Perhaps more than any other capital in the world, Beijing has closely observed
the change of the guard in the Kremlin. There are many reasons for Beijing's
concerns: Russia's revival as a major power, its petro-politics approach to
foreign relations, managing the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), not to
mention the stability of the 4,300-kilometer Sino-Russian border.
It's still Putin ... Russian President Vladimir Putin's arrangement with his successor
Dimitry Medvedev last December was a surprise for Beijing. Few, if any, Chinese
observers had anticipated that Putin would have his cake and still eat it. What
separates Beijing and the West in their respective perceptions of Russia's
leadership transition is a matter of substance versus form.
For the West, Putin's rule means Russia's departure from
democracy. Beijing sees that Putinism works
for a nation like Russia. During eight years under Putin, Russia has been
transformed from chaos to stability, fragmentation to recentralization, and
poverty to prosperity. It is only natural for Russians to continue the current
policy, with or without Putin. For Beijing, Moscow seems to have finally
figured out its approach to modernity: not the West, nor the East, but
somewhere in the middle - the Russian way.
The same charisma and capabilities that brought Russia back from the brink of
collapse have been actively applied to dealing with others, including China. In
eight years, Putin repositioned Russia’s relations with the West,
institutionalized the SCO with Beijing, and prioritized economics in Russia's
foreign policy. All this has been driven, at least partially, by rapidly rising
energy prices.
Sustaining the strategic partnership In the past eight years, the Sino-Russian strategic partnership has
broadened and deepened, ironically, without much progress on the
much-talked-about (initiated by Boris Yeltsin in 1994) oil pipeline from
Siberia to China's northeast. The pipeline is still in the pipeline. It remains
to be seen what Prime Minister Putin will do in this vital area of
Russian-China economic cooperation.
Although both sides claim that the current bilateral relationship is the "best"
in history, this state of affairs was achieved at a time of Russia's historic
decline and China's historic rise. For the foreseeable future, Beijing will
have to adjust to an increasingly strong and self-confident Russia. Already in
the past eight years, China has learned, from firsthand experience, that
Putin’s ability to defend Russia's national interests should never be
discounted.
One key element of the current Sino-Russian strategic partnership has been a
high level of trust, which is expected to continue under the Medvedev-Putin
team. Harmony among political elites, however, is no guarantee of success in
managing a host of dissonant issues such as asymmetrical trade (a rapid decline
of Russian equipment exports to China), stagnant military sales, and perceived
Chinese immigration into Russia’s far eastern region. It is unclear if the just
finished "China Year in Russia" (2007) and "Russia Year in China" in 2006 will
help ordinary Russians and Chinese to develop some mutual chemistry.
Moscow and Beijing also need to invigorate the SCO to turn it into a more
efficient regional grouping. It is not easy to interface with all major
religious and cultural systems: Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and
Confucianism. The SCO's future expansion and relations with others,
particularly Washington, continue to challenge this diverse group of nations
from the East and the West which includes democracies and non-democracies,
large and small nations, and relatively developed and less-developed countries.
While two US-led "wars on terror" are being fought on the SCO's peripheries
(Afghanistan and Iraq), none of the 10 formal and observer members of the SCO
want to turn this group into an anti-West or anti-US alliance. Beijing and
Moscow will have to figure out how to keep a delicate balance between these
diverse interests.
Thirty-year cycle? By the end of Putin's second term as president, Sino-Russian relations
have experienced 19 years of stability, which almost doubles the 10-year
Sino-Soviet "honeymoon" (1949-1959). It has, nonetheless, yet to pass the
30-year mark of "bad times" from 1960-1989, after Beijing and Moscow switched
from allies to adversaries almost overnight. During these three decades,
precious resources were diverted, drained, and wasted by both sides.
Russia is heading back to its past glory. And with a strong leader like Putin
as both "the Great" (staying in office beyond 2008) and "the Ghost" (working
behind the scenes), the dragon now has a new double team of bears to play with
in the coming years.
Yu Bin is senior fellow (byu@wittenberg.edu)
for the Shanghai Institute of American Studies and regular contributor to the
Pacific Forum's Comparative Connections.
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