From rivals to reluctant partners: Can Modi and Xi redraw the lines of trust as Trump's tariffs shake up global relations?
Analysis by Rhea Mogul, CNN

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the BRICS Summit in Fujian, China on September 4, 2017., Kenzaburo Fukuhara/AFP/Getty Images
A relationship frozen after a deadly clash high in the Himalayas five years ago appears to be thawing under the heat of US President Donald Trump's economic pressure.

For the first time since 2018, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will travel to China this week to attend a summit hosted by Chinese leader Xi Jinping, a visit that comes as New Delhi remains in a tense standoff with the White House over its threat of 50% tariffs.

In a moment of geopolitical whiplash, the two leaders – whose soldiers fought a brutal hand-to-hand combat with fists, rocks and clubs at their disputed border in 2020 – could now shake hands, prioritizing economic stability over entrenched rivalry.

Alongside Modi, world leaders from Russia, Pakistan, Iran and Central Asia will join Xi this weekend for what Beijing has said will be the largest summit yet of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a Moscow and Beijing-founded regional security club aimed at reshaping the global balance of power.

India's presence at the event is the most telling example yet of the warming ties between the two Asian powers – a budding realignment that threatens to undo years-long US efforts to cultivate New Delhi as a counterweight against a rising and increasingly assertive China.

While a thaw in India and China's fractious relationship was already underway, analysts say Trump's "America First" policies are making the two leaders, who have built their political brands on a strong foundation of nationalism, explore a partnership of necessity.

Trump's threat of tariffs over India's purchases of Russian oil have been especially hard to swallow for Modi, who enjoyed a budding bromance with Trump during the US president's first term.

The threatened levies have "infused a certain amount of urgency" in New Delhi's pivot toward stabilizing its relationship with Beijing, said Manoj Kewalramani, who heads Indo-Pacific studies at the Takshashila Institution research center in the Indian city of Bengaluru. However he said it wasn't the "primary driver" for reset, with both India and China looking to stabilize their relationship for their own national interests.

Successive White House administrations have worked to boost strategic ties with India through technology transfers and joint military drills, working with the world's largest democracy to counter an increasingly assertive China in the Indo-Pacific region.

Losing India would be "the worst outcome" for the US, analysts have said.


US President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi shake hands at the White House in Washington, D.C., on February 13, 2025. - Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Following a meeting between Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Prime Minister Modi in New Delhi last week, both sides recognized the recent improvements in their strained relationship.

"India-China relations have made steady progress guided by respect for each other's interests and sensitivities," the Indian leader said. "Stable, predictable, constructive ties between India and China will contribute significantly to regional as well as global peace and prosperity."

The view from Beijing, according to Yun Sun, director of the China Program at the Stimson Center think tank in Washington, is that "this detente was definitely started by Trump."

"India is no longer able to pretend that it still has strong support from (Washington)," Sun said. Therefore, Beijing's view is that because the US has "dialed back" India has to "recalibrate its foreign policy and improve its relationship with China."

But analysts say the summit is unlikely to usher in a fundamental realignment.

"To me, it's not a reset in the sense that India is saying ‘we are done with America.' That's not going to happen," said Kewalramani.

"The United States remains (India's) most important partner in the world, but China is our largest neighbor," Kewalramani said. "We have to live with it."