Dr. Brahma Chellaney

Professor, strategic thinker, author and commentator

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

In its centennial anniversary issue released today, @ForeignAffairs has a special review section, "Books for the Century." My book, Water: Asia's New Battleground, has been named as one of the six essential Asia-Pacific books published over the century. https://t.co/kgk2WoIlHH

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

Making India Pay for Europe's War

The goal of U.S. sanctions against Moscow under successive American presidents has been to inflict maximum damage on Russia's economy while minimizing collateral damage to the U.S. and its closest treaty allies. Trump and the current Congress continue to hew to that approach.

India bore the brunt of the oil sanctions Trump previously imposed on Russia, even though New Delhi has never been the largest or second-largest buyer of Russian energy (China ranks first and Europe second). Washington's objective has been to compel India to shift from Russian energy to American supplies.

To a considerable extent, Washington has already succeeded: within months, the U.S. became India's largest supplier of LNG and LPG. India is also now the largest export destination for Venezuelan oil, payments for which flow to the U.S. Treasury rather than Caracas.

Trump coordinated his Russian energy sanctions with Europe, granting European states a comfortable transition period to phase out Russian gas imports by early 2028.

Now the bipartisan bill in the U.S. Senate, the Sanctioning Russia Act of 2026, follows the same logic. It exempts America's treaty allies while seeking to target India, China (which has long sidestepped or circumvented U.S. sanctions), Slovakia, Hungary and Azerbaijan with tariffs of up to 100%. It also exempts the U.S., which continues to rely on Russia for enriched uranium to fuel its domestic nuclear reactors.

Today, even as the Western bloc wages a proxy war against Russia in Ukraine, it continues to pour far more money into Russia's coffers than India ever has through its own purchases of Russian resources — from LNG and piped gas to enriched uranium, fertilizers, and precious metals such as palladium and platinum.

Put simply, Washington is seeking to make India and other countries bear the economic costs of a European conflict while the U.S. and its allies continue to buy from Russia whatever they deem essential.

[Hamidreza Azizi @HamidRezaAz]

Is the United States Preparing for a Ground Invasion of #Iran?

🔹The escalating pattern of U.S. strikes against southern Iran in recent days – particularly over the past several hours – may point to a gradual strategy aimed at preparing the ground for a potential deployment of ground forces. Such an operation, if it were to materialize, could be intended to seize control of Iran’s southern coastal belt in order to remove Iranian control over the Strait of Hormuz.

🔹Reports indicate that recent U.S. strikes have targeted several bridges and railway links in southern Iran. At the same time, there have been reports of attacks on airports. These actions may have been intended to disrupt the logistics and mobility of Iranian military forces in the south. Additional reports also suggest strikes against fuel tankers in Bandar Abbas.

🔹Meanwhile, attacks in Sistan and Baluchestan in southeastern Iran targeted the Iranian Army’s 88th Armored Division, alongside similar strikes against positions of the 92nd Armored Division in Khuzestan in the southwest. Some analysts interpret these operations as an effort to degrade Iran’s military capabilities along its principal southern axes, aimed at reducing the risks associated with any future ground deployment.

🔹At the same time, in what appears to be a recurring pattern, U.S. strikes have continued to target Iranian military, missile, drone, and radar installations, as well as IRGC Navy facilities along Iran’s southern coastline on the Persian Gulf.

🔹Taken together, these developments increasingly suggest a gradual but persistent U.S. movement toward a possible ground operation in southern Iran. In other words, the campaign may extend beyond simply degrading Iran’s ability to threaten shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. It could instead indicate that Washington views control of Iran’s southern coastal strip as the only definitive solution to the Strait of Hormuz challenge.

🔹If such an approach exists, it would go well beyond earlier ideas centered on seizing Kharg Island to cut off Iran’s oil exports or occupying islands overlooking the Strait to secure maritime traffic. However, given the length of Iran’s southern coastline – roughly 1,800 kilometers – and the country’s considerable strategic depth, establishing comprehensive control would likely require hundreds of thousands of troops. Moreover, even capturing these areas would not necessarily translate into the ability to sustain long-term control.

🔹In any event, current indicators suggest that we may be approaching the most significant escalation in the U.S.-Iran confrontation since February, driven by Washington’s failure to achieve its strategic objectives. On the other hand, as noted previously, Iran’s actions thus far have also failed to present a meaningful obstacle to this gradual trajectory. One alternative for Tehran could be to shift toward targeting regional economic infrastructure – a move that would significantly broaden the scope of the conflict and lead to a region-wide catastrophe.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

The U.S. government awards more than $1 trillion annually in federal grants to nonprofits, universities, other institutions, and state and local governments. Some of these grants have long been used to advance U.S. national security objectives. But Trump wants to redirect many of the grants toward organizations and causes aligned with his political agenda — and to terminate funding for recipients whose activities or viewpoints diverge from his administration's priorities. That agenda is infused with racial and religious themes, including elements associated with white nationalist messaging and Christian nationalism.
https://t.co/cmAOC1cWIU

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

Trump's sudden decision to slap a 25% tariff on Brazil after a Section 301 investigation should send a chill through every capital negotiating a trade deal with Washington, especially New Delhi. If the U.S. can move that swiftly against one of the world's largest economies, every negotiation with the Trump administration becomes a high-stakes game of chicken.

