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In the time-honored triangular relationship between China, the United States and Russia, China and Russia are getting closer and closer in recent years.
For now, in the high-profile crisis between Russia and Ukraine, China is walking a tightrope to carefully weigh the stakes—on the one hand, an “old friend” who is getting closer in response to the changing geopolitical landscape, on the other hand It is an important gateway to Europe for its important economic strategy “One Belt, One Road”. In broader geopolitical relations, there are also games with traditional Western countries such as the United States and Europe in terms of their long-term strategic positions.
“China is increasingly recognizing that if Russia fails to win this round of geopolitical confrontation with the West, China will be the next target,” said Yali, senior lecturer in politics and international relations at UNSW Sydney. Alexander Korolev told the BBC in Chinese.
China’s “policy neutrality”
Following the recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Beijing has tended to remain silent in the early days, mostly citing facts in its responses. When the outside world was constantly questioned and questioned how China fulfilled its responsibility as a great power, Beijing gradually revealed its position. However, China largely maintains its policy of neutrality on the surface, that is, in principle, it does not choose sides between Russia and Ukraine.
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On the 22nd, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the recognition of rebel-held Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine as independent states.
On the 19th of this month, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi expressed China’s position on the situation in Ukraine at the Munich Security Conference. He emphasized, “The sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of all countries should be respected and maintained, because these are the basic norms of international relations, reflect the purposes of the UN Charter, and are also China’s consistent principled position, and Ukraine is no exception. ”
Wang Yi also said, “For European security, all parties can raise their own concerns, among which Russia’s reasonable security concerns should be respected and taken seriously.”
The remarks immediately sparked discussions among observers.
“I’m glad to see that China has decided not to remain silent on this issue. Beijing recognizes the risks of getting too close to Moscow, and it will be seen as abusive,” said Gladys, director of the Asia Program at the German Marshall Fund, a U.S. think-tank. (Bonnie Glaser) on Twitter.
“It’s too difficult for (China) to insist on a strict policy of non-intervention while giving Moscow a pass,” Derek Grossman, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation, a U.S. think-tank, said on Twitter. He also said that judging from Wang Yi’s statement, Beijing did not directly condemn Moscow’s military buildup, so it was just a “meaningless euphemism.”
Professor Zhu Zhiqun, head of the Department of International Relations at Bucknell University in the United States, described Wang Yi’s remarks as “stable and stable”. He told BBC Chinese that this reflects the consistent position of China’s diplomacy. “Although Sino-Russian relations are relatively close and special, China and Uzbekistan are also relatively friendly and have no conflict of interests. China’s respect for sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity should include Ukraine and Russia.”
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In September 2021, the first freight train from Ukraine to China will depart.
On the 22nd, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the recognition of rebel-held Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine as independent states. Biden immediately announced a ban on new investment, trade and financing by Americans with the two regions. Britain, Australia, the European Union and others have also condemned Putin’s decision.
China has not publicly condemned Russia’s actions. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in a phone call with US Secretary of State Blinken on the 22nd that China’s position on the Ukraine issue is consistent, the legitimate security concerns of any country should be respected, and the purposes and principles of the UN Charter should be upheld.
Wang Yi reiterated that the Ukraine issue is closely related to the failure to effectively implement the new Minsk agreement. He called on all parties to exercise restraint, ease the situation and resolve differences through dialogue and negotiation.
Acquiescence to invade Ukraine?
In this Russia-Ukraine conflict, China’s clearest stance so far in supporting Russia is that it opposes NATO expansion. But whether this means that China supports Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a matter of opinion.
The expansion of NATO has been a focus of Russia’s attention, putting the country in a standoff with the United States and its NATO allies. Moscow has demanded sweeping security assurances from NATO, including a halt to further eastward expansion, and a firm pledge to deny Ukraine membership as Russian troops have been massed on the Ukrainian border for weeks. The former Soviet state Ukraine wants to join the US-led NATO to defend against potential threats from Russia.
