By Bruce Parrot
The rise of China poses special challenges for contemporary Russian policymakers. Tsarist Russia’s vast geographical expansion into Asia came at a time when all of Asia had been eclipsed by the industrial dynamism of Europe, and St. Petersburg’s principal orientation remained toward the European balance of power. Near the end of the 19th century, however, Asia’s gradual awakening altered this geopolitical situation. Russia’s shocking military defeat by Japan in 1905 demonstrated that the country faced a new two-front security problem. This problem, which figured in many of Moscow’s subsequent policy decisions, was especially evident in the triangular Washington-Beijing-Moscow diplomacy of the 1970s and 1980s. Since then, the character of Moscow’s geopolitical problem has changed significantly due to Asia’s widening dynamism and Russia’s loss of superpower status after the breakup of the U.S.S.R. In contrast with past eras, Russia now faces both a powerful China and a powerful Japan on its eastern flank. Whether Russia’s political and economic revival since 2000 will allow it to deal effectively with this unprecedented situation is a crucial question for -decision-makers in Moscow. Russia, China and the United States
Immediately after the Soviet collapse, Russia experienced a burst of enthusiasm for domestic liberalization and integration with the West, and this Westernizing impulse contributed to a cooling of relations with China. Within a few years, however, NATO’s plans for eastward enlargement and the domestic Russian upheaval caused by economic “shock therapy” provoked second thoughts in Moscow. Since the mid-1990s, Russia frequently has sought to use China as a counterpoise against what it regards as the U.S. quest for global dominance. At one or two points in the past decade, Moscow even has made secret efforts to attract Beijing with the lure of technical assistance in developing strategic nuclear weaponry to counter new U.S. strategic programs. In all likelihood, this gesture has been no more than a political ploy, because providing such assistance could deeply harm Russia’s own military security and undercut its international options. But the gesture has reflected Moscow’s desire to improve relations with Beijing and restrict Washington’s diplomatic freedom of maneuver. China, although initially cautious about Russian bids for closer diplomatic cooperation, has responded with increasing enthusiasm in the past few years. Moscow and Beijing have repeatedly endorsed the goal of establishing a multipolar world and have expressed their objections to U.S. “hegemonism.” As permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, they have made parallel efforts to bolster U.N. influence on contentious international issues such as NATO’s war against Serbia over Kosovo. They also have cooperated with one another in the controversies surrounding the U.S. decision to invade Iraq and recent American attempts to win U.N. authorization for sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program.
After Vladimir Putin became president of Russia in 2000, the level of Sino-Russian cooperation diminished for a time. Putin’s decision to acquiesce in the expansion of U.S. strategic weapons programs, including a missile defense system with potential applications in Northeast Asia, made China feel that Russia had abandoned their joint campaign against these programs and left China diplomatically isolated. This feeling was sharpened by Putin’s dramatic alignment with the United States immediately following the 9/11 attacks and his firm backing for U.S. military retaliation against the Taliban in Afghanistan. Putin’s endorsement of the U.S. military presence in Central Asia worried China, which regarded the introduction of U.S. troops and bases not only as an anti-terrorist- measure but as a potential source of pressure on China’s vulnerable strategic rear. According to some observers, Putin’s casual reference to the possibility that Russia might join NATO also generated anxiety among China’s leaders. Cooperating With China
It is doubtful that Putin ever seriously considered NATO membership; in any case, events soon ruled out the possibility. Moscow’s disagreement with Washington over Iraq was amplified by sharp American criticism of Russia’s internal movement toward authoritarianism and by the intensifying Russo-American competition for influence in the post-Soviet countries near Russia’s western and southern borders. These developments have contributed to the Sino-Russian resumption of cooperative efforts to check U.S. initiatives—especially as the worsening conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have revealed the limits of U.S. power. Russia and China have manifested a strong common interest in preserving each country’s territorial integrity and thwarting secessionist movements. Russian pronouncements favoring a one-China policy encompassing both Taiwan and Tibet have elicited Chinese declarations that Moscow’s war in Chechnya is strictly an internal Russian matter. Moscow is anxious to thwart radical political and ethnic movements in the neighboring states along its southern border, and China is anxious to prevent such influences from filtering out of Central Asia into its vast northwestern region of Xinjiang. In the 1990s, Russia and China joined with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to form a diplomatic grouping known as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which aims to combat regional terrorism and ensure the territorial integrity of the member states.
