“Fantastic man … I love Pakistan,” US President Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday, referring to Pakistani Field Marshal Asim Munir after he hosted him for lunch at the White House.
“Reason I had him here was I wanted to thank him for not going into the war and ending it,” he added.
Trump’s embrace of Munir isn’t just tone-deaf, it’s also undermines India’s diplomacy.
The meeting came hours after Prime Minister Narendra Modi fact-checked Trump point-blank that there was no US mediation in the India-Pakistan conflict in May, and the ceasefire was achieved purely over bilateral military-level talks.
Yet, Donald quacked the same line, “I stopped a war between two major nuclear nations,” even as he said he was honoured to meet Munir personally.
This raises many red flags for India. Munir’s high-profile visit to Washington came just weeks after the military flare-up between India and Pakistan. The Pakistani army chief also reportedly has meetings lined up at the Pentagon and State Department.
Why this is significant is because the US has long said that Pakistan shelters terrorists and fuels cross-border violence. But Munir being given a red-carpet treatment after a round of hostilities with India is hypocrisy laid bare.
Worth noting is that when the US hosted Pakistan’s field marshal, the “world’s greatest democracy” quietly lent legitimacy to military leadership.
In this meeting, Pakistan, as many analysts have speculated, would want Washington to put pressure on India over the Indus Waters Treaty, too.
But for the US, an outreach to Islamabad may also have another motive – leveraging Pakistan’s ties with Iran amid escalating tensions with Israel.
Furthermore, Trump’s invitation to Modi, which coincided with Munir’s US visit, also reeked of political theatrics. Had Modi agreed, it would have given weight to Trump’s fictional narrative of mediating between India and Pakistan, as Munir and Modi would have been in the US at the same time.
However, the PMO cited prior commitments and refused the invite.
For Trump, the presidency appears to be a deal-making enterprise. He has made it abundantly clear that he is deaf to facts and unwilling, or perhaps unable, to comprehend that India has officially and publicly rejected his claims.
Now, a new phenomenon has emerged — Trump’s obsession with collecting feathers in his cap.
After his meeting with Munir, his remark about the ceasefire claim, “… I don’t think I’ve seen a single story written about it,” reveals his craving for media accolades.
Not just that – even the White House gave away the reason behind Munir’s rare meeting with Trump: the Pakistani field marshal reportedly called for the US President to be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, following which he was hosted by Trump.
For a billionaire born into wealth and occupying the most powerful office on the planet, the pursuit of yet another trophy begins to resemble a syndrome which is beyond merely narcissism.
But when a president of a superpower is consumed by vanity, attention, tantrums, and now seemingly trophies, diplomacy turns into a spectacle.
And it is India that’s left swallowing the bitter pill. Pakistan is feeding Trump’s ego, having announced plans for a national cryptocurrency reserve just weeks ago, which Asim Munir reportedly discussed with Trump, along with trade deals.
This may well be another reason Trump entertained the Pakistani Army chief at the White House.
But here’s the thing to note: Trump’s absurd, transactional diplomacy may dominate headlines, but the United States’ institutional resilience, especially in managing South Asia and its ties with India, runs far deeper than his narratives.
Former Pentagon official Michael Rubin and a longtime South Asia analyst, stressed that “India needs to understand Trump doesn’t single-handedly control US policy. Congress, in rare bipartisan agreement, remains firmly pro-India.”
He highlighted in an interview, “We’re (the US) far less willing to tolerate Pakistan’s terrorist sponsorship than the White House sometimes appears.”
The senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute put it bluntly: “Donald Trump may pretend he’s the fulcrum of negotiations, but only India’s government and PM Modi should decide what’s good for India,” even as he highlighted that sometimes, New Delhi must follow Netanyahu’s approach — ignoring Washington’s demands when they conflict with national security, as Israel did repeatedly under Trump.
While the current diplomatic environment may not be conducive for India at the moment, there is a decades-long strategic partnership between New Delhi and Washington, anchored in democratic values, trade, and concerns over China’s rise.
Delhi’s playbook, in the meantime, should simply stay the course through Trump’s presidency. Just grin and bear it. Trump too shall pass.
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