President Putin of Russia refuted “China threat theory” as he emphasized that he was not worried about the topics hyped by the west such as China’s growing military strength, including the development of hypersonic weapons and modernizing of its nuclear arsenal.
Putin said that Russia wasn’t going to adjust its China policy based on the interests of a third party as he praised the unprecedentedly high level of bilateral ties between China and Russia.
For Putin, Chinese leaders have the responsibility to make sure that 1.5 billion Chinese people are well protected and are living well.
The closeness of president Putin of Russia and President Xi Jinping of China has helped the relations between China and Russia to remain stable and supportive of each other as both countries face increasing pressure from the U.S.-led west inform of sanctions and rhetoric about human rights abuses and undermining of democracy.
The U.S military and political planners are very worried that the increasing collaboration between China and Russia will hinder the U.S’s ability to contain the rise of China and will allow both China and Russia to coordinate and do whatever they want with limited consequences.
U.S has been quick to capitalize on many disputes between China and its neighbors to amplify the China threat theory which has so far worked well especially with small countries which have started seeing China as a threat while the U.S as a savior but for a big and more powerful country like Russia and a well-trained spy and a master in politics like Putin, such rhetoric do not work and can be easily seen through.
For example; Russia and China share a land border of 4380 km and in 1969, it reported that the Soviet Union and China had an undeclared conflict but they later resolved their border disputes through a number of treaties signed by two countries to live in peace but this hasn’t prevented some people and leaders in the west from telling Russia of how Siberia is unpopulated while the other side of China has a growing population and that it’s likely that Chinese population will one day occupy and claim Siberia as their own since it used to a Chinese territory before it was taken by Russia.
The challenge presented by China to U.S global influence has never been seen before and U.S leaders and researchers have found themselves with no immediate answers on how to handle China without causing great damage to the U.S itself and many of its allies who have China as their largest trading partner.
Putin was saved by China when the U.S and its allies imposed sanctions on Russia during 2009-2010 protests in Moscow and 2014 sanctions due to Rusia’s acceptance of Crimea as another part of Russia, most Russian products banned by the U.S. and its allies were taken by China and the bilateral trade between China and Russia have since increased to more than 100 billion dollars.
The trade turnover between Russia and China for the first quarters of 2021 grew by 29.8% and in September, the trade between the two countries amounted to 13.458 billion dollars with imports from China to Russia reaching 6.601 billion dollars and imports from Russia to China reaching 6.867 billion dollars with overall trade expected to exceed more than 100 billion dollars this year.
Putin is under pressure from U.S.-led NATO over Ukraine and I think it would have been naive of Putin to ill-talk about China at this stage when Russia desperately needs as many countries as its friends and as much support as she can get.
Russia and China have been collaborating on many international issues and that cooperation has been seen recently in Syria, Afghanistan, Myanmar, South China Sea, Taiwan, and both leaders missing COP26 hosted by Uk about climate change.
When you observe the militaries of two countries both Russia and China, you can easily conclude that its a matter of time before China surpasses Russia in the military strengthen and technology and I don’t think there is anything we can do about it due to the sheer size of the Chinese population and the economy.
Both President Putin of Russia and XI Jinping of China knows that collaboration between the countries is the only choice they have got in order to protect their interests around the world and also in counterbalancing U.S.-led western influence around the World.
