- China and Russia have good reasons for cooperating, and not just to anger the United States.
- But there are a number of issues that could cause this alliance to fall apart.
- Successful alliances like NATO require partners to put their own interests ahead of the common good.
During the darkest days of the Cold War in the 1950s, Western nations feared that the Soviet Union and China would join forces to form a great Communist bloc.
But those fears proved overblown: Beijing and Moscow quickly went from allies to enemies, clashing over their long border. Fast forward to today, and military ties have strengthened, resurfacing the specter of a Sino-Russian alliance that would unite the world’s two most powerful nations.
But this partnership is not a solid alliance based on mutual defense and military interoperability like NATO. “Sino-Russian relations are best characterized as a marriage of imperfect partners who share a deep cynicism about the U.S.-led international order but often have different visions for what should replace it,” one expert said. report A report on Sino-Russian cooperation by the RAND Corporation think tank.
“These imperfect partners recognize that they are somewhat interdependent, albeit unequal, but at the same time have deep doubts about whether they can trust or rely on the other,” the study said.
This may be of little comfort to Western leaders who fear a scenario in which a Russian invasion of Europe and a Chinese invasion of Taiwan occur simultaneously, overstretching U.S. resources and overwhelming U.S. allies.
The Russian and Chinese armies have already conducted some 25 joint drills involving ships, aircraft and ground forces since 2005. Beijing and Moscow have cooperated on joint flight patrols, including an incident in 2023 where they flew near the Russian capital, Moscow. Korean airspace.
Just as important, China has been a key supporter of Russia’s war in Ukraine. Western sanctions have deprived Russia of key components such as electronics, and China and its vast manufacturing base have Major Suppliers Microelectronics, drone parts and other components.
But these do not amount to joint operations such as those practiced by the United States and Britain in World War II, when American forces operated under British command and vice versa, or by NATO today.
“Policymakers and planners should be careful not to overestimate the extent of military cooperation and operational integration that exists between Russia and China,” RAND warned.
Exercises involving Russian and Chinese militaries have been described as “parallel rather than joint,” with the Russian and PLA forces given set missions and schedules that are carried out synchronized yet independent, with overall limited interaction in areas such as planning and command and control. [command and control]”As a result, these exercises have been relatively ineffective in promoting interoperability at either the operational or tactical levels in practice,” RAND said.
As a result, military cooperation has been more symbolic than practical. “China’s involvement in the exercises has been relatively low,” the RAND Corporation said. “The PLA has [People’s Liberation Army] China sent around 3,200 troops to Russia’s 300,000-strong Vostok-2018 military exercise, but only 1,600 to Russia’s Tsentr-2019 exercise (which had around 130,000 troops). The PLA seems more interested in learning from Russia than sharing its military capabilities or training as equal partners. For Russia, the aim is to present an image of joint cooperation with China to the West, countering the impression that Moscow is isolated and vulnerable.
Mark Cozad, co-author of the RAND study, compared these arrangements to NATO and U.S.-South Korean military integration: “NATO and the U.S.-South Korean military plan to fight as alliances, and training requires them to develop and practice integrated command and control, targeting, and ISR.” [intelligence and reconnaissance]”It also means that these allies have a much more rigorous approach to training, and are generally much more realistic than Russian or Chinese training,” Cozad told Business Insider.
Although Russia and China boast about their military ties, they have little confidence in each other’s military capabilities. Russia’s dismal combat performance in Ukraine raises the question “whether China will view the Russian military as a capable and useful coalition partner,” the report said. Meanwhile, China’s lack of recent combat experience “may lead Moscow to view the PLA as a well-resourced but questionable partner,” the report said.
Some alliances are tighter than others: America and Britain had a grand alliance with the Soviet Union, in which Russia and the Western Allies conducted parallel, largely uncoordinated operations in an atmosphere of mutual distrust; capitalists and communists could agree on the need to defeat Hitler but not much else.
In a 2001 treaty of friendship, China and Russia agreed to consult with each other if either country was attacked, but they did not promise to fight for each other. “Notably, the pact does not include a mutual defense clause,” the RAND study noted.
Successful alliances require partners to sacrifice their own interests for the interests of their allies, and this is a major problem for Russia and China, who are leading partners in alliances and have a tradition of blackmailing their allies, as seen in the Soviet Union’s dominance over its Eastern European satellites and China’s treatment of neighbors such as Vietnam and South Korea as vassals.
“Neither China nor Russia has a recent history of forming interoperable military alliances with other nations, much less joint C2. [command and control] “Reform organizations or empower commanders in the field to innovate and collaborate to solve operational challenges,” the report said.
Besides the joy of driving America crazy, Sino-Russian military cooperation would bring tangible benefits. China, which hasn’t been to war since invading Vietnam in 1979, could learn from Russia’s combat experience in Syria and Ukraine. Russia would get access to Chinese products that are subject to sanctions in the West. Good relations would mean Russia and China could demilitarize their 2,600-mile border, allowing them to concentrate forces in Ukraine or prepare for an invasion of Taiwan.
But there are many issues that could tear this alliance apart, including the enormous historical baggage weighing on the relationship. “Russia and China have had a complex relationship for over 75 years that includes both a strategic partnership and intense hostility,” Cozad said.
China has not forgotten Imperial Russia Merger In the 1850s, they occupied 350,000 square miles of Chinese territory. In 1969, Chinese and Russian troops Border dispute Along the Ussuri River (at one point the Soviet Union Nuclear attack China’s attitude towards the United States is currently influenced by competition over Central Asia, Chinese anxieties about Russia’s war in Ukraine, and the fact that Russia is inevitably becoming a subordinate partner as China’s economic and military power grows.
It begs the question: Could Western countries exploit these potential rifts to disrupt the Sino-Russian alliance? RAND strongly warns against trying to do so. “We argue against trying to undermine the Russia-China partnership because we don’t have many tools or incentives that would make them see it as more valuable than their own partnership,” Cozad said. China might want something from the U.S., but “we suspect that in five or 10 years that incentive will be taken away again, and then losing that incentive will hurt our relationship with Russia.”
Instead, RAND suggests that the best response is for the US and its allies to work together more closely: “The most effective way for the United States to counter the strategic partnership between Russia and China is to ensure the health of its own alliances and further strengthen cooperation with its most important allies and partners,” the report recommends.
After all, successful alliances are a mix of shared values, not just national interests. And therein lies the real difference between an alliance like NATO, whose members mostly believe in democracy, individual rights, and free trade, and the Sino-Russian friendship, which is based on the question, “What’s in it for me?”
Michael Peck is a defense writer whose work has appeared in Forbes, Defense News, Foreign Policy and other publications. He holds a Master’s in Political Science from Rutgers University. twitter and LinkedIn.
