Bangladesh is committing billions to buy US gas, jets, and grain to honour a trade pact designed to ward off American tariffs. But as US courts strike down the legal basis for those tariff threats, Dhaka still remains locked into an expensive shopping spree.

Not once, but twice since February, United States courts have gutted the legal basis for Washington’s global tariff threats, including against Bangladesh. Yet, the systematic unravelling of this legal foundation in American jurisprudence has done nothing to slow Dhaka’s extraordinary US shopping spree.

A new item was added to the shopping list on August 12, when a cabinet committee cleared a decade-long liquefied natural gas deal with Gunvor USA LLC, the Texas arm of Swiss trading firm Gunvor Group. The agreement secures 117 LNG cargoes between now and 2038 -- roughly 7.5 million tonnes.

The deal is part of $15 billion US energy purchases over 15 years Bangladesh signalled under February’s trade agreement.

It bypassed any open tender process, binding Bangladesh’s gas bill to the US through an unusual “state-to-state” formula negotiated with a private trading firm.

The government has pitched the Gunvor deal as an act of prudent hedging and commercial common sense. Qatar, historically Bangladesh’s largest LNG supplier, has invoked force majeure on several contracts and warned it may deliver only half of its promised 2026 volumes -- collateral damage from geopolitical tensions around the Strait of Hormuz and US-Israeli attacks on Iran.

Asked to comment by this reporter at a press conference yesterday, Commerce Minister Khandakar Abdul Muktadir defended the purchase, insisting the cabinet approved the deal strictly on its economic merit. Based on the index price on the day of approval, the average price for all 117 cargoes works out to around $9 per MMBtu, according to the minister. “We considered that to be a good offer, so we approved it,” Muktadir said, maintaining that the government applies its “best judgment based on the merit of individual purchase”.

Yet the Gunvor contract is not a standalone energy strategy; it is one of the largest items on a rapidly expanding US procurement list. Wheat imports are actively underway, with 660,000 tonnes of a promised 3.5 million-tonne, five-year commitment already secured. Here too, Minister Muktadir pushed back against criticism of face-value pricing, arguing that long-term efficiency dictates the calculus. “Compared with wheat that we import from other sources, the percentage of waste in US wheat is much lower. If you translate that into monetary value, it becomes more cost-effective,” he said, noting that overall savings and long-term benefits must be factored into price determinations.

Beyond grain, Biman Bangladesh Airlines ditched a plan to purchase aircraft from European manufacturer Airbus in April to sign a $3.7 billion deal for 14 Boeing aircraft, while Annex III of the trade pact commits Bangladesh to “endeavour to increase purchases” of US military equipment.

This buying spree persists against the backdrop of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART), a bilateral pact with Washington whose underlying rationale has evaporated in US courts. Bangladesh signed the treaty on February 9, just three days before a general election, under Muhammad Yunus’s interim government.

Technically, the ART has not formally entered into force because neither government has completed domestic notification procedures to give it legal validity as an enforceable agreement. Yet Dhaka continues to execute multi-billion-dollar commercial commitments as if it’s bound by law.

Shrouded in a strict non-disclosure agreement, the text only surfaced when published by the US Trade Representative. Merely eleven days later, on February 20, the US Supreme Court torched the pact’s coercive foundation. In a 6-3 ruling authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the court found that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), the legal mechanism behind President Donald Trump’s threatened 37 percent tariff on Bangladesh and different rates on other trade partners, never granted the president such tariff authority.

The White House immediately invoked Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 to slap on a 10 percent uniform global tariff under a provision capped by Congress at 150 days. This, too, failed to survive judicial scrutiny. On May 7, the US Court of International Trade ruled 2-1 that the tariff was unlawful because the administration failed to demonstrate a genuine “balance-of-payments” crisis. Although a Federal Circuit stay in June allowed collections to continue temporarily while appeals dragged on, the statutory clock ran out on July 24.

