“You should be admiring me…” S Jaishankar

Brut India

When Jaishankar was asked if the US was okay with India buying Russian oil, he couldn’t hold back…

Transcript

00:00Your question, do we have multiple options, answer is yes.

00:05Is that a problem?

00:07Why should it be a problem?

00:08If I'm smart enough to have multiple options,

00:10you should be admiring me.

00:12You know, you shouldn't be criticizing.

00:13Now, is that a problem for other people?

00:19I don't think so.

00:20I don't think so, certainly in this case, and in that case.

00:23So, I don't want you to even inadvertently

00:28give the impression that we are purely

00:31and unsentimentally transactional, we are not.

00:35You know, we get along with people, we believe in things,

00:38we share things, we agree on something.

00:57India has more of a multiple choice mindset,

01:06would that be right?

01:10From non-alignment to, I think you may have called it,

01:13or somebody else called it, all alignment.

01:16So, you can pick and choose alliances,

01:19but you can also pick and choose topics.

01:21On Russia, for example, you still buy Russian oil.

01:27Is that okay with your counterpart from the U.S.?

01:32Everything is, your relationship is fine,

01:35you can do whatever you want, whenever you want?

01:37First of all,

01:38I mean, you're sitting next to each other.

01:40No, no, first of all, delighted to be here,

01:44and I couldn't find a better set of people

01:46to be with on the stage.

01:49So, thank you for whoever put us all together.

01:52Your question, do we have multiple options, answer is yes.

01:57Is that a problem?

01:58Why should it be a problem?

01:59If I'm smart enough to have multiple options,

02:02you should be admiring me, you shouldn't be criticizing.

02:05Now, is that a problem for other people?

02:10I don't think so.

02:11I don't think so, certainly in this case, and in that case,

02:15because, look, we try to explain what are the different

02:20pulls and pressures which countries have,

02:23and it's very hard to have a unidirectional

02:27dimensional relationship.

02:30Now, again, different countries and different relationships

02:33have different histories.

02:36If I were to look, say, between the US and Germany,

02:39it is rooted, you know, there's an alliance nature to it,

02:44there's a certain history on which

02:46that relationship is grounded.

02:49In our case, it's very different.

02:51So, I don't want you to, even inadvertently,

02:57give the impression that we are purely unsentimentally

03:02transactional, we are not.

03:04We get along with people, we believe in things,

03:07we share things, we agree on some things,

03:09but, you know, there are times when you're located

03:15in different places, have different levels of development,

03:18different experiences, all of that gets into it.

03:23So, life is complicated, life is differentiated,

03:27and I think it's very important today

03:30not to reduce the entire complexity of our world

03:35into very sweeping propositions.

03:37I think that era is today behind us.

03:41So, I agree very much with what Tony said,

03:43which is good partners provide choices.

03:48Smart partners take some of those choices.

03:52But, sometimes, there will be choices on which you say,

03:55you know, I think I'll pass up on that one.

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