China-Russia: A New Cold War?

[Music] I'm Andrew Schwartz and you're listening to the truth of the matter a podcast by csis where we break down the top policy issues of the day and talk with the people that can help us best understand what's really going on to get to the truth of the matter about the recent visit of Xi Jinping to Vladimir Putin in Russia we have with us two really special guests from csis we have Maria snigovaya who is a senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia at csis and we have with us Lily mcelwee who is a fellow in our Freeman chair and China studies welcomed you both so I want to start by asking you Lily this week's visit by Xi Jinping marks the 40th meeting between Putin and she since the Chinese leader came to power in 2012. he's met with Putin more than any other leader why was this meeting at this time so significant in your view thanks Andrew it's a real pleasure to be here these leaders know each other very well and have spoken many times both bilaterally and on the side of different events but it is significant because it comes at a time when Russia is increasingly isolated when it's in National Power Prestige and purse essentially are diminished and when Russia and Ukraine are gearing up to launch further operations in the spring and at a time when U.S tensions are rising and president XI is increasingly looking out in the world and looking for ways to build its relation International relationships as well as influence so I think it comes at a strategic moment and I was actually surprised given that how little of the meeting was focused on Ukraine and how much it was focused on furthering deepening the bilateral relationship between President XI President Putin and China Russia more broadly and Maria to you why was this meeting so significant for Vladimir Putin yeah absolutely like important for his own actions left himself quite isolated in this world and China is one key factor to Russia's survival long term even if in the stagnating and declining mode we've seen that one of the major issues that been raised during the discussion was this project the alternative cast project the disappear in the power of Siberia 2 which is supposed to essentially increase deliveries of gas to China now that Russia cut itself off the European markets so that's one uh because why wouldn't I was hoping to get is his interest in the projects and for the increase for the collaboration as of now I think China has become a result of the last year number one Russia's export destination and it probably will get even worse for Russia from now on because other countries are essentially not willing to cooperate with Russia on many of these issues Bloomberg kawada has reported just recently that there is no indication that China is interested to increase the supplies of gas from Russia so allegedly this visit was not as successful as Putin was hoping to be before I get to what I think is probably the real question which is are we looking at a new cold war between the United States and China and Russia I want to just ask what were the actual takeaways from this Summit love to hear both of your perspectives on this Recreation between the between read the concluding announcement that both sides published this year and you compare it with what they published last year it's actually very similar and looks like a copy paste which to me suggests that there's not a lot of breakthrough in this relationship or contrary to what we have been told overall um the key in symbolical importance for Russia is that despite the fact that Putin is now and essentially is charged with horrible Crimes by the international Court they still apparently political leaders and very influential political leaders who do not shy away from going to Russia and meeting him so the symbolically that's important it is a position to the West uh to the collective West as the Russian propaganda likes to call it in terms of specific achievements when it comes to like collaboration we don't really know what happens with the munition supplies which Russia really needs from China and that's really a big deal for it there were no announcement made so uh there is reasons to believe that China is reluctant to increase Supply submission to Russia in to avoid becoming a recipient of these sanctions on from the West on as I mentioned already when it comes to the gas it looks like Putin was unable to convince China to further increase civilizers of the Russian deaths which is bad for us in the long term because as I mentioned there are not in a lot of other markets looking at the overall trade between the two countries it's been increasing and it's clear that in the long term Russia becoming more and more dependent on China the trend that already existed before this war but after the war of course accelerated to an unprecedented scale these are essentially the major takeaways I think overall symbolically it's important for Putin but in terms of material Achievements not so successful as Russia hope Lily from your perspective and from China's perspective what were the key takeaways for Beijing I really think that Beijing came out with several key wins here and I think she really used the trip successfully to advance several of its major foreign policy priorities which are somewhat at odds counter-intuitively but all three were Advanced and I'd like to point out first maintaining and deepening strong relations with Russia which China sees as essential to pair back Western power and influence going forward second is maintaining ties with Europe which I know sounds counterintuitive and I'm happy to dig into that a little bit further but as U.S China tensions rise China arguably sees Europe as potentially a weak Link in the G7 and critical to avoiding all what it sees as all-out technological and economic containment and thirdly building influence in the global South and I think just by having this meeting where she was clearly marketing himself and the meeting as a way to broker a piece in Ukraine and as an investment in being able to broker a piece in Ukraine going forward China is keeping its hat in the game in the global South which has been harmed economically by this war and the ensuing sanctions so let's talk about containment for a minute Lily you know of course Russia believes it's being contained by Europe and NATO and by the United States what are the things that China believes that it's being contained about China has long seen the United States in particular is out to out to development because it frames the U.S China relationship and the US's International position seeking to preserve unipolarity which has characterized the International System since the end of the Cold War so it sees efforts like the October 7th export controls about investment screening further export controls expected and some degree of convergence with U.S allies on these