Some Russian enthusiasts have viewed the SCO as an instrument for checking U.S.-NATO influence in Central Asia, and recently China has cooperated in this endeavor. At an SCO summit in 2005, Russia and China engineered the adoption of a resolution calling on the United States to set a timetable for withdrawing its forces from the region. Although U.S. forces remain in Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan has closed the U.S. base on its territory and signed a new military alliance with Russia. Coupled with the U.S. campaign for global democratization, the fear of -Western-aided “colored revolutions” in several Central Asian capitals has allowed Russia and China to present themselves as reliable security guarantors who have no wish to change the authoritarian regimes of their Central Asian partners. The SCO’s recent decision to give India, Iran and Pakistan observer status highlights the absence of the United States from the diplomatic grouping. Although the revival of Russian influence in Central Asia is a source of satisfaction in the Kremlin, the wisdom of this effort to undermine U.S. influence remains open to question. Failure of the U.S.-NATO operation against the Taliban’s resurgence could precipitate a new cycle of Central Asian radicalism harmful to Russia’s security as well as China’s, and the two governments would have to decide how to respond. In recent years, Russia and China have increased the level of cooperation between their military establishments. During the 1990s Russia, whose military had been severely weakened by years of domestic upheaval, declined to back Beijing’s calls for a reduction of U.S. military forces in East Asia. This reluctance could be traced to Moscow’s apprehensions that such a step might free China (or possibly Japan) to pursue a more assertive policy that would further undermine Russia’s position in the region. Recently, however, Moscow’s stance has shifted significantly. In 2005 the United States and Japan broadened their security relationship to reinforce the protection of Taiwan against Chinese attack—a step that disturbed China. Later that year, Russia and China conducted joint military exercises along China’s coast. Although the exercises were billed as a rehearsal for counter-terrorist operations, their location and character were much more relevant to a potential Chinese clash with Taiwan. At the time, Russian foreign affairs officials emphasized the importance of resolving the political standoff between China and Taiwan by peaceful means, but Moscow has nevertheless tilted toward Beijing in the complex strategic maneuvering around Taiwan’s future. Closer cooperation with Beijing helps Moscow deal with the United States, but it also risks making Russia the junior partner in a relationship dominated by China. Nonetheless, Moscow appears to have been reassured by the large reductions of Chinese and Russian military forces along their common border and by a decade of steady progress that culminated in a final resolution of the territorial disagreements between the two states in 2004. A few skeptical Russian analysts have warned their countrymen not to be lulled into believing that the border settlement has caused China to forget about its “lost territories,” and nationalist politicians in the eastern regions near China have echoed this apprehension. But Moscow appears to have downgraded this concern, partly because it believes that Russia’s abundant oil and gas reserves give it new diplomatic leverage vis-à-vis a Chinese government struggling to satisfy the surging national demand for energy imports. Borrowing a tactic from the era of the Sino-Soviet conflict, Moscow also has attempted to cultivate an increasingly dynamic and assertive India as a regional counterweight against Chinese influence. Arms, Energy and Pipelines
Although it has refrained from aiding China’s strategic weapons programs, Russia has sold conventional weapons to China at an average annual rate of $1 billion for the past dozen years. These sales are a means of enhancing influence with Beijing while satisfying some of the urgent needs of Russia’s ailing military-industrial sector. Because of the Western embargo on military sales to China imposed after the massacre in Tiananmen Square, Russian sales may contribute significantly to the upgrading of China’s military power. Some close observers suggest that Moscow’s military-technical assistance to China is a wasting asset, given the paucity of new Russian weapons developed since the breakup of the U.S.S.R. On the other hand, a Chinese decision to offer large-scale material support for joint military research and development programs might conceivably ameliorate this problem. In any case, Russia’s willingness to sell China advanced conventional weaponry has raised its regional profile in both Beijing and Washington.
