China and Russia Are Not as Close as You Think
China and Russia have often been described as the two juggernaut nations that will unite to bring down the US-led Western powers. Pictures of Xi and Putin smiling together flooded the internet during Putin’s recent visit to Beijing, while many continue to assume the two powers are closer together than ever. However, there are three areas that show the subtle, yet important, cracks between Sino-Russian relations: Arctic exploration, Russian oil, and Chinese automobiles.
Firstly, with the continuing trend of global warming, China seems ever more interested in the possibility of an Arctic trade route to Europe. In recent years, China has significantly improved its Arctic shipping technology, and launched several expeditions to the region. It sees itself as a near-Arctic nation, and with the recent breakthrough in the development of the Xuelong Arctic ship, China’s ability to penetrate the ice into Europe is getting stronger. However, Russia has been a major player in this area, having cooperated and helped develop China’s ability in this region. Despite the two nations’ close cooperation in other areas, there seems to be reluctance and suspicion from both sides in expanding projects relating to the Arctic. For example, Russia has delayed the building of an oil pipeline into China, suggesting a rift in their cooperation.
Another major area that shows the division between the two nations would be Russian oil. Ever since the Russian military operation in Ukraine began, Western powers have placed sanctions on Russian oil, forcing Russia to become even more dependent on China and India to buy its oil. This gave China great bargaining power to demand oil at lower prices, and China has roughly bought oil cheaper by 8%, despite the discount in oil price not having an enormous effect on the Chinese economy. On the other hand, Russia’s decision to sell oil to China comes with great cost – the discount on oil will reduce profits for Russia, but the use of shadow fleets by Russia to transport oil will further increase costs. However, it is important to note that when the US relaxed its sanctions on oil embargoes, the discount rate for China decreased, which suggests that China does not have complete power over Russian oil, especially with the Iran war in the Middle East.
Moreover, another phenomenon that shows the tension between China and Russia is the rapid influx of Chinese automobiles into Russia. Before the Russo-Ukrainian war, China had about 2% of the Russian market, while after the war China has more than 50% of the market. This is due to all the Western car companies stopping production in Russia since the beginning of the war. However, this creates a significant problem for Russia, as the Western car manufacturers would produce the cars in Russia, while Chinese producers often made the vehicles in China. This has led to protectionist measures from Moscow, such as increasing foreign vehicles’ recycling costs to 85%. Despite this protectionist policy, which would have come ‘top down’ from Putin, Beijing did not respond aggressively and relations remained stable. This is undoubtedly
unusual, as Beijing’s response to Western protectionist measures is often rapid and aggressive, yet Beijing remained calm to stabilise relations with Russia.
Therefore, despite these three areas suggesting that China and Russia have problems between them, these problems are more obstacles than barriers. With Russia’s continued involvement in Ukraine, it would need to continue its close cooperation with China to protect its economy, while China can continue to sell to Russia’s market. Thus, despite the asymmetrical balance of power in China and Russia’s relationship, both nations will seek to ensure friendly relations to counter the US-led Western powers.
