WHO'S OUR COMMON FOE?

A large Chinese delegation led by President Xi Jinping made a three-day visit to Russia in early June to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Russian Federation and People's Republic of China and to take part at the annual St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF). Presidents Putin and Xi Jinping discussed many important issues of bilateral and international relations. Now the experts are wondering the real reasons behind warm relations between Moscow and Beijing and their sympathies against the U.S.

Russia welcomed Xi Jinping at the highest level, as the dearest guest. In addition to participation in the forum, Putin made with his Chinese counterpart a walk along the Neva River, excursions around the Hermitage and the Kremlin, a solemn reception at the Palace of Facets, a visit to the Bolshoi Theatre and the Moscow Zoo, where the heads of states watched two pandas presented by the Chinese in April, and speeches at St. Petersburg University. “Russia is the country that I have visited the most times, and President Putin is my best friend and colleague,” Xi Jinping admitted, and did not exaggerate at all - over the past six years, the leaders of China and Russia met about 30 times. “Russia has no such depth and breadth of relations with any other country but China. We really are strategic partners. Cooperation between our countries on the world arena, without any doubt, is the most important factor of stability in international affairs,” Putin said.

Strategic was a keyword that accompanied Xi Jinping's visit to Russia constantly - in official speeches, media and expert analyses. It also appeared in a joint statement signed by the two leaders on strengthening global strategic stability. In short, the document speaks of the principled position of Russia and China on the unacceptability of the destruction of the existing system of agreements in the field of arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation. The heads of Russia and China decided to bring ties between the two countries to the "level of comprehensive partnership relations" and "strategic interaction in a new era." “Our countries have coinciding assessments of the situation around the Korean Peninsula. Russia and China are working in favour of a peaceful settlement of the crisis in Syria, as well as stabilizing the situation in Venezuela. We remain committed to the full implementation of a joint, comprehensive plan of action on the Iranian nuclear program,” Vladimir Putin emphasised.

Statements from both sides about the feasibility of bringing together the two strategic development concepts, the Chinese project One Belt, One Way and the Russian idea of ​​the Eurasian partnership, were among the fundamentally important decisions made during the SPIEF-19 forum held in St. Petersburg on June 4-8, which Moscow is positioning as an important platform for attracting investment in Russia and making landmark agreements in global economy. This year the event gathered more than 20 thousand participants from 140 countries, but the key visitor was the Chinese guest.

Russians enjoy listing joint Russian-Chinese projects, noting that the total amount of agreements concluded during Xi’s visit amounted to $20 billion. Together with Chinese partners, they have established about 100 enterprises and 13,000 high-tech jobs in the Far Eastern territories with priority development. Trade turnover between the two countries is $108 billion. About 4 million Chinese tourists visit Russia annually. There is a branch of Chinese automobile manufacturer Great Wall for the production of off-road vehicles in the Tula region, a joint agricultural holding in the Primorsky Krai, etc. Certainly, a lot of time was devoted to modern technologies, including artificial intelligence, 5G, new materials, renewable and portable energy sources and technologies of its transmission and storage, genomic technologies for medicine, agriculture and industry, digitalisation of the state administration system and many more, in which Moscow hopes for the help of Beijing who seems willing to share their innovative technologies. Thus, the Russian Direct Investment Fund and the Chinese Investment Corporation formed a $1 billion-fund to support research and technological innovation, and Huawei concluded an agreement with Russian telecommunications company MTS to develop the 5G network in Russia.

In exchange for such assistance, Russia supplies China with the very necessary energy resources. For example, Russia is the main exporter of oil to China (67 million tons in 2018). The Power of Siberia gas pipeline is expected to deliver natural gas to china starting from December 2019 (in May 2014, the parties signed a 30-year agreement for $400 billion to purchase 38 billion cubic meters of gas annually) . Now China has expressed its readiness for additional supplies, and, according to Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Board of Gazprom, it is about an additional 6 billion cubic meters of gas annually. Beijing is also interested in the military and nuclear power industries of Russia.

Meanwhile, a number of experts believe that the root cause of improving Russian-Chinese relations is their common understanding to confront the U.S. Although presidential aide Dmitry Peskov argued that it was wrong to talk about the joint coordination of efforts between Russia and China in terms of opposition to the United States, “because both China and Russia have their own problems with the U.S.,” few people became convinced with his arguments. Indeed, China is in a state of trade wars with Washington, and especially recently has been pushing Huawei. At the same time, the problematic Russian-American issues are a clash of interests in the post-Soviet space, in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, energy security, and disarmament issues. For example, one of the most pressing moments right now is the situation around the Russian Nord Stream-2 pipeline, which goes to Europe and is seriously criticized by the United States. The favourite pressure tool of Americans against both countries is sanctions and high import tariffs. By the way, almost in parallel with Xi Jinping’s visit to Russia, the head of the White House Donald Trump visited the UK, where he also touched on the topic of a trade war with China, reprimanding English friends for their cooperation with Beijing on 5G. They also spoke about international security at different levels - in the context of both China and Russia. Therefore, to assert that Putin and Xi Jinping did not attempt to agree on joint actions against Washington during their walks around the Kremlin is, of course, somewhat strange. Especially in the joint statement of the two leaders, as already mentioned above, it is said “about strengthening global strategic stability”, and how could it be without the United States?

