China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi reportedly told the EU’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas on July 3 that the country cannot afford for Russia to lose the war in Ukraine amid fears the U.S. would shift focus towards Beijing, the South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported, citing sources familiar with the conversation.
As the war in Ukraine drags on, Wang’s reported comments suggest that Russia’s war in Ukraine may serve China’s strategic needs as focus is deviated away from Beijing’s mounting preparation to launch its own possible invasion into Taiwan.
[…]
China has been a key ally to Russia during its full-scale war, helping Moscow evade Western sanctions and becoming the leading source of dual-use goods fueling the Russian defense industry.
[…]
The frankness of Wang’s reported admission was greeted with surprise by EU official, according to Hong Kong-based SCMP, amid China’s past public statements in favor of a peace deal. Two sources familiar with the meeting told SCMP that they believed Wang was providing Kallas with a lesson in realpolitik during the four-hour encounter.
Wang on July 3 again reportedly rejected Western accusations that it was providing funding and weaponry to support Moscow’s war effort in Ukraine.
President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly accused Beijing of providing weaponry to Moscow. On May 29, Zelensky said that China had stopped selling drones to Ukraine and Western countries while continuing to supply them to Russia.
[…]
If Russia is successful in Ukraine, that makes it more likely that in future China will be able to carry out the same trick in Taiwan.
It’s not only that, it’s also that USA is doing the competition with China the rough way.
China is mostly building up peaceful (of the cutthroat kind, but still) economic influence, USA is mostly not countering that with the same, but just disrupting possible logistical projects beneficial to China with wars.
So they’d want, I think, to have USA at least keep applying force where it already does, allowing China to keep growing. They don’t want to do military solutions, their military is not that experienced and it’s not necessary when economically time is working in their favor.
Putin is basically mocking (or imitating) the US, it’s his inferiority complex - he thinks Russia should be perceived as some superpower of the kind of the US, and the same things to be “allowed” to it, so he does what he sees as the same things that US does. The results are secondary. While the US establishment and current, eh, leadership in turn too have an inferiority complex - they think today’s US should be as “great” or at least “reliable” in perception as the US of 1960s, except they forgot the context and why even US of 1960s needed to be what it was. The results, in foreign policy, are mostly secondary too to that, I think.
IMHO it’s because of the stagnation of the elites. The more involved wide population is into decisions, - even USSR had something reminiscing meritocracy in ministries and in industries and in the military, - the better is the quality of the whole state mechanism with its culture and elites. While the more narrow and closed it is, the more similar it is to a Hearts of Iron game.
Noted… anyway
Lol, where Russia used to be the one using proxywars to fight the west. It’s now fighting said proxy war. So much for big old Putin’s new strong sovjet union.
Russia was using proxy wars? I think it was overwhelmingly the US that decided to invade Vietnam and other places. Of course the UDSSR and China would then back the resistance against the US invasion.
Russia was using proxy wars?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_proxy_wars
Here is a list of (also) Cold War-era proxy Wars. You’ll find the Soviet Union in quite a lot of them and I’m not so sure if they overwhelmingly can be accurately subsumed to “Americans invaded and Soviets only helped to fight back”…
Lets go through the list. Subsequently i will count not only USSR and US, but their allies, e.g. China, France, UK, Germany too:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Civil_War
In the last month of World War II in East Asia, Soviet forces launched the huge Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation against the Japanese Kwantung Army in Manchuria and along the Chinese-Mongolian border.[71] This operation destroyed the Kwantung Army in just three weeks and left the USSR occupying all of Manchuria by the end of the war in a total power vacuum of local Chinese forces. Consequently, the 700,000 Japanese troops stationed in the region surrendered. Later in the year Chiang Kai-shek realized that he lacked the resources to prevent a CCP takeover of Manchuria following the scheduled Soviet departure.[72] He therefore made a deal with the Soviets to delay their withdrawal until he had moved enough of his best-trained men and modern materiel into the region. However, the Soviets refused permission for the Nationalist troops to traverse its territory and spent the extra time systematically dismantling the extensive Manchurian industrial base (worth up to $2 billion) and shipping it back to their war-ravaged country.[72] KMT troops were then airlifted by the US to occupy key cities in North China, while the countryside was already dominated by the CCP. On 15 November 1945, the KMT began a campaign to prevent the CCP from strengthening its already strong base.[73] At the same time, however, the return of the KMT also brought widespread graft and corruption, with an OSS officer remarking that the only winners were the Communists.[74]
I’d say that is 50:50 USSR was there first to fight off the Japanese. When the USSR didn’t let the nationalists reclaim the territory, the US joined on the nationalists side.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_crisis_of_1946
In the aftermath of the occupation of Iran, those Allied forces agreed to withdraw from Iran within six months after the cessation of hostilities.[6] However, when this deadline came in early 1946, the Soviets, under Joseph Stalin, remained in Iran. Soon, the alliance of the Kurdish and People’s Azerbaijani forces, supported in arms and training by the Soviet Union, engaged in fighting with Iranian forces,[1] resulting in a total of 2,000 casualties. Negotiation by Iranian premier Ahmad Qavam and diplomatic pressure on the Soviets by the United States eventually led to Soviet withdrawal and dissolution of the separatist Azerbaijani and Kurdish states.
