Post by soulflower on Apr 19, 2024 13:54:52 GMT -5
Fascinating and informative read.
Major changes to the alignment of global powers are happening in our lifetimes...
Foreign Affairs: Putin and Xi’s Unholy Alliance
Major changes to the alignment of global powers are happening in our lifetimes...
Foreign Affairs: Putin and Xi’s Unholy Alliance
After the breakdown of Russian relations with the United States following Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, the Kremlin pivoted to the East to offset the effect of Western economic sanctions and make the Russian economy more resilient to Western pressure. Russia, whose defense industry survived the lean 1990s largely by selling arms to China, stepped up its exports of more sophisticated weaponry to its southern neighbor, such as S-400 surface-to-air missiles and Su-35 fighter jets, and invested in expanding pipelines, railroads, ports, and cross-border bridges that bring Russian natural resources to the Chinese market and Chinese imports to Russia.
As a result, the share of bilateral trade between the countries in Russia’s overall trade jumped from ten percent before the annexation of Crimea to 18 percent before Putin’s full-scale onslaught against Ukraine in 2022. The EU remained a more important partner for Russia, however, accounting for 38 percent of the country’s trade, as well as being the country’s largest investor and technology provider and a key destination for oil and gas exports. As for China, Russia accounted for only 2.5 percent of its trade in 2022, barely scraping into the ranks of its top ten trading partners. China has counted its commercial, financial, and technological ties to the United States and Europe as far more important for the dynamism of the Chinese economy than its equivalent ties to Russia.
This helps explain why, after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine—which by many accounts Beijing had not expected—China tried to sit on the fence. It maintained ties with Russia, seized the opportunity to buy cheap Russian oil (as did other fence sitters, including India), and did not directly criticize Russian aggression. At the same time, it refrained from supplying Moscow lethal aid except for occasional small shipments of gunpowder and other war-related materials, formally supported Ukrainian territorial integrity, and did not engage in gross violations of Western sanctions—although several Chinese companies were put under U.S. and EU sanctions in early 2024 for shipping banned goods to Russia.
As a result, the share of bilateral trade between the countries in Russia’s overall trade jumped from ten percent before the annexation of Crimea to 18 percent before Putin’s full-scale onslaught against Ukraine in 2022. The EU remained a more important partner for Russia, however, accounting for 38 percent of the country’s trade, as well as being the country’s largest investor and technology provider and a key destination for oil and gas exports. As for China, Russia accounted for only 2.5 percent of its trade in 2022, barely scraping into the ranks of its top ten trading partners. China has counted its commercial, financial, and technological ties to the United States and Europe as far more important for the dynamism of the Chinese economy than its equivalent ties to Russia.
This helps explain why, after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine—which by many accounts Beijing had not expected—China tried to sit on the fence. It maintained ties with Russia, seized the opportunity to buy cheap Russian oil (as did other fence sitters, including India), and did not directly criticize Russian aggression. At the same time, it refrained from supplying Moscow lethal aid except for occasional small shipments of gunpowder and other war-related materials, formally supported Ukrainian territorial integrity, and did not engage in gross violations of Western sanctions—although several Chinese companies were put under U.S. and EU sanctions in early 2024 for shipping banned goods to Russia.
Indeed, the deepening of this partnership is one of the most consequential results of the Ukrainian tragedy. Moscow and Beijing may never sign a formal alliance, but the evolution of their relationship in the years ahead will increasingly affect the world and challenge the West.
To come to terms with this development, Western policymakers should abandon the idea that they can drive a wedge between Beijing and Moscow. Under Trump, the National Security Council entertained the idea of a “reverse Kissinger” approach of engaging Russia, the weaker partner, but to no avail. Whereas former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger courted communist China during the Cold War by offering Beijing a normalization of ties with the United States, U.S. officials cannot extend a deal of that sort to either Moscow or Beijing at this point. Any hopes of peeling them away from each other are nothing more than wishful thinking. Certainly, the Sino-Russian relationship is not without its strains, and existing tensions may be exacerbated as China grows more confident and is tempted to start bossing around the Russians in a more heavy-handed way—something that no ruler in Moscow would take lightly. For now, however, Beijing and Moscow have demonstrated a remarkable ability to manage their differences.
If the China-Russia tandem is here to stay, Western leaders must build a long-term strategy that will help maintain peace by accounting for all the ramifications of having to compete with China and Russia simultaneously. For a start, the West will need to find the right balance between deterrence and reassurance with Moscow and Beijing to avoid dangerous escalatory situations that could arise from accidents, misperceptions, and miscommunication. Western governments should consider the second-order effects of the coercive economic measures they have applied to Russia and China and how retaliatory countermeasures further erode the fabric of globalization. And while they should not tolerate Russian and Chinese disinformation and attempts to subvert the functioning of international institutions, Western countries should seek to make some of these institutions, such as the United Nations and its related agencies, functional again even with Beijing and Moscow on board. When considering how to protect European and Asian security, rein in climate change, govern new disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, and address the challenges facing global financial architecture, Western policymakers must now reckon with the reality of an increasingly resolute Sino-Russian axis.
To come to terms with this development, Western policymakers should abandon the idea that they can drive a wedge between Beijing and Moscow. Under Trump, the National Security Council entertained the idea of a “reverse Kissinger” approach of engaging Russia, the weaker partner, but to no avail. Whereas former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger courted communist China during the Cold War by offering Beijing a normalization of ties with the United States, U.S. officials cannot extend a deal of that sort to either Moscow or Beijing at this point. Any hopes of peeling them away from each other are nothing more than wishful thinking. Certainly, the Sino-Russian relationship is not without its strains, and existing tensions may be exacerbated as China grows more confident and is tempted to start bossing around the Russians in a more heavy-handed way—something that no ruler in Moscow would take lightly. For now, however, Beijing and Moscow have demonstrated a remarkable ability to manage their differences.
If the China-Russia tandem is here to stay, Western leaders must build a long-term strategy that will help maintain peace by accounting for all the ramifications of having to compete with China and Russia simultaneously. For a start, the West will need to find the right balance between deterrence and reassurance with Moscow and Beijing to avoid dangerous escalatory situations that could arise from accidents, misperceptions, and miscommunication. Western governments should consider the second-order effects of the coercive economic measures they have applied to Russia and China and how retaliatory countermeasures further erode the fabric of globalization. And while they should not tolerate Russian and Chinese disinformation and attempts to subvert the functioning of international institutions, Western countries should seek to make some of these institutions, such as the United Nations and its related agencies, functional again even with Beijing and Moscow on board. When considering how to protect European and Asian security, rein in climate change, govern new disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, and address the challenges facing global financial architecture, Western policymakers must now reckon with the reality of an increasingly resolute Sino-Russian axis.