The dictators of Russia and China met this week in Moscow to concelebrate a ceremony that symbolizes the understanding between the two authoritarian regimes. The summit has occurred when the International Criminal Court has launched an arrest warrant against Putin for war crimes and without Xi Jinping condemning the Russian invasion of Ukraine in open contradiction with his permanent proclamation, a basic pillar of his foreign policy, respect for the territorial integrity of states. It is obvious that this principle does not apply to the actions of his colleague, the Muscovite autocrat, or by analogy to any hypothetical action by China in its self-proclaimed zone of influence, especially over that rebel province, called Taiwan.
In this context, the twelve points proposed by Beijing to negotiate an end to the Russo-Ukrainian war constitute a crude maneuver to mitigate criticism of China over its role in the conflict and a propaganda platform to sell its Global Strategic Initiative and the Global Development Initiative (GSI and GDI in English). Both projects have two basic goals: first, to shield autocratic systems from any external interference, and second, to create a climate of opinion destined to make the United States and the West the main threats to world peace. This approach is too often ignored or overlooked, but it is essential to understanding the strategic vision and tactics of the totalitarian regime installed in the ancient Celestial Empire. Xi's visit to Putin is only part of this.
The GSI and the GDI have taken a prominent place in the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. Although the specific details are not yet known, the two strategies are based on Beijing's attempt to shape an international order that is favorable to the global expansion of its interests under the invocation of a supposed "community of common destiny". In this context, China is promoting and leading regional initiatives, for example, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) or the Brics groupings to bring together developing and emerging countries, including those grouped in the so-called Global South, to address the challenges of development and security that Washington and the Western democracies have created or ignored. In a recent speech to the OCC, Xi described a world divided into two camps: the US-led one that has produced a global "peace deficit", and the led or, to use an Eastern euphemism, inspired by China, guarantor of stability.
In this framework, China's alliance with Russia is logical, inevitable and destined to persist. This was reflected in an editorial by the Global Times, a newspaper owned by the Chinese State, when it pointed out that the peace plan put forward by Beijing did not involve a distancing from Putin and when it assigned to the United States and NATO the responsibility of the beginning of the war; in other words, Russia is not to blame for the invasion, it is not the aggressor, but an innocent victim of the evil and voracious Western imperialism. From this perspective, it is extraordinary arrogance, and an insult to intelligence, for Xi Jinping's claim to believe it is possible to continue to make a profession of faith in neutrality while in practice he supports his Moscow partner and moment, without any substantial cost. And there remains a huge question mark over China's hypothetical willingness to sell arms to Moscow.
Although China's proposal to end hostilities says it is open to all, the real targets are developing and emerging countries, whose support it hopes to win with two attractive claims: freeing them from obligation to choose between the warring sides and free them from pressure from the United States and its allies to join the sanctions against Russia. The argument is very simple. The war harms the economy of these states, the well-being of their population and the rich and selfish West is indifferent to their suffering. In this way, an attempt is made to break Russian isolation while advancing the configuration of a world power pole around China, which has become the champion of those oppressed by the forces of capitalist and democratic imperialism.
These are the real reasons for the Chinese position in the Russian-Ukrainian crisis and it is vital to take them into account because they are part of the Great Game in which world politics is and will continue to be immersed in the coming decades.
It is another move towards the attempt to articulate an international order around two blocs with features very similar to those of the Cold War. It is intended to revise the global geopolitical map that emerged in the wake of the collapse of the USSR and put an end to the hated Western domination, which fills both the Russians and the Chinese with secular resentment. In synthetic terms, the only difference between then and now is the change in the leadership of the autocratic powers, but their imperial ambition, the aspiration for world hegemony, persists. This is the reality and to ignore it would be very dangerous.
With this scenario, the only real and acceptable peace is that derived from a withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine, the preservation of that country's territorial integrity and its survival as an independent and democratic country capable of rule their destinies as they see fit. A solution of this nature is also highly relevant for deterrence purposes when the Chinese Communist regime is proceeding with an accelerated militarization of the disputed areas of the South China Sea and making its ambitions over Taiwan increasingly explicit. the annexation of which would be consistent with the doctrine of the Beijing regime since it would not imply a violation of its sovereignty because it does not consider the old Formosa an independent State but a part of its territory; the same conception that Putin has of Ukraine.
Russia and China, Putin and Xi Jinping are the face and the cross of the same coin: tyrants resentful of the West and with imperial dreams. With them there can be no appeasement, only coexistence.
