re: #139 Hecuba’s daughter

I wonder how committed China is to any alliance with Russia. They need us — not their neighbor — for their economy to prosper. Other than some natural resources, what does economic advantage does Russia really offer to China? Or is there some military Russian military asset that China believes will help them? Doesn’t China’s plans involve world domination through non-lethal economic and social domination, rather than use of their military?

Richard Engle tweeted a NYT article about this earlier today.

“Biden administration plans to build up global coalitions to counter a pact between Vladimir V. Putin and Xi Jinping, portending a new type of Cold War.” https://t.co/gWX1Ow1XR1

— Richard Engel (@RichardEngel) February 21, 2022

My guess is that China is using Russia to see if the US is in retreat. Which would allow China to grab up portions of Asia, such as Taiwan, without risk.

From the article:

The Biden administration plans to build up global coalitions to counter a pact between Vladimir V. Putin and Xi Jinping, portending a new type of Cold War.

*snip*
In recent weeks, the two nations negotiated a 30-year contract for Russia to supply gas to China through a new pipeline. They blocked a demand from Washington that the United Nations impose additional sanctions on North Korea for new missile tests, even though the two nations had agreed to similar sanctions before. And Russia moved large numbers of troops from Siberia to its west, a sign that Moscow, in preparing for a potential invasion of Ukraine, trusts China along their shared border in the east.

*snip*

“It’s certainly concerning, and it is not a positive development from the standpoint of U.S. national security or U.S. national interests,” said Susan Shirk, the chair of the 21st Century China Center at the University of California, San Diego, and a former State Department official. “They have a kind of common perspective on the U.S. right now, and there is this affinity between the leaders.”

*snip*

China and Russia are not united by ideology, and they are in a marriage of convenience that Russia needs more. While Mr. Xi appreciates Mr. Putin’s defiance of the United States, he does not want the economic uncertainty that a European war would bring. China also traditionally insists on respecting every nation’s sovereignty, as Mr. Wang made clear on Saturday.

There are limits to what China would do to help Mr. Putin if he invades Ukraine. After Washington imposes sanctions on Russia, Chinese companies could buy more oil and gas from Russia and help fill some technology gaps, but the major Chinese state-owned banks would probably refrain from overt violations of the sanctions for fear of being shut out of the global financial system.

nytimes.com