic autonomy” to Washington

India is not abandoning the US—its QUAD commitments and Indo-Pacific cooperation remain central—but New Delhi is making it clear that:

It will not reduce Russian oil purchases.

Its defence diversification will not exclude Russia.

It will keep multi-polarity at the center of foreign policy.

This pushes Washington to engage India more respectfully, knowing that coercion could backfire.

c) Impact on US sanctions calculus

Because India is now one of Russia’s top economic partners post-2022, and because India–Russia ties deepened further in 2025 (energy, mobility pacts, defence co-production), the U.S. must weigh:

Whether sanctioning India hurts America’s Indo-Pacific strategy

Whether India’s Russia ties weaken the Western coalition’s leverage over Moscow

Bottom Line (India–US):

India becomes more assertively independent, but not anti-US. Washington will continue courting India in the Indo-Pacific, even if uneasily accepting India–Russia closeness.

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🇮🇳🤝🇨🇳 2. Impact on India–China Relations: Subtle Pressure on Beijing

a) Arctic navigation training gives India future maritime leverage

India will now train its seafarers to navigate the Arctic using Russian expertise—an area where China has invested heavily to build a “Polar Silk Road.”

This allows India to:

Enter a domain China hoped to dominate

Strengthen presence in new shipping lanes

Build leverage in global sea-route politics

b) Strengthening Russia ties keeps China guessing

China’s deep strategic closeness with Russia has often created a two-against-one dynamic against India.

By strengthening defence, energy, and mobility ties with Russia in 2025, India ensures Moscow does not drift entirely into China’s sphere.

This gives India:

Access to Russian technology

Political goodwill

Space to prevent a full Russia–China strategic lockout

c) India counters China’s Eurasian influence

A possible India–EAEU FTA expands India’s economic footprint in Central Asia—traditionally a Chinese sphere via Belt and Road.

Bottom Line (India–China):

India uses Russia to offset China’s growing Eurasian and Arctic ambitions. New Delhi keeps Russia economically interested enough that Moscow cannot take sides with Beijing automatically.

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🌐 3. Impact on BRICS: India Strengthens the Multipolar Bloc

a) India–Russia co-development in defence resets BRICS identity

The Modi–Putin agreement to move beyond the old buyer-seller defence model and embrace co-production and joint research modernizes the defence pillar of the BRICS world order.

BRICS becomes:

A forum for technology partnerships

A source of alternative defence ecosystems

A mechanism for reduced Western dependency

b) Rupee–Ruble settlement reinforces BRICS currency ambitions

Both countries expanding trade in national currencies supports:

De-dollarisation

BRICS payment systems

Greater currency autonomy

This strengthens BRICS' long-term plan for a BRICS alternative payments architecture.

c) BRICS becomes a platform for India to shape Eurasian geopolitics

The closer India–Russia alignments allow New Delhi to:

Influence Russia’s positions in BRICS

Counterbalance China’s dominance

Strengthen Global South cohesion

Bottom Line (BRICS):

India emerges as a central pillar of the multipolar BRICS order, balancing China and shaping global economic alternatives.

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🧭 Overall Strategic Conclusion

India has executed a major geopolitical balancing act in 2025:

With the US:

India signals that strategic autonomy remains non-negotiable, even under U.S. pressure.

With China:

India ensures Russia stays geopolitically neutral instead of falling fully into China’s embrace, while gaining new Arctic and Eurasian leverage.

Within BRICS:

India emerges as the most influential non-China member, pushing multipolarity, de-dollarisation, tech co-production, and new trade routes.