'PM Modi Is Smart': NYU Professor Edward Price Slams Trump, Rebukes Navarro

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New York University adjunct instructor Edward Price hailed PM Modi’s handling of global affairs while tearing into Donald Trump and Peter Navarro. Price said Trump had 'no understanding of economics' and accused him of damaging India-US ties, stressing Washington should be deepening friendship with New Delhi instead.  #IndiaUS #PMModi #Trump #PeterNavarro #IndiaUSrelations #ModiXiJinping #ModiPutin #SCO #RussiaUkraine #Indiatariff #UStariffonIndia #World  🔊 LIKE ➡ SHARE ➡ SUBSCRIBE  For More Updates:  English: https://newsable.asianetnews.com/  Hindi: https://hindi.asianetnews.com/  Malayalam: https://www.asianetnews.com/  Kannada: https://kannada.asianetnews.com/  Tamil: https://tamil.asianetnews.com/  Telugu: https://telugu.asianetnews.com/  Bengali: https://bangla.asianetnews.com/  Like us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AsianetNewsa...  Follow us on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/AsianetNewsEN  Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ann.newsable/  ➡ If you like our video, give us a thumbs up and subscribe to our channel to get the daily dosage of news, entertainment, sports and more.

Transcript

00:00President Trump has no understanding of economics and statecraft, that he has damaged the relationship

00:06between India and the United States, that he has pushed India closer to Russia and China.

00:12Modi is smart, Modi is playing his cards, and he's reminding the US that he has a choice.

00:17Look, I don't know why anyone would take anything that Navarro says seriously. This is the guy that

00:21is alleged to have made up quotes in a book. This is not Modi's war, this is Putin's war.

00:27India is a super, super important player in the 21st century. It's only going to get more powerful.

00:32Ed, thank you so much for talking to me, and I really appreciate your time.

00:36If you could just introduce yourself, your full name, please, and how you want us to designate you.

00:44Sure thing. So my name is Ed Price, and I'm an independent analyst who also teaches at NYU.

00:52Great. I don't know if you've seen the remarks from the Oval Office today. When asked about removing

01:00tariffs on India today, President Trump stated that we get along very well with India, but at the same

01:07time, he did make references to the tariffs that are imposed in India on US companies. Now, how

01:16should this seemingly contradicting messaging be interpreted? And what does the trajectory of

01:23this relationship from its origins to the present moment reveal about the underlying tensions?

01:30Well, thanks for having me on. I used to think that President Donald Trump had a very poor

01:35understanding of economics and statecraft. And I realize now that that was wrong. And in fact,

01:41President Trump has no understanding of economics and statecraft. That is the only conclusion that I

01:46can draw, given the way that he's behaving towards India. Now, there is some case in a sort of good

01:52old fashioned great power competition to have China and the USA go at it against each other. There's some

01:58case for Russia and the USA to go at it against each other. It's one of our national hobbies. It's one

02:04of their national hobbies. But there is absolutely no reason, particularly in the current moment, to have

02:10the United States and India clash like this, it wasn't necessary. And it was entirely the doing of

02:17the US side. Yes, India does place tariffs on items. I mean, by the way, so do we now. But the point is that

02:23India has a developing economy. So the entire conception of the post war order was that those economies that

02:30were developing, rather than developed, would get the ability to put a higher tariff on goods. So I

02:35really don't know what he's talking about. I think that he has damaged the relationship between India

02:41and the United States. And it seems to me that he either does not understand the US national interest, or

02:47is actively working against it, which is mind blowing.

02:50A few days ago, we did see a united front that that appears to be forming, which is President Xi

02:56being flanked by President Putin and Prime Minister Modi, you know, all in one together, in one frame and one picture.

03:06How has President Trump's status strategy really backfired and strengthen the alliance that the United

03:14States still has seeked to counter over these years?

03:17Yes, I don't know that President Donald Trump has has sought to counter anyone effectively. He seems to give

03:25Vladimir Putin whatever he wants. He doesn't really seem to be able to hold the line in his tariff walk

03:32with President Xi Jinping. But yes, it does seem that he has pushed India closer to Russia and China. I

03:38would just put a little word of warning on that, though, it comes with a health warning, because it is not

03:43the case that India, China and Russia are the best of friends. I mean, this is an outsider

03:49speaking. I'm a Westerner, a US citizen. But it's pretty obvious with reference to history, as you just

03:54mentioned, that the Chinese and the Russians have a long term complaint with each other. If I was Moscow, I'd be most

04:01worried about Siberia rather than Ukraine, to be honest with you. And of course, the Chinese and the Indians have very

04:07deep civilizational differences and a border dispute right up until the present day. So yes, President Trump has pushed

04:15Modi closer to Putin and Xi. But I wouldn't look at that visual that we saw, that compelling visual, and think

04:21that it is necessarily the case that those three men will now always work together. Modi is smart, Modi is

04:27playing his cards, and he's reminding the US that he has a choice.

