BY JOHN FENG, Newsweek,
There are no permanent friends and no permanent enemies, only permanent interests, as the saying goes. And while China isn’t party to the conflict in Ukraine, perhaps no country has been scrutinized more for its relations with Russia.
On February 4, just three weeks before Vladimir Putin ordered his troops into Ukraine, Russia’s president was in Beijing, standing shoulder to shoulder with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, to reaffirm their alignment against the West.
What followed was a 5,000-word joint statement in which they declared the China-Russia partnership to be one with “no limits,” with “no forbidden areas” of cooperation. At a time when Russian forces were amassing on Ukraine’s borders, this bond raised concerns in European capitals—and rang alarm bells after the invasion began.
The West has been perturbed by what it sees as China’s tacit support for Russia because of its refusal to condemn Moscow four months into the war. It has accused Beijing of repeating the Kremlin’s line against NATO, opposing military aid for Kyiv and sanctions on Russia, despite Chinese officials’ insistence they support Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Following the West’s sweeping penalties against the Russian economy, U.S. officials, including Pentagon policy chief Colin Kahl, see few choices for Moscow other than to further align itself with Beijing.
To be sure, China views its relationship with Russia—the only major power with enough clout to back Beijing in meaningful ways—as geostrategically vital, too. Together, experts see a joint effort to degrade the U.S.-led liberal order and replace it with one more amenable to authoritarian systems.
But this alignment, which Beijing says is based on “non-alliance, non-confrontation and non-targeting of third parties,” may come at the expense of China’s important trading relationships with North America and Europe, which together make up more than half the world’s GDP.
Russia, meanwhile, benefits from growing ties with the world’s busiest market. Since invading Ukraine, Russia has also increased its financial dependence on China. Without Russia, China might find itself isolated in its systemic rivalry with the United States, which is spans every area from trade and technology to diplomacy and military power.
Russia has said relations with China are a foreign policy priority. Its foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, said this month that there remained “truly inexhaustible potential” in bilateral ties.
Putin, in a recent call with Xi, said the relationship was at an “all-time high,” and constantly improving. The two countries will look to further develop their defense ties, he said, in a dynamic likely to change the makeup of regional security in Northeast Asia.
China argues it has partnered with Russia in order to “protect the UN-centered international system.” However, not everyone is convinced their goals will remain aligned in the future.
A survey published Monday by Foreign Affairs magazine asked international relations analysts about the prospect of Chinese-Russian ties enduring in the long run. Dozens of subject-matter experts ranked the possibility of continued alignment on a scale from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree,” and confidence in their position from 1 to 10.
“However, whether the two countries will be able to manage the growing asymmetry in their relations in the coming years is a point of great uncertainty,” she added, agreeing that the ties will last with a confidence level of 7.
Bonny Lin, director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), agreed that the two countries’ ties would endure with a confidence level of 8.
Agreeing with a confidence level of 9 was Bonnie Glaser, director of the Asia Program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.
“Although not all Chinese and Russian interests coincide, both Beijing and Moscow seek to weaken U.S. global domination and adjust the international system so it is more favorable to their shared interests,” she said. “This is unlikely to change for the foreseeable future.”
“There is no other major power that shares as much of Beijing’s and Xi’s broad worldview as does Russia and Putin. This hasn’t changed in the wake of Putin’s disastrous war against Ukraine and explains why, even now, Beijing refuses to condemn Moscow’s actions,” he said.
Respondents to the Foreign Affairs poll were split. With a confidence level of 8, Wang Jisi, president of the School of International Studies at Peking University in Beijing, strongly disagreed that the long-term alignment between the two countries will endure.
“An alignment or friendship is durable only when the two sides not only show their solidarity but can afford to discuss their disagreement candidly and openly. The Sino-Soviet alliance in the 1950s was claimed to be ‘unbreakable’ and ‘seamless.’ But when their differences were made open, the friendship soon turned to hostility,” he said.
Alina Polyakova, president of the Center for European Policy Analysis, also disagreed with the idea that the Russian-Chinese ties will last, with a confidence level of 9.
“The gap between the comprehensive national strength of China and Russia is widening day by day, Russia has a strong concern about China, and China and Russia have different national identities,’ Feng Yujun, professor and vice dean at the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, wrote.
“China’s development has been achieved within the existing international order, which Russia strongly wishes to overturn,” Feng added, disagreeing with a confidence level of 9.