The Russian assumption underlying these arms sales is that China remains preoccupied with potential threats from the United States and Japan and therefore is unlikely to direct its growing military capabilities northward toward Russia. Moscow also may calculate that its extensive arms sales to India, historically a Chinese rival, will help counteract any negative effect of the Chinese arms purchases on Russian security interests. However, some Russian analysts have expressed the apprehension that weapons exported to China ultimately might be turned against Russia or might draw Russia into conflicts between China and third powers. In particular, they have urged Moscow to refrain from supplying advanced weapons to Beijing or taking other actions that might compel it to choose between China and the United States in case of a crisis over Taiwan. Some of these observers continue to believe that Russia should tilt toward the United States in order to contain China’s widening influence. Trends in the energy sector are an increasingly prominent focus of Sino-Russian ties. The recent surge in Chinese energy imports and the turmoil in the Middle East have sharpened Beijing’s desire for access to new Central Asian and Siberian energy supplies. In the past few years, Russian-Chinese summits have regularly dealt with proposals to construct major oil and gas pipelines linking Siberia with China. Some Russian policymakers believe that increased energy exports to Asia can serve not only as a diplomatic tool in the region but also as a source of leverage in energy negotiations with European governments. The fate of future energy trade with China hinges partly on whether Russia accepts a Japanese counter-offer to help finance a longer oil pipeline that would extend to the Pacific Coast, thereby allowing Japan and other states access to Siberian energy reserves. Moscow’s hesitation over this decision has caused some vexation in Beijing, and Russia has tried to square the circle by proposing to add a separate leg to the Pacific pipeline to supply China. However, the economic feasibility of all these pipeline projects remains uncertain, not least because of questions about Russia’s ability to extract the necessary volumes of oil and gas. Internal Dynamics
For the next decade or two, the pivotal issue for the revival of Russia’s international power is how well or how poorly the government manages the energy sector. By strengthening state control of energy production and distribution, Putin has sought to bolster Russia’s national security and its leverage in dealings with other countries. However, this statist approach threatens to restrict the energy sector’s production potential and contribution to the economy as a whole. Compared with the record of privatized oil companies—which accounted for most of the post-Soviet surge in oil output—state-owned companies have made only a minor contribution and have failed to identify and develop adequate reserves to sustain the sector’s rapid growth. The monopoly position of the state-dominated Gazprom corporation has produced a similar problem in natural gas production.
As a result, Moscow may not be able to produce enough energy to satisfy its ambitious objectives for energy diplomacy with China and the rest of Asia. Over time, if the government were willing to raise domestic prices substantially to match world levels, it could reduce the profligate domestic consumption of energy and enlarge the exportable share of energy output. However, a price boost would negatively affect the competitiveness of the Russian manufacturing sector, which is already at a serious disadvantage against many foreign manufacturers. Even more important, a major increase in domestic energy prices could destabilize the political system by driving up consumer prices across the board. Russia’s economic performance and relations with China are also intertwined with the severe health and demographic crisis besetting the country. In the past 15 years, the Russian population has shrunk dramatically due to low birth rates and an epidemic of alcoholism and other diseases. The resulting contraction of the workforce now threatens the country’s long-term economic growth, as well as its capacity to man an effective army. In the sparsely populated region bordering eastern China, the general population decline has been magnified by migration to European Russia, which reduced the regional population by about 10 percent during the 1990s. The population crisis has prompted some Russian observers to raise alarms about a purported influx of millions of Chinese immigrants into Russia’s eastern territories. Although research has shown that these claims are greatly exaggerated, the overall population shortage is real, and it has fueled a Russian immigration debate resembling those in many Western countries. Russian nationalists and officials concerned about strategic vulnerabilities have favored restricting immigration, while businessmen and officials eager to foster economic growth have advocated expanding it. At present, there are no clear signs of a Chinese government attempt to “infiltrate” Russian territory with Chinese settlers (although the conclusion of China’s WTO pre-accession agreement with Russia was delayed until Beijing dropped its effort to win greater latitude for Chinese workers to enter Russia). Nevertheless, an economic strategy heavily dependent on Chinese immigration would raise difficult security issues. Even if large-scale Chinese immigration occurred without any special encouragement from Beijing, a subsequent political crisis could expose Russia to the danger of an ethnic Chinese secession movement that might claim the right of self-determination and receive support from Beijing if it were at odds with Moscow. All in all, trends in Russian relations with China and developments inside Russia itself pose major challenges that are sure to tax the skills of Russian policymakers. Whether they will meet these challenges successfully remains to be seen. Bruce Parrott is a professor and director of the Russian and Eurasian Studies Program. | 