measures as out to contain China's technological and economic development which arguably it is designed to curb that development because because the U.S and its allies now see that development as facilitating China's military prowess and with Rising chances of conflict and with rising Chinese assertiveness and aggression abroad there is reason to do so and we have overt examples of economic containment you know for instance the semiconductors policy that the administration and and you know even today March 23rd Thursday is a hearing up on Capitol Hill about Tick Tock and about whether the United States should ban Tick-Tock are there also other Tech and Military applications where China believes the United States is trying to contain it Lily yes so we have the semiconductor export controls and some of my colleagues at csis have have shared the these aren't the end of export controls there will be further ones targeting I think biotechnology Quantum Computing these are just some of the areas where the US feels that these are dual use Technologies rightly because they obviously have clear civilian commercial purposes but can be translated into military uses as well so these are areas where given the Blurred boundaries between civilian and Military sectors in China the US is no longer willing to to share these Technologies particularly at the high end to both Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin did this meeting really reinforce their views about the United States did it align their views and do you think Maria that this is the beginning of a new Cold War I certainly think it's a beginning of the new cold war with Russia though I really doubt at this point that the Cold War ever ended right it looks increasingly that we have a small period of thought but eventually the key all kind of preferences of the Russian Elites never changed partly because the Russian Elite has never fundamentally changed since the Soviet times there was never a true rotation of the latent places I showed that one of my work and So eventually as Russia got stronger as a result of this influx of energy within the same kind of attitudes the same beliefs the zero-sum mindset re-emerge resurface again so from that perspective we certainly see the Cold War it's inevitable it's coming and certain policies of containment of Russia on the western side will be in place from now on for me however then I'm really interested in Lily's perspective on that issue it's a question to what extent China is interested in you know total contestation and opposition to the West given this is really serious Reliance on the trade with the West in case of Russia it's different a little bit there was this Reliance on energy trade which we thought would constrain Russia some would but ironically turns out that Putin thought that will constrain the West rather than the other way around right and he tried to use this energy tool consistently before but of course going into this war luckily uh as we know now not successfully eventually one small takeaway by the way from the meeting that I forgot to mention is also the fact that contrary to previous expectations of Russia that the trade will increasingly switch from U.S dollar into Russian rubles now they are only talking of Chinese currency trading in Chinese currency which is again an authentication that Putin is not really getting what he wants he is now saying yes I'm very happy that we are now switching to trade into Juan but in reality it's not at all a watch here I wasn't lying and saying at the start of this war so essentially he has to pretend things are great for him while in reality they're not so great at all Lily what are your thoughts I I tend to agree with Maria I I really there's there's an argument made that at the china-russia relationship is a marriage of convenience and merely rhetorical at this stage and I don't I don't agree with that I think that there are enduring strategic economic even security reasons why we're bound to see greater alignment going forward and one is economic and Maria mentioned this Russia is a key source of energy it improves China's energy security to have a close relationship with Russia on that but beyond that it's really a partner and I think the Iran nominated trade is interesting it's a partner in in shaping and contesting the global economic and monetary order which is a clear goal of China's and that was Advanced to the trip they will be pursuing joint energy projects in whatever form but expanded bilateral trade and efforts to use local mainly U.N currencies for trading and then expansions of cooperation between the various trading blocks that each country has but then beyond the economic front I think a really fascinating aspect to me is the Strategic front and I would recommend to listeners an essay that Gideon Rockman of the financial times wrote in January 2020 before the Ukraine war where he talked about the ways that China and Russia are aligning their goals for the International System and he pointed to these two U's there's unipolarity so contesting the dominance of the West in terms of raw material capabilities but also universality this idea that Western forms of democracy human rights are Universal and should be adopted by