The chronicle of Russia sleepwalking into being China's client state

Russia is "the last obstacle to be eliminated before dealing with China," according to Sergey Lavrov. The Russian Foreign Minister claimed that China was the endgame of the West to attack Russia. Leaving aside whether his remark is valid, it derives some relevant questions to understand what changes and challenges the world is undergoing: Is confronting Russia a detour that the West inevitably goes through "before dealing with China"? Is the war in Ukraine now becoming China's proxy war through Russia against the West?

China ostensibly takes an ambiguous stance on the war in Ukraine. China neither condemns nor imposes sanctions on Russia for the invasion in Ukraine. Chinese diplomats maintain their appearance of neutrality. However, the Chinese judge Xue Hanqin siding with her Russian counterpart voted against the UN's international court of justice (ICJ) in The Hague's judgment on 16th March 2022 to order Moscow to halt its invasion of Ukraine. Moreover, on 23rd March 2022, when TheUnited Nations Security Council smacked down a Russia's motion that called attention to the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine while failing to mention Moscow's role as the aggressor, China casted the sole supporting vote in favor of the text. Besides, Chinese state-run news outlets amplify the Russian narrative blaming the US and NATO for provoking the Ukraine war. The Chinese domestic propaganda machine, which is always mirroring China's ruler's will, is apparently favoring Russia.

China siding with Russia should surprise no one. In early February, which was just 3 weeks before Russian President Vladimir Putin launched the so-called "special military mission" against Ukraine, he and Chinese President Xi Jinping had just met face-to-face and released the China-Russia joint statement on International Relations Entering a New Era. The statement emphasizes that both Russia and China have their own superior models of democracy, celebrate a "no limits" partnership, and oppose NATO's enlargement.

The leading China expert Bonnie Glaser has told DW that the most striking point in the joint statement was that China supported Russia's proposal to install new security arrangements in Europe on top of, if not instead of, NATO. Beijing's hands are reaching to European security affairs.

Despite China's deeds revealing its pro-Russian position, the world is under the impression that China seems to be sitting on the fence and unwillingly being partial in the war on Ukraine. European Union's foreign policy chief Josep Borrell even hopes that China will be the broker and bring peace. He told El Mundo in early March 2022 that "(t)here is no alternative (no hay alternativa)" other than having China mediate the talks between Ukraine and Russia. Nevertheless, Borrell failed to mention that the China-Russia joint statement weeks ago had just revealed that China was no longer impartial in European security affairs.

Australian prime minister Scott Morrison is warning of Beijing's hidden motives behind its neutral appearance. On 7th March, Morrison criticized Beijing for being "chilling silence" on the war. On 16 March, Morrison condemned Beijing for being "chilling silence" again and called on China to be more transparent about the nature of its relationship with Russia.

What is Xi thinking behind Beijing's "chilling silence"? The world might never know. However, three aspects of Chinese foreign relations are worth scrutinizing: 1. Over the past decade, Russian expansionism has repeatedly distracted the West from looking at Chinese aggression; 2. China avoids confrontations with the West on the issue of Ukraine while economically and politically supporting Putin's war; 3. China-Russia partnership is not an equal one and China's advantages are increasing rapidly. These three aspects are leading to one situation: China and the West are at the edge of having a proxy war, in which China is the principal actor and Russia the client state.

Intentionally or not, China and Russia's proxy alignment have been gradually developing for more than a decade. Particularly, 2007 was a significant yearwhen Russia started to sleepwalk into becoming China's client state.

On 10th February 2007, Putin gave a speech at the Munich Security Conference criticizing the US-led unipolarity, indicating his resolve to restore the bipolarity of the cold war. On 26th March 2007, Putin greeted then President of China Hu Jintao at the Opening Ceremony of the Year of China in Russia at Moscow and said that both countries were "beginning the ascension towards new heights" in their partnership. On 27th March 2007, both countries signed commercial deals worth US$4 billion.

Putin turned his back to the West and embraced China. That all happened within six weeks in early 2007. As Chinese capital became the only backup for Putin to challenge the US-led international order, Moscow's reliance on Beijing became inevitable. When China surpassed Germany to become Russia's largest single trading partner in 2010, Moscow's reliance on Beijing was further consolidated.