04:30Now, some serious allegations coming in from Jake Sullivan, who has accused Trump of sacrificing

04:39India relations to advancing family business interests in Pakistan. To what extent might

04:44personal financial considerations be influencing the broader foreign policy decisions by the Trump

04:51administration, particularly keeping Pakistan in mind?

04:54Well, Jake Sullivan is a partisan political actor, so I won't remark on his views.

05:00I'm an independent analyst. But it does seem that the President of the United States has active

05:06financial interests. And this is a departure with what's always traditionally been the case,

05:11right, which is that presidents are not supposed to have active financial interests. And I'm afraid

05:17to say we'll never know. I mean, it's almost impossible to get to the bottom of what exactly those

05:22interests are, we just know that they exist. One example that is pretty well documented at the same

05:27time as not being very well documented is this meme coin scam, and these various sort of coins that

05:33pop up, people try and buy them, they're pulled out, you know, it's all very shady. So yes, I would say

05:39that the President of the United States probably does have some sort of personal active financial

05:44interest, which is a departure from the norm. But someone like me from the outside, I have no

05:48information, I don't really know what those interests are. Right. Now, if we talk about, you know,

05:56some allegations by some Trump loyalists, Peter Navarro, to be precise, he used inflammatory language

06:06referencing this war in Ukraine as Modi's war and making derogatory comments. How significantly might

06:15such rhetoric damage this bilateral relationship? Well, look, I don't know why anyone would take

06:22anything that Navarro says seriously. This is the guy that is alleged to have made up quotes in a book

06:28that he wrote, quotes from himself. So again, Navarro is one of these characters that I think is

06:33probably a little bit off piste intellectually, as well as in terms of the administration's policy.

06:39That said, he has a position of influence, we're talking about him right now. And probably that's,

06:44that is something that the Indians will note, by the way, in defense of Modi, this is not Modi's war,

06:50this is Putin's war, Putin's war. So it's very strange to me that the United States has an official

06:56who is making remarks like that. And let's bring it back to the start of our conversation. If I can,

07:01the United States has every interest in making friends, deeper friends with India right now,

07:08if I was running US trade policy, which obviously I'm not. But if I was running US trade policy,

07:13I would have India tariffs at 00%, not 50. So Navarro, honestly, not someone that I take seriously.

07:24Foreign policy experts have warned that pressuring,

07:27pressurizing India to abandon Russia could drive it deeper into the Moscow sphere of influence.

07:34Historically, this relationship has been that strong. Are we witnessing this prediction materialized

07:40through India's increased BRICS engagement alongside with Brazil who've also been slapped by heavy tariffs?

07:46Well, there is no Moscow sphere of influence. And that's Putin's entire problem, right? He's trying to rebuild

07:53the old Soviet empire. So there is no Moscow sphere of influence. There is a Chinese sphere of influence,

07:59which Russia is a part of right now. Now, if you're asking whether India under Modi is willingly becoming

08:07a part of of that sphere of influence, which is effectively the Chinese sphere of influence. No, let's just go back and

08:13remember our Indian history to some degree. India is an independently minded sovereign with its own

08:19civilization. It makes its own choices. It of course, basically led a non aligned movement during the Cold

08:25War. So there's no way that India is going to permanently put its feet one side or other of a line.

08:31And especially not when it looks at what's happened to Russia, which is essentially a form of economic

08:36conquest by China. So I my personal interpretation is that Modi's being pretty smart. He is reminding

08:43the Americans, he's reminding people like me that he has options, but he's not fully embraced China and

08:48Russia and is not attending the military parade, for example. Well, my last question is what concrete

08:57diplomatic and economic steps would actually reverse this current downward trajectory before the United

09:04States potentially loses what many analysts consider as the most crucial 21st century partnership.

09:12I consider the most crucial 21st century partnership, the partnership between India

09:17and the United States will effectively decide what happens between China and Russia. I've put this a

09:22different way before, which is to say that India has the deciding vote in the 21st century. If India

09:27chooses the US versus China, or if India sits out of any US China competition, it will effectively decide

09:34the outcome. So India is a super, super important player in the 21st century, it's only going to get

09:39more powerful. And like I say, I can't for the life of me understand why the President of the United

09:45States in a confrontation with China, in a war, if you think about it with Russia, would deign to put

09:5250% tariffs on India. So I think the number one thing that we could do of two is remove that 50%

09:58tariff and get it down to something far more reasonable, I suggest 0%. And the second thing we can do is apologize.

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