There was an extraordinary photograph available in New Delhi this week.Narendra Modi hosting Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin and Iran's President Masoud Pezeshkian at the BRICS summit. To British eyes, the temptation is obvious. Look at the guest list and conclude that India is assembling with the West's enemies.
That conclusion would be understandable. It would also be wrong. The most important lesson from this week's BRICS summit is not that India is turning against the West. It is that India increasingly refuses to accept the Western assumption that friendship requires choosing one camp.
That distinction may define the emerging world order. Russia is at war with Ukraine. Iran is in direct confrontation with America and Israel. China is America's principal strategic competitor. BRICS itself is discussing greater use of national currencies, alternative payment systems and reform of institutions historically dominated by Western powers.
Yet sitting at the centre of this gathering is India, simultaneously building closer economic relationships with Britain, Europe and the United States. This is strategy. For much of the period after 1945, international relations were organised around blocs. You were broadly with Washington or Moscow. After the Soviet Union collapsed, Western governments became accustomed to something even more comfortable: an international system whose institutions, currencies and assumptions were overwhelmingly Western.
India never entirely accepted either model. Its doctrine of non-alignment has evolved into strategic autonomy. India wants American technology without American foreign policy. Russian relationships without Russian dependency. Trade with China without Chinese dominance. British investment without British instruction. That may irritate everyone.
Which is precisely why it works. The UK and India are developing one of their strongest relationships in decades. Trade, investment, technology, defence and artificial intelligence increasingly bind the two countries together. India will sit with Britain on Monday and with countries Britain profoundly disagrees with on Tuesday if Indian interests require it.
The mature British response is not indignation. Indeed, there is an irony here. For centuries, Western powers insisted that sovereign states were entitled to pursue their national interests. Now that India possesses sufficient economic and geopolitical weight to do precisely that, Western commentators sometimes regard the behaviour as suspicious.
BRICS itself should not be romanticised. Its members have enormous disagreements. India and China are strategic competitors, they have fought wars, and India is no fool - it knows never to trust China ever since its invasions into Indian territory and occupying Tibet. Iran and several Gulf members have conflicting regional interests. Russia wants BRICS to weaken Western leverage more aggressively than India does. BRICS is important because the West messed up it's Foreign Policy, because it tarriffed, it threatened, it dictated. It's the ex-girlfriend not treated well, finding someone who treats her with respect.
Britain possesses universities, capital markets, technology, legal institutions and global networks that India wants. India possesses growth, scale, talent and geopolitical reach that Britain increasingly needs. That relationship does not require India to become Western. The great mistake would therefore be to look at Modi standing alongside Putin, Xi and Pezeshkian and ask:
“Whose side is India on?” The answer is becoming increasingly obvious.
India's.