In a joint statement before the opening of the Winter Olympics, the leaders of China and Russia said both sides opposed “the continued expansion of NATO” and called on NATO to “abandon the ideology of the Cold War.”
The Chinese and Russian media are promoting almost identically that NATO expansion is the root cause of the conflict. Both sides have also repeatedly said that the United States and its allies have exaggerated the threat from Russia.
The China National Defense News, which is in charge of the General Political Department of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, said on the 9th of this month that “the West continues to exaggerate Russia’s massing of troops on the Russian-Ukrainian border with the intention of ‘invading’ Ukraine.” Tensions are ‘adding fuel to the fire'”, emphasizing that the United States continues to increase its intervention in the situation in Ukraine and “attempts to put pressure on Russia in multiple directions”.
Some analysts believe that the unanimous pace of China and Russia in opposing NATO expansion means China’s acquiescence to Russian aggression.
“China’s support for Russia’s position on the European security order is very clear,” wrote the Marshall Foundation’s Gregory and Andrew Small in the US news magazine “Foreign Policy”. Having provided Russia with a partial safety net from economic sanctions after the 2014 conflict, this time Beijing has more openly facilitated Russian aggression in Europe before a possible invasion.”
But some scholars hold different views. Wen-Ti Sung, a lecturer at the School of Asia-Pacific at the Australian National University (ANU), believes the word “acquiescence” is an overstatement. He told BBC Chinese, “To oppose the expansion of NATO is to oppose the spread of the Cold War mentality, which is in line with what China has always said, and China has not made a special case for Russia.”
He explained that China has always claimed to oppose the so-called “Cold War mentality”, and criticized various military alliances with this argument, such as the loose Quartet Security Dialogue (QUAD), the Australia-UK-US Security Agreement (AUKUS), etc., not to mention NATO’s more a real military alliance.
Song Wendi therefore believes that China expressed its opposition to NATO’s continued expansion in the Sino-Russian joint statement. “It is not so much that China supports Russia on behalf of China. It is better to say that China tries its best to avoid making any comments on the Ukraine case by name.”
Zhu Zhiqun also said that the joint statement of the leaders of China and Russia reflects the consistent views of the two countries, and China has not acquiesced to Russia’s provocations in Europe.
“The current world pattern seems to be back to the Cold War era, and the United States and its allies are fighting against China and Russia. From the perspective of China and Russia, the Cold War has long since ended, the Soviet Union has collapsed, and the Warsaw Pact has also been dissolved, so why does NATO still exist and do not exist? Continue to expand? They have been questioning the rationality of NATO’s existence.” Zhu Zhiqun said.
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Despite the looming war situation, Putin visited Beijing earlier this month for the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics and to meet with Xi.
Some analysts believe that China’s seemingly neutral position in this Russia-Ukraine conflict actually reflects the mutual support between China and Russia in a tacit way.
“They didn’t make a clear statement about each other’s territorial claims, but they supported each other in confrontation with the West,” Alexander Korolev, a senior lecturer in politics and international relations at the University of New South Wales, told the BBC Chinese.
Judging from past interactions, when it comes to China’s sovereignty disputes in the South China Sea, Russia has only issued some “general courtesy statements”, saying that it must be resolved through diplomatic channels; but Russia fully supports China’s ignoring of the Hague Tribunal’s decision on the South China Sea issue. ruling and expressing rejection of U.S. attempts to internationalize the issue, Korolev explained.
“Even if Wang Yi says territorial integrity is important, China is most likely to support Russia when it comes to containing the West, especially the United States.”
China and Russia are not military alliances in the traditional sense, but from the current situation, China and Russia are getting closer.
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a joint statement on the opening day of the Beijing Winter Olympics. The two sides also unveiled broader plans for economic cooperation, particularly in the oil and gas sector.