other countries and I think we're seeing active efforts by China to contest that idea we've seen China come out with these different initiatives just over the past two years called Global development initiative security initiative Global civilization initiative these are efforts to promote Chinese style development practices security practices in ways that contest those of the West so I think we're definitely going to see greater alignment between China and Russia on that front and in terms of this particular meeting I do think that China came away with a Dependable partner in Russia in terms of amplifying their voice in global governance institutions like the UN so voting together for example proposing candidates together as well as advancing beijing's ongoing efforts to expand institutions like the brics and the Shanghai cooperation organization china-centered organizations that will be important in governance going forward so Maria looking ahead what are some of the key issues or challenges that you think will shape the russia-china relationship in years to come first of all in terms of capacity to fully substitute for European markets I mentioned that already I think China has limits to that right for example when it comes to this power of Siberia 2 our brush is very eager to increase gas supplies to China but China has for example a manga supplied suppliers took many Stan and it was actually this is nothing of that is new that's another thing right we've seen this Dynamic unraveling since 2014 where Russia also kind of tries to make the best of this so-called Eastern turn that's been unraveling uh since then but in reality is that this just China is not willing to fully follow Russia's demands plus Russia right now is clearly in a weaker position so China can dictate its rules so that's one a limitation Russia will have to keep searching for alternative markets for energy supplies and it's unclear to what extent it will be able to fully substitute for what it lost in Europe European markets at this point we can pull up a probably say safely their lost form for a long period of time another problem is I think generally this Putin is also unwilling right to become fully dependent on China even if he has put himself literally in that situation for his actions so we'll see we see this Dynamic unraveling consistently where he's kind of trying to please China but to an extent right the China will keep pushing understanding that Russia is now dependent so that probably will create some issues in the long term we've seen already that the duration of the visit maybe I wasn't as long as original expected there is some speculation on that Putin didn't come meet she at the airport again this attempt to demonstrate some strength on the put inside even if everybody understands that Russia is right now in the position of weakness last but not the least we published a report last year talking about the broader transatlantic security implications of great assign a Russian military alignment our general conclusion that despite growing of course cooperation on all sorts of military and technological issues between Russia and China there is still a degree a pronounced degree of distrust between the two countries there is a degree of you know strain in the relationships the Russian side is very wary of Chinese attempts to you know take over quote unquote dominate over Russia and also potentially like take advantage of the resources that Russia possesses and also on the Chinese side they're not very eager to full open up to Russia that's what we're quite typical of autocrats right they're not happy with democracies but that they're not happy with each other either that's just this natural Dynamic probably will put certain limits to how far the relationship can go and of course the key issue on everybody's radar these days is the military assistance to Russia in this war the munition supplies Remains the key question mark but we've seen we've seen of course growing cooperation on all other areas in particular they imported semiconductors drones a lot of those things not necessarily even illegal we've seen repeatedly while working on our forthcoming report on the fact of sanctions on Russia's defense industry that you a lot of the details you can literally purchase on AliExpress in Russia so it's a it's a version of Amazon essentially Chinese Amazon so that is certainly something that Russia highly reliant on China and of course the big question is to what extent China will be willing to assist Russia in providing one of those supplies given that China probably does not want to see Russia fully defeated a degree of cooperation and increasing cooperation will continue in that regards but to the extent that does not hurt Chinese strategic long-term positions against the West as well so I think we'll China probably will avoid being sanctioned by the West so all of that Corporation will sort of try to fly under the radar but Lily the Chinese have tried to position themselves as the peace broker in Ukraine which of course was the overarching issue in this particular Summit what's your take on China positioning themselves that way I think it serves two purposes for China first it really speaks to the developing world in the global South which as I said has been affected by this war and ensuing sanctions economically but also has been affected more broadly by the return of great power competition whether it left or not is another debate but the acceleration of great power competition to some degree there's an incentive to play different powers off each other to gain tactical Advantage but to a large degree any geopolitical developments that curb free trade and investment will affect the development environment of countries in the global South so I think by positioning itself as a peace broker there it's saying we're on your side we know that development is important to you we know that you're being hurt by sanctions and we're the ones who are trying to bring this conflict to an end and by the way the US and Europe by supplying weapons to