US needs India in their sphere, in order to help isolate Russia and economically disentangle from and challenge china.
They can’t afford to undermine him, especially with all his fervent nationalist support (on the rise in a world full of economic and cultural uncertainty).
There's always a choice, but while Modi's India is a fairly bad ally, it's still better than others, like Saudi Arabia. Gotta pick your battles.
Maybe some day when the important conflicts are in a different region we can take India to task over things like their police-sanctioned cybercriminals that keep robbing the elderly.
Yes, they have a choice. Ignoring India's issues including that they in fact increase trade with Russia massively is not what stops them from going on like this.
Yes, but ignoring their issues doesn't make them a close ally. Just another one roughy affiliated, that knows it can do whatever without consequence other than strongly worded letters.
Yes, I have lived under a rock where India bought Russian military for years and is now working hard to become their new biggest trading partner... such close allies.
What you are talking about is: it could be worse and they could be openly hostile.
I guess you have been living under a rock because I'm still old enough to remember George Bush inviting Putin to Texas where they played golf together, and every President before him going to Moscow for diplomatic missions.
Hey, here's a video of Obama and Medvedev having a Burger together
I'm also old enough to remember Germany helping to build the Nord Stream pipeline:
"Nord Stream (German-English mixed expression for "North Stream"; Russian: Северный поток, Severny potok) is a network of offshore natural gas pipelines which run under the Baltic Sea from Russia to Germany to provide Western Europe with natural gas"
What you're talking about is China, not India. Get your countries right. China literally has the same Hammer and Sickle Emblem on their stupid State Insignia ffs. They held a massive communist rally 2 years ago and mimic the Soviet Union in every way.
Why would India join any sphere? India's success historically has always been from a policy of neutrality and having the Himalayan mountains block any ideas against that neutrality.