For Russia, China’s support is a godsend. The United States has been warning recently that it will impose economic sanctions on Russia if it invades Ukraine. And working with China, the world‘s second-largest economy, would mitigate the impact of sanctions. After Russia annexed the Crimea peninsula in 2014, Western countries led by the United States canceled cooperation with Russian oil and gas companies, while China signed a new gas supply agreement with Russia and started construction of the “Power of Siberia” pipeline, an important energy project.
Nikkei Asia quoted Russian political insiders as saying Putin was counting on China to help him through the storm as Moscow and Washington sparred over Ukraine.
“China is our strategic buffer,” Sergey Karaganov, director of Russia’s foreign and defense policy committee and a longtime adviser to the Kremlin, told Nikkei Asia. “In any difficult situation, we can count on China for military, political and economic support.”
China a short-term winner?
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The reason why China is so cautious in expressing its position is that it has long-term strategic considerations with the United States and Europe in terms of diplomacy and economy.
The reason why China expresses its position so cautiously is closely related to its strategic game with the United States and Europe in terms of diplomacy and economy.
“China has benefited in the short term from the current Ukraine crisis because it has distracted the United States from China, which is Washington’s main adversary, not Russia,” Korolev said.
Relations between China and the United States have deteriorated sharply in recent years. Since the outbreak of the US-China trade war in 2018, the two sides have clashed in military, technology and other aspects, and the relationship between the two countries has fallen into a period of ice. The new crown epidemic has worsened the relationship between the two countries. Washington’s diplomatic boycott, citing human rights concerns in Xinjiang, ahead of the Olympics, which Beijing is particularly concerned about, has cast a shadow over China’s international image.
Korolev said that Sino-US competition is the most prominent structural feature in the contemporary international system and a long-term trend. Recently, the United States is also consolidating its power in the Indo-Pacific region to contain China. And all the attention of the United States is currently on Russia and its Ukraine policy, and no one is talking about Xinjiang for a while.
“This exhausts the US and buys time for China to compete with the US for geopolitical influence in the Asia-Pacific region.”
In the past two years, not only has the relationship between the United States and China deteriorated, but the relationship between China and the EU has also been in a downward spiral. Concerns about China’s non-market economic practices and human rights record are growing in Europe. In March last year, the EU sanctioned four Chinese officials and the Xinjiang Public Security Bureau; China subsequently imposed counter-sanctions on European lawmakers. A proposed EU-China investment pact was also shelved last year.
China has imposed a trade ban on NATO member Lithuania in recent months after it deepened ties with Taiwan. EU nations have united to defend Lithuania, suing China at the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Craig Singleton, a researcher at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank in Washington, wrote in Foreign Policy that China’s exports to the EU and the UK combined are almost 10 times larger than to Russia . With growing restrictions on technology transfer and Chinese investment, as well as calls to reduce supply chain reliance on China, China’s economy could face sanctions from Europe if China is too supportive of Putin over Ukraine .
Song Wendi believes that “China hopes to maintain a detached commanding heights between Europe and Russia, causing both sides to compete for Beijing’s support, thereby increasing China’s bargaining chips in the face of the United States.”
He described China’s need for Russia to create “just right tension” in Europe, “tense enough to distract the West from the Indo-Pacific region, and even trigger Europe to seek Chinese mediation; but don’t escalate to a full-scale war, lest it be a problem for China’s 20th Party Congress. This year brings too many uncontrollable international environmental variables, and also avoids Western countries blaming China and criticizing China for providing assistance to the aggressor Russia.”
Korolev noted that Europe itself is divided on Ukraine. France, Germany, Italy, etc. are not exactly on the same front as the United States. It is unlikely that Europe will deliberately cut off economic cooperation with China because of Ukraine, because Ukraine is not a priority strategic interest for Europe.
He believes that while China is concerned about the possible consequences of an escalation in Ukraine, it is unlikely that Beijing will stop supporting Russia in general matters of global politics, especially Russia-U.S. relations. Amid growing tensions between China and the West, “China cannot lose its only ally.”