That one is on the USSR
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War
The conflict, which erupted shortly after the end of World War II, consisted of a Communist-led uprising against the established government of the Kingdom of Greece.
Note that the “Kingdom of Greece” government was a Fascist puppet of occupying Germany and Italy.
German forces withdrew on 12 October 1944, and the government in exile returned to Athens. After the German withdrawal, the EAM-ELAS guerrilla army effectively controlled most of Greece, but its leaders were reluctant to take control of the country, as they knew that Stalin had agreed that Greece would be in the British sphere of influence after the war. Tensions between the British-backed Papandreou and EAM, especially over the issue of disarmament of the various armed groups, leading to the resignation of the latter’s ministers from the government.
The Yugoslav and Albanian Communist governments supported the DSE fighters, but the Soviet Union remained ambivalent.[
The Greek Army now numbered about 90,000 men and was gradually being put on a more professional footing. The task of re-equipping and training the army had been carried out by its fellow Western Allies. By early 1947, however, Britain, which had spent £85 million in Greece since 1944, could no longer afford this burden. US President Harry S. Truman announced that the United States would step in to support the Greek government against Communist pressure. That began a long and troubled relationship between Greece and the United States. For several decades to come, the US
Stalin explained to the Yugoslav delegation that the situation in Greece had always been different from the one in Yugoslavia because the US and Britain would “never permit [Greece] to break off their lines of communication in the Mediterranean”. (Stalin used the word svernut, Russian for “fold up”, to express what the Greek Communists should do.) Churchill and Stalin had agreed in 1944 that Greece would be in the British zone of influence and Romania in the Soviet zone of influence.
That one is on the US and UK
First Indochina war doesn’t even list the USSR or China as involved. That one is clearly on the US and France
Paraguyan civil war again doesn’t even list USSR or China and is a US war
Malayan emergency, same thing. No USSR or China, but US involvement
Korean war - 50:50 as US and USSR split Korea in half, which let to the war
Mau Mau uprising - only UK is mentioned
Second Indochina war (Vietnam war) - that one is on the US and to a lesser extent France who also mainly destroyed South Vietnam instead of fighting for control in the North
First Taiwan Strait crisis - That one is not a proxy war from the Chinese perspective, as it is the continuation of the Civil War. With the US involving itself it is a proxy war on the side of the US
First Sudanese civil war - here the cold war opponents were on the same side with non combat support. Doesn’t make sense to count it imo.
Suez Crisis - Obviously on the UK, France and Israel who wanted to keep their colonial control
Second Taiwan Strait crisis - same as before. PRC China is not a proxy in its own civil war. The US has been using ROC as proxy.
1958 Lebanon crisis - US proxy war as USSR and China not even on the list
1959 Tibetan uprising - same as the Taiwan Strait crisis. PRC China is not a proxy on its own soil, that one is on the US
I will stop here, because i need to work. I’ll count Afghanistan towards the USSR as instigator into the proxy.
That leaves by my count (excluding the 6 or so more on that list) 4 proxy wars in which the Communist bloc was instigating or equally responsible. The Western bloc meanwhile has been instigating or was equally responsible in 13 proxy wars.
Thanks for your effort!
The way I see it, most of these conflicts can be boiled down to the Communist bloc trying to establish Communist rule while the Western bloc tried to maintain the previous, non-Communist rule. In those cases, I’d say that both sides equally fought a proxy war to achieve their own respective goal.
Take the Greece Civil War for example. You say it is on the UK and the US. For helping the existing government fight a Communist uprising, which itself was supported by the Communist bloc? I’d say it is a perfect example of both blocs supporting their respective side. Hence, I’d count it on both. Both blocs were in a global struggle to increase their respective sphere of influence.