Washington instantly replaced it with fresh Section 301 “forced labour” tariffs resulting from a spring-long USTR investigation. Bangladesh landed in a 17-country penalty tier alongside India, Pakistan, Mexico, Cambodia, and Indonesia, facing a flat 10 percent additional duty aimed at blocking imports of raw materials produced with forced labour. When stacked on top of Bangladesh’s standard 15.6 percent Most Favoured Nation (MFN) rate on garments, the total tariff burden on exporters surged to nearly 25.6 percent.

This imbalance highlights the asymmetric nature of the treaty. Under Article 1.1, Bangladesh must eliminate duties on nearly all US goods immediately or within five to 10 years.

In return, the US did not commit any guaranteed purchase of Bangladeshi products under the lopsided agreement.

Washington’s matching concession on garments, which represent 86 percent of what Bangladesh sells to America, is outlined in Article 5.3. Until now, it is merely a commitment to “establish a mechanism” for zero-tariff apparel access. The US has not explained the mechanism yet.

That pledge is tied strictly to the use of US-origin cotton and man-made fibre and offers no volume guarantees or implementation deadlines.

Khalilur Rahman, who became the foreign minister after the BNP swept the February 12 election, negotiated the deal under the interim government as its foreign adviser. He publicly defended the arrangement, insisting that both major political parties were briefed before the signing of the deal.

In defence of the deal, he highlighted an exit clause allowing Bangladesh to walk away with 60 days’ notice, arguing the pact does not conflict with a “Bangladesh First” policy.

Political figures remain sceptical, with independent MP Rumeen Farhana calling for the deal to be discussed in parliament and Jamaat-e-Islami advocating for a selective excision of harmful clauses.

However, economic analysts argue that viewing the pact through a standard diplomatic lens misses its true function.

Mohammad Abdur Razzaque, chairman of Research and Policy Integration for Development (RAPID), contends that the ART is “not in fact a genuine trade agreement”, but rather a “power and political dominance agreement” where US interests are preserved overwhelmingly.

Despite the presence of a 60-day exit clause and the double nullification of reciprocal tariffs by US courts, Razzaque argues, Bangladesh lacks the geopolitical leverage to actually trigger an exit. Instead, Dhaka is compelled to maintain its elevated import schedule from the US as a symbolic gesture, essentially buying American goods to demonstrate political alignment and signal “that it wants the US”.

This political compulsion has led Bangladesh to concede significant long-term policy autonomy through third-country clauses that operate independently of any tariff threat.

Article 4.3.5 bars Bangladesh from purchasing nuclear reactors, fuel rods, or enriched uranium from any nation that “jeopardises essential US interests”. It may affect the future expansion of the Russian-financed Rooppur nuclear plant.

Article 4.3.4 permits Washington to terminate the agreement if Bangladesh enters a free-trade deal with a “non-market economy”, creating major hurdles for Dhaka’s potential entry into the China-led trade bloc, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).

Furthermore, Article 3.2.2 extends US oversight to digital trade, Article 4.2 aligns export controls and sanctions enforcement with Washington, Article 4.1 appears to target Chinese-owned firms, and Article 5.2 grants the US rights to audit Bangladeshi industrial subsidies.

Article 6.4.2 allows the US to reimpose reciprocal tariffs under Executive Order 14257 if Bangladesh defaults. Neither government has explained what legal mechanism replaces this nullified penalty clause.

However, the US Supreme Court has already struck down the reciprocal tariffs under Executive Order 14257.

Mohammed Amirul Haque, president of the Chittagong Chamber of Commerce and Industry and chairman of Seacom Group, who was involved in the ART negotiations, stresses that commercial logic must dictate procurement regardless of origin. “The important thing is the price,” Haque notes, emphasising that any purchase must scrutinise whether pricing is favourable and that final terms depend heavily on negotiation skills.

Haque also urged the government to include private-sector representatives in major procurement decisions, such as LNG and aircraft acquisitions, arguing that “business leaders possess superior negotiation skills and pricing expertise that could benefit state purchases.”

Fazlul Hoque, administrator of the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry, framed the rising trade volume as a routine aspect of global commerce. “Export or import from the US may increase or decrease, and it is a normal process of international trade,” Hoque said, adding that it remains difficult to attribute the import surge directly to the ART.