It is not surprising that the visit of the Chinese leader caused a rather violent reaction in the West, which immediately dubbed it almost the beginning of a new era in relations between Russia and China. American politicians have repeatedly recognised Moscow and Beijing as the main threats to their national security at various levels, including officially. Both the White House and Capitol feel certainly nervous about multi-day talks between Russian and Chinse “in the spirit of deep trust”. Americans are worried that because of the trade war, China will begin to focus closely on the Russian market or even move production facilities to Russia. Washington is well aware of the level of mutual support between Russia and China during the voting at the UN Security Council. But most of all Americans seem to be concerned about the strengthening of military-industrial complex of Russia and China. According to The Hill, China has many resources to strengthen its army, and the country "continues to make great strides in artificial intelligence, machine learning and operations in space." At the same time, Russia has a huge scientific potential accumulated over many years, and it has already experienced almost all of its new systems in battles in Syria. At the same time, the publication is concerned whether “America will overtake either China or Russia in terms of advanced weapons other than stealth, where its lead seems unassailable.”

Another question is to what extent Russia and China are able to coordinate their efforts and whether this coordination in this format fits their potentials and interests. First, equal friendship (meaning true strategic alliance) between Russia and China is ambiguous due to statistical reasons at least, for the EU remains the main trading partner of Russia with more than $290 billion worth trade turnover in 2018. The main trading partners of China are the EU, U.S., ASEAN and Japan, which make up to 41.2% of the total foreign trade turnover of the country. It is understandable, as China is the first largest economy in the world and the Russian market is very small for Chinese commodities. Therefore, China has the greatest economic interest in the West. On the other hand, Europe and the U.S. are very large markets with rich technological and financial resources. Therefore, it was by no means a coincidence that Xi Jinping did not focus on American attacks on Huawei, rather leaving this chance to Putin. In general, the Chinese delegation seemed reluctant with criticism of Americans in Russia, which is not so much about their Oriental prudence as the fact that Beijing does not tend to make a big deal out of the existing situation. It is also obvious that the core of trade turnover between Russia and China is mainly made of oil and gas, despite many talks about shifting to high-tech projects. In fact, Chinese companies and commercial banks, fearing the same sanctions from the U.S., are not particularly interested in investing to Russia. Just before Xi Jinping’s visit to Russia, Dmitry Peskov said in his interview with RT: “It’s not that China invests heavily in the Russian economy.” Finally, even in matters concerning armaments, which in fact worries Americans the most, Beijing and Moscow are not partners, but rather competitors. Chinese sell their weapons in the Middle East (even in Syria), Africa and, of course, Asia.

However, there are ideological and political moments as well. Historically and traditionally, Russia has always tilted towards Europe. This is unlikely to change in the near future. Ordinary Russians, perhaps, in many ways and for many reasons, do not like Europeans and Americans, but this is not going to make the Chinese closer and more understandable to them. Civilization codes forged over the centuries are different between the two nations, and one cannot expect a sudden change in the first quarter of the 21st century due to different geopolitical circumstances. Moreover, there is a certain degree of rejection of China and the Chinese in Russian society strongly associated with warnings about "creeping conquest of Siberia", "pollution of Baikal" and general damage to the environment, etc. We can say that the current close relations between Russia and China is, to a certain extent, a product of personal relations between Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, which in the long run cannot become a solid foundation for bilateral relations. Neither can the general opposition to the U.S. become one.

Rather, Russia and China experience a situational convergence of interests in terms of joint opposition to the U.S.'s dominance in the world economy, American dollar, as well as the settlement of situations in North Korea, Syria and Iran. By the way, the fact that Beijing has never tried to support Moscow in Ukraine, because this is not its area of ​​interest, speaks in favour of this conclusion. Apparently, such experienced politicians as Putin and Xi Jinping decided to maximise benefits from this situational friendship, particularly to impress the newcomer in politics, Donald Trump.

Definitely, we are witnessing a transition to a bipolar world where the U.S. will no longer play the leading role. World economy experiences a painful transition to digital era. Many ideals, conventional systems, and working schemes have been deteriorating for years. But despite the expectations of Russian media covering the visit of Xi Jinping, friendship between Russia and China cannot play a decisive role in the “global concert”. This is just a piece of a common puzzle but an important, bright and surprising one, no more.