Indian Sailors Dead in US Strike — Analyst Slams Modi’s Silence

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By TRH Op-Ed Desk

“If these were Chinese sailors, would America have fired?” — Analyst Manish Anand asks the question India’s foreign ministry won’t. Three Indians are dead. Washington has not apologised.

New Delhi, June 11, 2026 — Three Indian merchant sailors are dead. A third incident has struck a vessel with Indian crew aboard. And as New Delhi delivered a formal protest to Washington, a prominent Indian geopolitics analyst is asking a question that the government appears unwilling to voice: does the Modi-Trump friendship mean anything when Americans are killing Indians?

Manish Anand, speaking in a monologue on The Raisina Hills YouTube channel, delivered a sharp indictment of both Washington’s conduct and New Delhi’s response to a week of devastating attacks on commercial vessels carrying Indian seafarers near the Strait of Hormuz.

“Three Indians have been killed in American attacks,” Anand said. “And America has expressed no regret, no apology, no condolence. Instead, they are releasing videos — essentially chest-thumping about having destroyed three ships with missiles,” he added.

The attacks in question involve MT Marivex (June 8), MT Settebello (June 9), and now a third vessel, MT Jalveer, struck off the Omani coast just hours after US President Donald Trump publicly congratulated Prime Minister Narendra Modi on becoming India’s longest-serving elected prime minister — surpassing Jawaharlal Nehru’s record.

“At the very moment the prime minister and his ministers were celebrating the Nehru record, devastating news was coming in for Indian families,” Anand noted, adding: “Three Indians killed in an American attack.”

All crew aboard MT Jalveer are reported safe, rescued with the swift assistance of the Omani navy — a point Anand acknowledged with appreciation. But the broader pattern, he argued, represents a fundamental challenge to India’s dignity and strategic posture.

Anand reserved pointed criticism for the Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, who stated that two of the three targeted vessels were on US sanctions lists, with only one classified as non-compliant. For Anand, that framing amounts to victim-blaming.

“What the foreign ministry is essentially saying is that Indian merchant navy workers were themselves taking risks by working on sanctioned ships,” he said. “The blame is being shifted onto the Indians who died. This is deeply worrying,” noted Anand.

He also questioned the effectiveness of India’s diplomatic demarche — the summoning of US chargé d’affaires Jason Meeks — pointing out that the protest produced no visible deterrence: Washington struck MT Jalveer anyway, hours later. “What was the point of summoning the American diplomat if America simply carried on and attacked a third ship?” he asked.

The analyst raised what he called the central geopolitical question of the crisis: “If these ships had Chinese sailors aboard — if these were Chinese-crewed vessels in the Gulf of Oman — would America have targeted them? China also sends its people into the merchant navy. Chinese vessels also pass through these waters. America fears China. It does not fear India. That is the conclusion this forces us to draw,” asked Anand.

With Modi expected to meet Trump on the sidelines of the G7 summit in France next week, Anand called on the prime minister to directly seek answers and compensation. “People will expect Modi to look Trump in the eye and ask: why were Indians targeted? What compensation is America prepared to offer?”

He also challenged the wisdom of India rushing to sign a bilateral trade deal with the United States — one that Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal has indicated is 99% complete — at a moment when US forces are striking vessels crewed by Indian nationals. “Why should India sign this deal when America is directly attacking Indians, costing Indian lives?” Anand asked.

At its core, Anand’s commentary is a challenge to India’s much-cited doctrine of strategic autonomy. “Strategic autonomy has been the hallmark of Indian foreign policy for decades,” he said. “Today, people in diplomatic circles are debating whether we have compromised that autonomy — whether we have become so aligned with America that we cannot condemn them even when they kill our own people.”

The deaths of deck cadet Aditya Sharma, engine fitter Shivanand Chaurasiya, and a third seafarer whose identity is being verified have put faces to the geopolitical argument. Their families, Anand noted, are in mourning — and international media is showing it to the world.

India is watching to see whether its prime minister, at the most powerful table in the world next week, will ask the question that the foreign ministry has so far been reluctant to: Why are Indian sailors dying in American strikes — and when will it stop?

(Based on a monologue by geopolitics analyst Manish Anand published on The Raisina Hills YouTube channel, June 11, 2026.)