The Quad was built to counter China. Today’s meeting is mostly about Iran.
S. Jaishankar hosts US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Australia’s Penny Wong, and Japan’s Toshimitsu Motegi in New Delhi today — the first Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting since the US and Israel went to war with Iran on February 28. The Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the world’s oil moves, has been effectively closed for over a month. India’s energy map looks permanently different. The IEA called it the largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market.
What’s Actually on the Table
The Quad’s founding purpose was Indo-Pacific deterrence — freedom of navigation, supply-chain resilience, a quiet check on Beijing’s reach. Iran’s foreign minister and Russia’s Lavrov were in Delhi for BRICS days earlier, which adds geopolitical weight. Today, half the agenda is energy survival.
India is the world’s third-largest oil importer. Modi has already asked Indians to skip gold and cut fuel use. Fuel prices rose by ₹3 a litre this month — the first hike in four years. Refiners are pivoting to Latin American and African crude. Jaishankar has to argue for Hormuz reopening while keeping the Quad’s China credibility intact. That’s two separate alliances in one chair.
The Trade Deal Sitting Next to the Meeting
Rubio arrived May 23. He met Modi and Jaishankar on May 25 — trade, defence, maritime security, energy, all in one bundle. He said the India-US trade deal could be finalised “very soon”. The Trump administration also says an Iran deal is “largely negotiated” — uranium surrender in exchange for a phased Hormuz reopening.
Both deals are loaded onto today’s meeting room. Neither is signed.
The Quad has no mutual-defence treaty. No joint command. No binding power. It is a coordination platform being asked to coordinate three crises at once — China’s Pacific expansion, an Iran war reshaping global oil, and a US-India relationship the Trump administration keeps calling strategic while picking fights over tariffs.
Four ministers. One room. One alliance built for a different decade. Today tests whether it still fits the one it’s in.