Axis of Convenience by Bobo Lo
Russia and China have a famously complex relationship. They last came to blows as recently as 1969, with casualties on both sides running into the hundreds. And yet, though the official historians of the Communist Party of China are loath to admit this too much now, without the support of the USSR it is very doubtful the Party would ever have got off the ground in the early years in China, and started its march to final victory more than 20 years later. The USSR was a major technical and strategic partner in the early years of the People’s Republic, before the great falling out in the late 1950s, after Stalin’s death.
Bobo Lo has worked as a diplomat in Russia, and spent time in China while working on this study. Few are as well qualified as him to talk dispassionately about a relationship which arouses strong passions on both the Chinese and Russian side, but which few outside observers really understand. One of the strengths of this study is that Lo supplies strong historic context. The traumatic historic memory of the Mongolian attacks in the 12th and 13th century has left deep stains in the collective Russian consciousness to this day. In the more nationalistic periods of Russian internal politics, this memory can easily be aroused. China’s default position for many Russians is often set simply as a threat, despite the fact that the two countries share some pretty clear goals - energy (Russia a supplier, China a user), trade (massive increases in cross border trade since the 1980s) and geopolitics (supplying a counterbalance to the United States, in what the Chinese call a “multipolar world”.)
One case study Lo illustrates this through is the claims made in some parts of the Russian press that Siberia is being filled with Chinese immigrants. In fact, what evidence there is shows that Chinese who work in areas of Siberia are largely short-term visitors, and that the numbers are no where near as high as is claimed. But this sense of Chinese threat among the general Russian population, especially with China’s rising economic clout, is an easy thing to enflame. And even though the Russian and Chinese national leaders have created a framework in which to talk to each other well in the last decade (with the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation being one of the most visible), there is plenty of space for miscommunication and disagreement. Look at the endless talk of a pipeline from Siberia carrying natural gas into northern China, and the lack of any real outcome here yet. And look at the clear signs that China is desperate to diversity its sources of energy as much as possible rather than being too reliant on the rich energy supply that could come from Russia, for being too much under the thrall of their massive, unpredictable neighbour.
The relationship is dominated, as Bobo Lo’s title suggests, by a strong undercurrent of pragmatism now. The ideological link from the past now that the USSR has gone and Russia has partially democratised, is defunct. But there are plenty of shared issues, and “convenience” replaces anything higher-minded. Perhaps this is just as well. Russia has been a supplier of huge amounts of military kit to the PRC, running from aircraft carriers, to submarines, to aircraft. But as Lo wryly points out, almost all of this kit is only relevant to the situation across the Taiwan Straits, and would be little, if any use, in aggressive moves against Russia itself.
In 1972, China tied its colours to the mask, and, in moving towards rapprochement with the US, set the broad parameters of its main international relationships for the foreseeable coming decades. There is even throwaway talk recently of the world really being dominated by two powers—the G2, China and the US. Even so, as Lo makes clear, Russia is not so easy to push aside, and it’s more assertive leadership under Putin has proved that it can still pack a hefty diplomatic punch. The combination of the new Obama administration in the US, and the global economic slowdown, which has well and truly reached the shores of China, only adds two more unpredictable elements into something that was already complex. Love each other or loath each other, Russia and China are going to need to work with each other in the years ahead, just as they have in the past, and this book is a good place to start working out this complex, fascinating relationship.