The news that Donald Trump is planning a visit to India, with Narendra Modi finally thawing what was once a conspicuously frosty relationship, should elicit more than a mere shrug from those who still cling to fantasies of the Commonwealth as a meaningful geopolitical force. It is yet another nail in the coffin of Britain’s post-imperial delusions. For years, the Commonwealth was sold to a reluctant public as a ‘network of influence’, a soft-power bridge to far-flung markets.
But when the world’s most powerful man sets his sights on New Delhi, it is not to pay respects to the Queen’s legacy. It is to cut deals with a rising superpower that has long since outgrown the need for a British guardian. Modi, the strident nationalist, has shown little patience for sentiment; his foreign policy is a calculus of hard interests.
That he now warms to Trump is a sign that India sees the White House, not Buckingham Palace, as the centre of gravity. Britain, meanwhile, plays the role of a slightly eccentric uncle, dispensed with when serious business begins. The visit, if it happens, will confirm what many have whispered: the Commonwealth is a glorified book club, not a power bloc.
And the sooner our politicians admit this, the sooner we can focus on forging real alliances rather than nursing post-colonial nostalgia.
