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OPINION - Why Xi Jinping still sees Vladimir Putin as his ‘best, most intimate friend’

 (Katie Stallard)
(Katie Stallard)

When Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, some analysts suggested that Vladmir Putin had “played” his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping. The pair had stood together in Beijing three weeks earlier and declared that there were “no limits” to their relationship. It made Xi look like an accomplice.

The timing was certainly suspect. Putin was in Beijing for the opening of the Winter Olympics. American officials claim they shared intelligence with the Chinese government ahead of the meeting and urged them to help deter the attack, but that they had merely requested that it did not take place during the Olympics. Sure enough, 24 hours after the closing ceremony, Russian tanks began crossing into eastern Ukraine.

So did Xi know what Putin had planned and was he complicit? Or was he duped by the man he has called his “best, most intimate friend”? And perhaps, more importantly, what does this mean for the future of the China-Russia relationship?

It is certainly plausible that Putin played down the scale of his ambitions, or that he told Xi what he seems genuinely to have believed; that Kyiv would fall within days and any serious conflict would be short-lived. It is also possible that they did not discuss the situation in much detail at all.

Regardless of what Xi did or did not know ahead of the conflict, his actions over the last six months have shown the importance he attaches to the relationship. It is not limitless, as they have claimed.

China has been careful to avoid crossing any Western red lines that might trigger sanctions, such as supplying direct military aid to Russia, and Chinese exports to Russia have plummeted as Chinese firms appear to be abiding by international export controls.

But Xi has continued to provide Putin with diplomatic and economic support. During a phone call between them on June 15, for instance, long after the horrors of the Russian atrocities in Ukrainian cities such as Bucha had been exposed, Xi praised the “sound development’ of their relationship and pledged his backing for Russia’s security concerns.

That same month, he told an economic forum in St Petersburg that the two countries would set “new records” for bilateral trade. During the first five months of 2022, the value of that trade was up almost a third on the year before, with Chinese imports of Russian oil and gas surging. The rationale on the Russian side is clear. Faced with growing international isolation, Putin has little choice but to turn to China and accelerate the “pivot to the East” he began after his annexation of Crimea in 2014. And while it might not be as immediately obvious, the reason Xi is so determined to stick with the relationship is actually quite straightforward too: China’s rivalry with the US.

Xi believes that the US is set on a long-term, systemic contest with China that aims to halt its rise and threaten the Communist Party’s grip on power. He values Putin, above all else, as a powerful partner in their shared pushback against this common adversary.

This is not the “marriage of convenience” that is sometimes portrayed. There are limits to how far they will go to support the other, as Xi has demonstrated. Both leaders will continue to look out for their own interests first and last.

But they have each other’s back in what both men view as their most important fight, and so their relationship, despite its difficulties, is likely to endure.

Katie Stallard is a senior editor at the New Statesman and the author of Dancing on Bones: History and Power in China, Russia, and North Korea