You say the Iran crisis of 1946 is on the USSR. I’d instead also attribute that to both, as it is part of that larger struggle for power between the two blocs. As in Greece, one bloc supported the faction trying to spread Communism, one bloc supported the side trying to uphold the current rule.
The problem in the case of Greece is that the “existing government” was quite extensively involved in collaborating with the Nazi and Italian Fascist occupation forces. As such it may be existing, but arguably not legitimate. Also it later lead to a far right dictatorship in 1967-1974.
That’s true, but the other bloc was still run by a man called Stalin who himself was not very cautious when handling his opponents (and also collaborated with the Nazis when he deemed it beneficial for himself). For a political opponent, it might not be so important what political ideology locks him up in a prison camp.
My point: at that time, you’d have a hard time looking for someone that fulfilled our ideals from today.
I recommend people to listen to John Mearsheimer. He explains it very well. Basically there is three focal points in global geopolitics from the US perspective.
Eastern Europe, because there is Russia close to NATO. The Persian gulf, because there is the most Oil and Gas and South-East Asia, because there is China emerging as the main global competitor to US hegemony.
Because the US started to develop their own Oil and Gas exploitation, and China is ever growing, since Obama the goal is to shift the focus from the Middle East to South-East Asia. Now Russia bogged down US commitment in Eastern Europe and Israel keeps bogging down the US in the Middle East, ideally wanting to drag the US into a full scale war against Iran.
This situation is perfect for China as the US keeps its military resources away from where they actually need them for their geostrategy.
Subsequently China does not want Russia to win in Ukraine either. They want the US to remain involved. This is also why a different approach to China by the EU could be the best way forward for peace in Ukraine. If the EU dislodges itself from the US hegemony and stops involving itself in the Middle East alongside the US, China could see a greater benefit in ending the war in Ukraine. Chin, Russia and Iran do not as much form an alliance because of being great friends. They share an alliance because they all have the same opponent, the US and its client states.
So “if Europe caves to the bully, joins the side that is actively supporting its enemy that invaded a sovereign country, maybe China will see a benefit and do something countrary to their interest and work towards peace in Ukraine”. Have you even thought how your post sounds? If it is beneficial to keep the war in Ukraine going, why would they “switch sides”? The US would still be “bogged down” in Ukraine even if the EU started better relations with China. So either we would totally need to cut off Ukraine (in which case Russia wins) or China would magically do something that’s completely stupid from their POV.
China benefits from the Ukraine war because it weakens the US. If the EU was to dislodge itself from the US that would be a far greater benefit for China. Also China has its own conflicts with Russia in central Asia.
China is not the one “bullying” the EU here. The EU is being bullied by the US and Russia. Trump is already showing that the US is not really interested in Ukraine as much, unless it gets its money back in resources. What China doesn’t want is the US and Russia joining sides and the EU tagging along as it lacks proper independent foreign policy. China also doesn’t want Russia to win as this would strengthen Russia militarily and embolden it in Central Asia as well as compel countries in Africa to seek more relationships with Russia than with China.
I think you perceive the countries opposed to US hegemony as far more monolithic as you are used to the EU countries practically always falling in line with the demands of Washington. But the relationships between the countries outside that bloc are far more ambiguous.
“EU dislodging itself” would be better, but US being bogged down in Ukraine would still be good. So why would they help Ukraine in that case? Or are you suggesting we abandon Ukraine?
China is absolutely bullying the EU. Otherwise they wouldn’t be supporting the greatest threat to the EU.
It is a transaction. If China exerts pressure on Russia to end the war it gets better relations with the EU and the EU limiting its military involvement with the US in return.
This also wouldn’t be abandoning Ukraine. As it stands Ukraine is being used to do the attrition of the Russian military for the West. Meanwhile the US already lays claim to Ukraines natural resources and the EU countries will probably follow suit. The longer the war goes, the less basis will be left for Ukraine to maintain sovereignty. If the war continues another year or two, Ukraine will either become a puppet of Russia, or a puppet of the US, with the EU asking to be allowed to play the strings every now and then.
Or alternatively the EU would need to go to all out war against Russia, with all the consequences of it. That might save Ukraine relatively speaking, or it might annihilate Ukraine completely as it will be the main battlefield.
The current status quo represents a slow abandoning of Ukraine.
And Europe meanwhile can’t do shit because, in all our capitalististic fervour, we made ourselves critically dependent on China. Smaht.
China tells EU
???