The concern is not just Trump's willingness to escalate, but his willingness to abandon his own commitments. After signing an MOU with Iran at Versailles on June 17, he effectively tore it up barely three weeks later by resuming airstrikes.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

Washington’s original Indo-Pacific strategy rested on the proposition that the U.S. could prevent Chinese hegemony in Asia only by strengthening a network of capable allies and partners. A G2 rests on the opposite assumption. Instead of organizing a coalition to balance China, Washington would increasingly seek stability through direct understandings with Beijing itself. For America’s allies, the distinction is enormous. https://t.co/lklT4HOaxK

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

Pakistan is confronting a widening crisis of state authority in its frontier regions. The spreading grassroots protests in Pakistan-held Jammu and Kashmir, with police killing seven demonstrators in the latest shootings, and the intensifying insurgency in Balochistan reflect a common pattern: economically marginalized and and politically disenfranchised populations demanding autonomy and accountability while the Pakistani state responds with iron-fisted security crackdowns rather than political accommodation.

In Pakistan-held Jammu and Kashmir, protests that began over economic grievances have evolved into a broader movement for autonomy. In Balochistan, the separatist insurgency is no longer merely a security challenge; it is threatening Pakistan's economic lifelines by jeopardizing Chinese mining projects, the broader China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, and investor confidence.

Together, the dual-front crisis exposes the limits of Pakistan’s security-first approach and underscores a deeper structural problem: a weakening ability to govern its frontier regions through consent rather than brute force.

[Mairav Zonszein מרב זונשיין @MairavZ]

When the Vice President of the United States is a target of Israeli propaganda machine and information campaigns

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

The IMF has provided financial bailouts to Pakistan a record 25 times, placing it just ahead of Argentina’s 23 to 24 financial arrangements. Yet, after securing a $7 billion package in the last IMF bailout less than two years ago, Pakistan is now seeking billions more from its patrons China and Saudi Arabia.

The fundamental reality is that Pakistan is no longer borrowing to grow; it is borrowing simply to pay the interest on what it already owes. Pakistan is truly caught in a "Ponzi dynamic" or "Ponzi finance."

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

From diverting Venezuelan oil-export revenue to the U.S. Treasury, to imposing a crippling fuel blockade on Cuba without provocation, to now levying a 20% fee on cargo transiting the Strait of Hormuz, President Trump is turning America's unrivaled power into an instrument of unbridled unilateral coercion, making a complete mockery of international law in the process. Yet the world watches helplessly.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

China occupied then-autonomous Tibet shortly after the founding of the People’s Republic. The occupation is often viewed primarily through the prism of human rights. But it should also be understood as an effort to lay claim to one of Asia’s most valuable geopolitical assets: the vast, resource-rich Tibetan Plateau dominates the Himalayas, contains the headwaters of Asia’s great rivers, and overlooks South, Central and Southeast Asia. https://t.co/OpMM28Uu08

[Joe Kent @joekent16jan19]

This is objectively absurd.

McKenzie oversaw the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. GWOT generals offering more GWOT-era ideas should not be taken seriously.

It’s insane to hear a GWOT leader like McKenzie casually suggest that we can seize ground, as if that’s the ultimate solution.

In the GWOT, we had no issue seizing ground—it was holding that ground and the resulting insurgency that was the real problem, and most of this occurred before our adversaries possessed drone/ballistic missile capabilities.

Attempting any boots-on-the-ground operation in Iran is a fool’s errand. It will result in Americans getting needlessly killed, all for the sake of stroking neocon egos in Washington.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

My op-ed: The quiet demotion of India in America’s grand strategy represents the most significant shift in U.S. policy toward New Delhi since Washington embraced India as a strategic partner at the turn of the century. https://t.co/zKO4m3DF9j

[Eva Golinger @evagolinger]

Delcy sends selfies to Marco Rubio and runs every decision by him, including her social media posts, cabinet appointments and TV appearances. In turn he sends her "crates of cash" and runs the Venezuelan government from Washington. A XXI century Colony. https://t.co/P47y1oMcFw

[Project Syndicate @ProSyn]

.@Chellaney proposes modest but meaningful steps that would help preserve one of Asia’s oldest civilizations, while sending a clear message to China that it cannot act with impunity. https://t.co/qyPvOVQ0wo

[Stephen Wertheim @stephenwertheim]

“The U.S. Treasury receives the revenue from most of Venezuela’s exports, then disburses it to Venezuela through the country’s banking system, a relationship akin to parents handing out allowances to children. Mr. Rubio and his team set the conditions on what that money can be spent on, and by whom.” https://t.co/7yxteTNQQQ

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

The U.S. and Iran are locked in a "neither war nor peace" stalemate. The U.S. enjoys overwhelming military superiority, but Iran holds the power to shake the global economy. Trump's renewed air campaign reflects not only an effort to recover from a war that has become a political liability, but also mounting pressure from rising U.S. gasoline prices ahead of the congressional midterm elections.

[Dr. Brahma Chellaney @Chellaney]

Tibet has steadily disappeared from the international agenda. Overshadowed by wars, tensions and global economic uncertainty, the Tibetan question has faded into the diplomatic background. China has exploited this silence to accelerate a project to erase Tibet as a distinct civilization ��� and even as a name. https://t.co/Jca6rTiIha