2014 is another significant year when Russia leaped its way to become China's client state. In early 2014, Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Moscow president of Ukraine and Putin's puppet, was overthrown after a months long protest in Kiev. Responding to that, Putin used military force against Ukraine and annexed Crimea. His move drew international sanctions for violating the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances, which prohibited Russia, the UK and the US from threatening or using military force or economic coercion against Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan.

Putin's move not only upset the European security order, but also hurted the Russian economy due to the international sanctions following Russia annexing Crimea. As a result, the Russian economy became even further reliant on China. Fast forward to 2018, China accounted for 15.5 percent of Russia's total trade when Russia only accounted for 0.8 percent of China's total trade.

Russia annexing Crimea gave China not only economical but also geopolitical advantages. The West was anxious about both Putin's blatant expansionism and the disturbing Russian natural gas supplies due to the Crimea crisis. Few European countries had the luxury to care about China's stealthy aggression. It provided an opening for China to erode Hong Kong's autonomy with little international backfire.

In 2014, China cracked down on the Umbrella Movement which called for universal suffrage in Hong Kong. China denied Hong Kong's autonomy despite it being guaranteed by the Sino-British Joint Declaration, which had been registered as a treaty at the United Nations by both China's and the UK's governments. In June 2014, China claimed that the treaty was just a historical document that no longer had any significance.

Few countries cared about China's breach of the international treaty, as the world was busy dealing with Putin. At the 2014 G20 Brisbane summit, Western country leaders confronted Putin with threat of imposing further sanctions on Russia, while Xi was greeted by world leaders, including the then US president Barack Obama. The then UK prime minister David Cameron did not complain to Xi about China denying the Sino-British Joint Declaration. After the summit, Xi even delivered a speech at the Australian parliament.

In 2015, Russia's GDP fell 3.7% as the country was suffering from falling oil prices and international sanctions. Russia's reliance on China became irreversible.

Thanks to Russia, China once again got away with its aggression in 2016, when China rejected the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague ruling, which denied China 's claim of exercising exclusive control historically over the South China Sea. While China defied the rule based international order, the world's attention was drawn to Russia commiting war crimes in an aerial bombing campaign of opposition-controlled territory in Aleppo, Syria from September until October 2016.

In 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine in full scale. Putin needs China to fund the war. While the West is wondering whether China could help mediating, China is plotting to buy up Russian energy industries as Moscow desperately needs Chinese capital to undermine the international sanctions. As the war in Ukraine is prolonging, Putin seems to have not many choices except to allow the Chinese capital to dominate the Russian economy. For Xi, to secure energy resources from Russia, to dominate the Russian economy and to probably make Russia become China's client state are too tempting to refuse.

Although the war might hamstring some projects of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in Ukraine, it is still in the interest of China expansionism regardless of how the war ends. If Ukraine falls into Moscow's hands, it would align with China's interest as long as Beijing manages to maintain the "no limits" China-Russia partnership. If the war drags Russia to be in trouble, Beijing would further secure the upper hand in its relationship with Moscow. China wants a weaker Russia to gain more control over their partnership, according to Alexander Gabuev, the chair of the Russia in the Asia-Pacific Program at the Carnegie Moscow Center. For reasons above, Gabuev believed that Beijing would keep supporting Moscow even if China had high costs to pay for Putin's invasion of Ukraine.

Asserting that the China-Russia partnership was not an equal one, Glaser told DW that China is a much stronger player in terms of its overall GDP," the Chinese technologies and innovation outstripped the Russian, and the Russian economy would decrease further as the war continued. Now, the prolonged war is upsetting Russian military and economic capacity. It provides China an opening to cement its influence over Russia,according to the former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

Russia is fighting and exhausting itself while benefiting China. As China is going to be Putin's sole source of foreign financial support to fund his expansionism, the Russia-Ukraine war is becoming a proxy war under the context of the new cold war between China and the US with allies. Putin's invasion of Ukraine is the turning point where the proxy alignment between China and Russia materializes.

Cooking the proxy war, China is to control the Russian economy, gain political leverage by maintaining a pseudo-neutral position, to further secure the BRI trade routes, to exhaust and distract the West from blocking Beijing's way of seizing the South China Sea and Taiwan. China is pursuing its goal when Russia is sleepwalking Into being its client state. What the world needs to brace for next is the conflict between the two great powers, which are China and the US.