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.
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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
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
That one is on the USSR
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Civil_War
Note that the “Kingdom of Greece” government was a Fascist puppet of occupying Germany and Italy.
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.