Just one caveat, the crude oil is not directly consumable, it needs to be refined. The oil refineries are designed to process only a limited types/grades of crude oil.
India entered the picture when it comes to the Russian crude oil because some of our refineries possess the capability to process this type of oil. Many middle eastern countries get their oil refined here in India for a similar reason.
You must have heard about Pakistan importing the sanctioned Russian oil. It was processed here in India.
As someone who grew up in the oil industry, what you are saying has always been the case - countries who lack refining capacity always re-route their oil consumption to countries who can refine it for them.
Pre-2022, say a country like Poland would go 'Hey italy, i bought Russian oil, i need it refined, pls gib slot'. Post-2022, a country like Poland goes 'hey India, italy or spain(two biggest refiners in europe) wont take russian oil, i wont import russian oil, so can you buy extra russian crude, refine it and gib it to me plz'.
Thats it. thats all the difference there is.
Absolutely, they are saving India for the dinner. They have not been overtly hostile towards India because their Indo-Pacific strategy will go up in the flames.
Also, we cannot be blind to the fact that US + UK jointly run a naval base right in the middle of the Indian Ocean on an occupied piece of land (Diego Garcia).
That is a major saving grace for Russia. Russia never hosted the anti-India "non state actors" on it's soil. Russia doesn't interfere in India's domestic politics (overtly). There is no major geopolitical friction between India and Russia.
This is because Russia and India do not have any geopolitical competition or competing goals with one another.
To summarize, this is the geo-political goals of the 4 main players:
1. China : World domination, while breaking out of the 1st island chain.
2. USA : world domination, by making sure it remains the top dog in the 'free world' and can weaponize 'freedom' against its competitors.
3. India: survival, with self-contained mini-continental logistics, with potential for world domination due to demographics & geography
4. Russia : security of the state.
The Russian central geopolitical considerations are two-fold : a) access to warm water ports b) protection of the east european plain.
Its these two goals that drive Russian expansionism, as their only warm water ports basically lead to two big salty lakes with tiny outlets ( Black sea and mediterranean) that are both controlled by NATO, while the east european plains are indefensible and the *only* way to defend a vast & indefensible flatland is to shorten the front.
This is exactly what the soviet union did by annexing western half of poland after ww2 : with its southern flank anchored by the Carpatian mountains ( Ukraine-Romania-Hungary border), it effectively shortened the eastern european plain to the length of the Polish border.
A tertiary Russian geopolitical goal has surfaced since breakup of USSR : protecting the Russian underbelly from central Asia. They do this by creating a buffer state in Kazakhstan, which is effectively the most russi-fied nation on the planet with a huge % of Russians living in it.
As such, Russia and India are not hostile to each other even behind the scenes because Russia and India do not have any competing interests. India has no interest in projecting control north of the Hindu Kush or Tibetan plateau, India also has no horse in the Russian desires as mentioned above.
Absolutely. and we select the best option available to us under a particular situation. However, this is also true that India-Russia relation has less friction points than the India-US relation.
Also, there is a cultural angle, the western societies are more individualistic and amoral than the eastern ones. This reflects in their foreign policies as well.
West needs to maintain itself as the attractive option. Because west is highly dependent on brain-drain to sustain itself. Pre 2000s, the brain drain was required to maintain their technological lead and as such, the west projected itself as the 'you mind your business we mind ours, no harm done but so rich and clean' image to attract top talent.
Post 2000, the west's survival depends on brain-drain and manpower drain because western birth rates have cratered. West has also learned from its own history that if you are highly dependent on immigration, you cannot resist the immigrant cultures of origin and eventually, they will dominate your land. Hence the focus since 2000s to vilify India,China and all such nations that are the bulk majority of western immigrants - if you can keep projecting India as terrible, such as rape stories ( despite the fact that almost every single western country is 20-50 times more rape filled per capita than India), it will make 2nd generation Indians disassociate with India out of moral guilt and absorb better into western culture.
THAT is the key driver of anti-indian sentiments put out by western media, all of which are highly controlled by their governments through embedding ( just see how many CNN, BBC, CNBC, Fox etc hosts are former state department or former DoD employees).
America has an added incentive to be hostile towards India : it is the only country that has the demographics AND the system structure to challenge USA's crown as 'leader of the free world'. Ie, what happens if India hits 40 trillion economy one day and what happens if that day comes before USA hits that mark ? Boom. India is the leader of the free world. Its a democracy, its far more diverse indegenously than USA is and USA can't use ' evol dictatorial barbarians who are threat to free world, unite behind meeeeee' rhetoric. Hence US panderings to these fake-ass democracy ratings to try and de-legitimise Indian democracy and keep a hold of its crown along with sponsoring balkanisation of India.
No country has a bigger stake in breaking up India as USA or China does.
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