Ukraine are not so it's an effort to build influence in the global South and I also think that you know I mentioned relations with Europe and I think that these are really a wild card for China in in positioning itself here because on the one hand it has provided economic and diplomatic support for Russia at the very least in terms of its war effort and clearly strength and ties between the two leaders just over the past year on the other hand arguably because of those strength and ties China is now positioning itself as one of the only powers and she in particular one of the only world leaders that could feasibly meaningfully bring about a mediated de-escalation because of his close ties with an increasingly isolated President Putin so I think China is really trying to balance a lot of different priorities right now and my question is how long can it do that it can only Market itself as a peace broker for so long before countries start asking questions about well what concrete actions are you taking the peace plan that it released was not seen as a credible concrete contribution to peace in Ukraine particularly in Europe so I think especially European powers are going to begin to start looking for concrete action so I think it's a useful marketing tool for now kicking the can arguably but I think there will be a reckoning at some point yeah it seems like more of a charade Maria what's your take on that yeah absolutely the long-term strategic is happening between the of the relationship between the two countries but again this weakening position of Russia in Russia's reluctance to accept uh its weakening uh position this evidence relationship will probably keep constraining the two Powers I wanted to extend it's possible uh truly for two the two countries with fundamentally maybe different maybe not but quite different interest uh in where the International System will be going had it next right to achieve this Corporation given that Russia clearly wants to undermine the International System uh China's desire to undermine the International System is less clear to me right right China has a lot to benefit from the current status quo and its International influence is growing so from that perspective it seems to me that statistically the interests of the two powers are not necessarily that closely aligned Russia will probably just keep being increasingly exacerbating its dependence on China and it's really an unclear to metallic Central will be able to achieve the goals in the long term right it's a proxy war right but in the world that Russia essentially fighting against not just Ukraine but the west and the total economic power combined is 40 times larger than the Russia's GDP so it's just impossible I think in the long term for Russia to fundamentally alter the situation and it does not really seem to me that China is that eager to assist uh Putin in his long-term goal to destroy the international order as we know it Lily finally I want to ask both of you and start with you Lily are there any major disagreements between China and Russia of note I think Maria indicated some just then in terms of in terms of approaching the International System and I'm just more familiar with the Chinese side but I definitely agree with Maria that there isn't an intent to upend the International System but there is an intent to make it work better for China and the furtherance of China's goals and aims so I don't think China wants to you know abolish the U.N or anything or you know the IMF World Trade Organization these International multilateral groups but what it wants to do is to pair back Western influence in those organizations boost Chinese influence in those organizations whether that's through voting shares or the leadership and make them better conduits for China's values and China's interests rather than what it sees as the fact that they've been conduits too long for Western influence so I think that might be one disagreement and and as you know as Maria also hinted I think China continues to rely on key technology components and economic relationships with countries in with Advanced industrialized democracies in Asia and Europe as well as the United States so I don't think that it's in a position to take any actions that would completely curtail those relationships Maria final word on this yes as a result of his actions I think Putin the Kremlin they put themselves in the very difficult situation and this does not seem to be a great way out the only thing that they were able to do right now right is to rely increasingly rely on China as we've seen it but as Lily has pointed out too right the fundamental or future outlook of the two countries appears to be quite different and that is probably one of the key points of tangent is at the time understanding that Russia is becoming more and more reliant on China in the long term So eventually it will probably will have to accept the the future division of the future the way China sees it and of course as I mentioned before there are underlying fear Mutual suspicion trust issue is in this marriage of convenience or maybe not of such a big convenience which will probably continue hunting this relationship and why are we on our side should be wary as to where this is going right and definitely Implement all sorts of tools to constrain this relationship and prevent China from supplying more of the materials and Technologies to Russia I think there is limits on what is achievable for China and Russia going forward well Lily Maria thank you so much today this is really informative and helps us get closer to the truth of what's going on between China and Russia if you enjoyed this podcast check out our larger Suite of csis podcasts from into Africa the Asia chessboard China power AIDS 2020 the trade guys smart women smart power and more you can listen to them all on major streaming platforms like iTunes and Spotify visit csis.org podcasts to see our full

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2023-03-27 11:20

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