Opinion | Ukraine crisis: why China’s hands are tied as Russia and the West face off
- A Russian invasion would benefit China but supporting that position would attract an EU backlash, win Taiwan support and leave Beijing with no wiggle room should Putin back down
If Russia invades Ukraine and precipitates a drawn-out conflict with the United States and its Western allies (though a direct military confrontation is unlikely), China obviously stands to benefit.
America would need to divert strategic resources to confront Russia, and its European allies would be even more reluctant to heed US entreaties to join America’s anti-China coalition.
Worse still, after Putin had skilfully exploited the US obsession with China to re-establish Russia’s sphere of influence, the strategic value of his China card may depreciate significantly.
For Putin, capitalising on Biden’s fear of being dragged into a conflict with a secondary adversary (Russia) to extract critical security concessions is a risky but smart move. But ordering an invasion of Ukraine – and thus effectively volunteering to be America’s primary geopolitical adversary, at least in the short to medium term – is hardly in the Kremlin’s interest.
