On one side of the equation stands India, which, amid intensifying rivalry among major powers, has pursued a strategy of “selective multilateralism.” New Delhi simultaneously emphasizes cooperation with Russia and China within frameworks such as BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, while also expanding its relations with Europe and the United States. India’s strategic objective is to elevate its global standing — including securing a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.
Although this multilayered policy has given India significant room for maneuver, it has also carried costs — including U.S. tariff pressures in response to New Delhi’s dealings with Moscow and Beijing. Still, Indian officials view Macron’s visit as an opportunity to strengthen ties with Europe and to create balance against regional rivals, particularly Pakistan, which in recent years has concluded extensive military agreements with various actors.
In this context, closer alignment with France could serve India both economically and as a geopolitical signal at regional and global levels.
Macron: Seeking a Way Out of Domestic and European Gridlock
On the other side stands Macron himself, confronting domestic economic challenges, declining public approval, and constraints on France’s influence within Europe. Developments related to the war in Ukraine and France’s relative sidelining from certain diplomatic processes have intensified the need for Paris to redefine its international role.
Macron has sought to diversify France’s foreign policy — strengthening ties with China and India and even signaling readiness for dialogue with Russia — in an effort to rebuild the image of an independent global actor. Beyond foreign policy objectives, this strategy also serves a domestic purpose: demonstrating a degree of distance from Washington and projecting France’s capacity for strategic autonomy.
The central question, however, is whether these moves are merely tactical and temporary — or evidence of a deeper shift in French foreign policy. The answer hinges on Paris’s willingness to bear the costs of greater independence from the United States.
Rafale: The Arms Economy in Service of Geopolitics
One of the key pillars of the visit is its military-commercial dimension. Reports point to the potential sale of more than 100 Dassault Rafale fighter jets to India by Dassault Aviation — a deal that could become the aircraft’s largest foreign contract.
Such an agreement would not only strengthen France’s defense industry but also allow Macron to appear as a major arms broker, forging strategic ties with New Delhi through military cooperation. From Paris’s perspective, this collaboration could also serve as an indirect lever of pressure on Russia. Yet given India’s ongoing economic ties with Moscow, achieving that objective may prove far from straightforward.
At the same time, France’s entry into India through a military gateway underscores that the defense economy remains one of the principal drivers of European power diplomacy.
Europe and the Acceptance of a New Order
Beyond the bilateral dimension, Macron’s trip must be analyzed within the broader evolution of Europe. Multiple signs point to a reassessment among European states of unilateral approaches and full alignment with the United States. Visits by European officials to China and India, along with acknowledgments of past missteps toward BRICS countries, reflect this recalibration.
Europe, which for years defined itself within a West-centric order, now confronts the reality of the East’s rising power and is compelled to engage with it more actively. Yet structural weaknesses, security dependence on the United States, and internal economic challenges limit the continent’s ability to become a fully independent actor in the near term.
As a result, Macron’s trip to India can be seen as a symbol of Europe’s gradual accommodation to a new order — one in which the East is no longer peripheral, but one of the central pillars of global power.