Wrong approach LOL
China […] does not want to see Russia lose its war in Ukraine
China could simply tell Russia to fuck off of Ukraine. Case closed.
As I understood, their interest is actually prolonging the war, as that will keep US attention divided.
China could simply tell Russia to fuck off of Ukraine. Case closed.
Or send troops and weapons to finish the war in russias favor if they REALLY wanted to see russia win.
That’s the nuance. They “don’t want to see them lose” doesn’t mean they need to win, China probably just likes the destabilizing effect it has on the area. So they prop them up just enough to keep them going.
Yeah, i am pretty sure China is playing the same “game” the US (or the collective west) is playing since the start of the war: Just send in enough support to keep it going and let the geopolitical adversaries tire themself out. Its very much amoralistic but has a surprisingly relateable logic behind it
Although the west certainly could do more to enable a Ukrainian victory, I don’t see their motivation as being the same as Chinas.
Why not? Its all about the position on the geostrategic playing field… get a better position without risk to lose it all.
Because the west has nothing but cost to gain from drawing this out any more. Russias military has already been demolished, reduced to using drones and rockets. At this point it would make more sense to end this with a win and strenghten Ukraine against further russian aggression. It would still allow for increased military spending, and all the other stuff they want to do.
country cannot afford for Russia to lose the war in Ukraine amid fears the U.S. would shift focus towards Beijing,
How will the US remain the hegemon but with a war against China?
No idea what that means, but they do not remain anything anyway.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population-with-un-projections?country=CHN~USA
This is how. Obviously Trump is really not helping.
A lot of things can happen in 75 years, so the outcome shown here might not even come to fruition
Obviously, but even within the next 25years according to this forecast China goes from having 4.1x the US population to 3.3x. In 50 years it would be 2.3x. Basically if this is somewhat right, then it is a possible strategy to contain China dimplomaticly and weaken its economy without going to war. As the odds improve for the US over time.
I guess we will just have to wait and see
This article is slightly misleading if compared with the SCMP article which has big implications on understanding the global power dynamics. Draw your own conclusions.
SCMP:
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told the European Union’s top diplomat on Wednesday that Beijing does not want to see a Russian loss in Ukraine because it fears the United States would then shift its whole focus to Beijing, according to several people familiar with the exchange.
vs
As the war in Ukraine drags on, Wang’s reported comments suggest that Russia’s war in Ukraine may serve China’s strategic needs as focus is deviated away from Beijing’s mounting preparation to launch its own possible invasion into Taiwan.
It’s subtle, but the attack on Taiwan is an interpretation. The minister means something else.
If the economic development continues, Taiwan will want to join China. Thus the focus of the US is interpreted differently by China, more like the focus Iraq or Afghanistan received.
SCMP:
During a marathon four-hour debate on a wide range of geopolitical and commercial grievances, Wang was said to have given Kallas – the former Estonian prime minister who only late last year took up her role as the bloc’s de facto foreign affairs chief – several “history lessons and lectures”.
Some EU officials felt he was giving her a lesson in realpolitik, part of which focused on Beijing’s belief that Washington will soon turn its full attention eastward, two officials said. One interpretation of Wang’s statement in Brussels is that while China did not ask for the war, its prolongation may suit Beijing’s strategic needs, so long as the US remains engaged in Ukraine.
vs
that they believed Wang was providing Kallas with a lesson in realpolitik during the four-hour encounter.
No mentioning of the “history lessons and lectures”, which is a friendlier way of saying that he has referenced past behavior that suggest that the EU is in the wrong.
There seems to be ignorance about what is going to happen even right at the top of the EU. The Chinese minister is calling bullshit. Yet Kallas must have already known better.
Your remarks regarding “lessons in realpolitik” and the alleged U.S. policy and the rest is all mentioned in the linked article. Just read it.
But your comment:
If the economic development continues, Taiwan will want to join China.
is pure Chinese propaganda as you know. Taiwan has said the exact opposite multiple times.
I have checked again. They are not. Could you please quote where the history lessons are mentioned or the other missing parts that I have pointed out?
is pure Chinese propaganda as you know.
It is not, and you know it. The US calculate that by 2027 China can be technologically leading not only in some but all areas. What does it tell you about global economics in 2035? Who is going to build the phone that everybody wants?
Taiwan has said the exact opposite multiple times.
How is that convincing? Do you know how fragile public opinion is? If China has prettier stuff in 2035, Taiwan will switch sides. China knows and just has to make sure that the US doesn’t destroy them before.
