China and Russia Deepen Their Ties
by Judith Bergman • February 7, 2023 at 5:00 am
Just 20 days before [Russia's invasion of Ukraine]..., Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping signed a statement that said their cooperation had "no limits... no forbidden zones."
"Russia and China are making common cause to better defend their respective interests and their authoritarian systems from Western pressure," said Daniel Russel, a former Obama administration official handling Asia issues, at the time.
Shortly after that, Putin announced new Russian oil and gas deals with China worth an estimated $117.5 billion.
Both countries have also increasingly been conducting this trade in their national currencies.
In February, China and Russia will be holding joint military exercises with South Africa off the South African coast, underscoring the growing influence that China has in Africa
Above all, China's close and increased dealings with Russia have provided a lifeline to Putin, enabling him to continue his war on Ukraine. This is something that the Biden administration has done little about, apart from threatening last March that there would "absolutely be consequences for large-scale sanctions evasion efforts or support to Russia to backfill them. We will not allow that to go forward and allow there to be a lifeline to Russia from these economic sanctions from any country, anywhere in the world."
"There's a number of ways that China's support is just crucial for Putin. I believe the Chinese could stop the war with one phone call to him. It would be like the banker calling you... so far it's not happening... Probably the only way to get ahead is going to be American sanctions on China... the war will go on because the banker is not going to make that call." – Michael Pillsbury, author of The Hundred Year Marathon," Fox Business, March 9, 2022.
So far, the Biden administration's help to Ukraine has been insufficient and slow in coming; however, protecting the West by saving Ukraine may yet go down as Biden's legacy and his administration's greatest achievement.
China and Russia continue to deepen their ties, a pact that has not gone unnoticed by the European public. In a new poll taken by the International Republican Institute (IRI) across 13 Central and Eastern European countries, there was much concern about this deepening partnership.
Jan Surotchak, Senior Director for Transatlantic Strategy at IRI, said:
"Our data clearly show that many Europeans see a working relationship between Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping as a threat to security and prosperity across the continent. As the war in Ukraine rages on, they are worried that an alliance between powerful authoritarians will continue to have a negative impact in their own backyard."
Similarly, a Pew research poll taken in the United States in April 2022 found 62% of respondents saying that the strengthened China-Russia relationship was "a very serious problem."
