How China sustains the illusion of equality with Russia

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s back-to-back meetings with US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin seem to suggest a new dynamic in the Russia-China-US triangle. However, despite the display of pomp and best behaviour between Trump and Xi, the basic contours of the geopolitical triangle have not changed. 

China maintains an upper hand over Russia, but any breakdown between the two countries remains a distant possibility. What seems to be a strategic truce between Beijing and Washington has not weakened the anti-Western edge in Sino-Russian joint communications adopted at the Putin-Xi summit.

A stable triangle

Russia has not leveraged Trump’s amity for Putin or the White House’s readiness to roll out the red carpet for the Russian leader. Meanwhile, Trump has not pushed Ukraine into accepting a ceasefire or peace agreement on Moscow’s terms. Despite a better atmosphere in Russia-US relations, hardly anything changed in practice. Coupled with Europe’s relentless support for Ukraine, this means that the Kremlin’s room for manoeuvre remains limited, including vis-à-vis its key partner — China. 

Moreover, any hopes Russia and China had of the US retreating into isolation following Trump’s presidential campaign in 2024 were ultimately shattered by the removal of Venezuelan President Nicholás Maduro and the war against Iran. 

Trump’s second presidency removed one of the links between Moscow and Beijing — the principles upholding the liberal international order. The fears for regime survival should subside in the Kremlin and the Zhongnanhai alike, with the US dropping democratisation and human rights from its political agenda, and embracing global far-right instead. Nonetheless, Trump’s second-term embrace of military force as a key instrument of foreign policy means that the three-decade-long resistance to US primacy and pursuit of a multipolar world order remain the cornerstone of Sino-Russian cooperation.

The impact of the US-Israeli war against Iran has turned out to be smaller than what some expected. Russia hoped that the oil and LNG supply crisis would convince China to finally agree to the proposed new gas pipeline, Power of Siberia 2. The pipeline would help Russian state energy giant Gazprom at least partially compensate for the loss of the European market, and it would signal Beijing’s long-term commitment to cooperation with Russia, regardless of the US and Europe’s dissatisfaction. 

Moscow played the card of stable overland deliveries that could spare China fears of a Hormuz Strait-type scenario in the Strait of Malacca. However, as so often in the past, the Russian representatives invoked the mantra of a deal being almost done, with some details in need of ironing out. In fact, this means that China is either not interested in the deal and negotiates only to allow the Kremlin to save face, or it is asking for more concessions on price or assets in Russia. In any case, it is Beijing that sets the pace and areas of cooperation with Russia.

Long shadow of asymmetry

The origins of this asymmetry between the two states can be traced back almost two decades, to the 2008-2009 global economic crisis. At that time, Moscow decided that it could no longer play China and Japan against each other in their pursuit of oil imports from Russia. Russian leading companies, Rosneft and Transneft, accepted multi-billion dollar loans from Chinese banks, began construction of the East Siberia–Pacific Ocean pipeline with a branch to China, and signed long-term contracts.

The asymmetry deepened in the wake of Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. Even though Western economic sanctions were relatively mild, in the face of expulsion from G8 and general condemnation across Europe and the US, Putin was determined to show the world that Russia was not isolated.

Putin forced Gazprom, one of the world’s largest producers of natural gas, to accept Chinese conditions, enabling agreement on the Power of Siberia gas pipeline, linking new gas fields in Eastern Siberia to the Chinese market. Russia also agreed to sell the S-400 Triumf anti-missile system and Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets, making China the first customer for these weapon systems.

Even before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, Russia felt the impact of the asymmetry. Symbolically, in 2019, the two sides added the words “for a new era” to the description of their strategic partnership, a phrase relevant in Chinese politics but alien to the Russians. More substantially, Russian armed forces joined their Chinese counterparts in air patrols around Japan and South Korea, effectively supporting Beijing’s assertive policy towards its neighbours and reducing Russia’s room for manoeuvre in East Asia.

Russia’s ongoing failure to defeat Ukraine militarily and the unprecedented scale of Western economic sanctions have pushed Moscow even further in Beijing’s embrace. Bilateral trade, including the provision of dual-use items, is necessary for the Russian war effort. Political support, including Chinese media mirroring Russian justification for the war and blaming the West, prevents any attempts to genuinely isolate Russia. The war drew American attention and resources away from Indo-Pacific and East Asia, indirectly strengthening Beijing’s hand in its rivalry with Washington.

Two metaphors

The story of the two summits can be told in two different ways. In one reading, China has emerged as the player with the strongest card in the Russia-China-US geopolitical triangle. Beijing does not need to choose between Russia and the US. Even when it stabilises rivalry with the US, China can still prop up its weaker partner.

The second reading places the emphasis on the new bipolarity, an international order in which there are only two major players, the US and the People’s Republic of China. Russia increasingly finds itself in the position of post-World War II Britain, with some remaining assets of a leading power, but unable to catch up with the two superpowers.

The Chinese leadership and its media machine emphasise the first reading in an effort to create the illusion of equality between China and Russia. The Chinese policy of “massaging Russia’s great-power ego” helps prevent a backlash from the Russian elites, for which great-power status is often more important than any material benefits. This illusion is, however, more difficult to sustain over time.

Related: Xi meets Putin after Trump summit to balance China-US-Russia triangle | Why China must reject Trump’s ‘G2’ narrative