‘America First’ Exposes the Lie of US-India Friendship

The COVID-19 situation in India has spiraled out of control with more than 300,000 new cases per day for several days in a row, leaving the health care system overwhelmed and in chaos. India urgently needs the support and assistance of the international community to get through the crisis.

Yet the behavior of the world’s leading power, the U.S., has been a major disappointment. In April 2020, the U.S. announced it would impose export controls on raw materials for vaccine production, which to date have not been lifted. This is the main reason for the shortage of vaccines in India. India, known as “the world’s pharmacy,” does not lack the technology to produce vaccines, but the imported raw materials to do so. The U.S. ban has placed a stranglehold on the production of vaccines in India. Recently, Indian officials have asked the United States for help, in the hope that the U.S. will relax export controls on raw materials. The U.S. response has been utterly indifferent. On April 22, State Department spokesman Ned Price said that the U.S. is currently focusing on controlling the domestic outbreak as it prioritizes vaccinating the U.S. population, and may “do more” only after the domestic pandemic has eased. Ironically there is currently a huge stockpile of vaccines in the United States. Researchers at Duke University’s Global Health Innovation Center estimate the U.S. may have a surplus of more than 300 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines by this summer.

The indifferent attitude of the United States has caused great anger among the Indian public. Indian media have bluntly called the move “an act of vaccine mafia” and the international community has also condemned it. Responding to public pressure, the U.S. was forced to make a gesture. Recently the U.S. said that it would provide India with 300 oxygen concentrators and would “share” 60 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine with other countries. However, 300 oxygen concentrators are a drop in the bucket for India’s current situation, and the 60 million doses of AstraZeneca vaccine are “spares” that the U.S. may never use itself. It is not known how many will be distributed to India and when. One could say that the sincerity of the U.S. in helping India is questionable.

Under the banner of “America First,” the United States has long pursued a policy of unilateralism and hegemony, and has damaged the interests of other countries to serve its own geopolitical and economic purposes. The world has long recognized this hypocrisy. The pandemic is now out of control in India, and the country is facing an unprecedented humanitarian crisis. In this case, the United States has turned a blind eye and a deaf ear to the enormous suffering of the Indian people and has been reluctant to put aside its “vaccine nationalism,” always working out its own petty calculations. Its coldblooded, mean-spirited attitude has once again set a new low point for the world. U.S. actions have pulled back the curtain on the U.S.-India friendship to reveal the same old “America First” routine. Those words, “America First,” have now become an arbitrary free pass the U.S. gives itself to disregard international rules in its own self-interest.

The COVID-19 pandemic is a major global disaster. If the spread of the virus intensifies, no country will be able to deal with it alone. At the same time, if the world’s vaccines cannot be distributed fairly, the international community is bound to become even more divided, which may cause more contradiction and conflict. The United States is clinging to a one-sided attitude of vaccine nationalism that seems better able to protect its own economic and social interests. In reality, though, it is constantly exacerbating the state of the international environment. Inevitably, it will come back to bite them and it will cost them even more.