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China is concerned only with itself, they obviously don’t care about Ukraine but are eager to loot the sanctioned economy of Russia. The coalescing of Western i
by dahdum 5y ago
China is concerned only with itself, they obviously don’t care about Ukraine but are eager to loot the sanctioned economy of Russia. The coalescing of Western interests and reinvigorated NATO are not in their favor of course, but are no existential threat.
Ultimately, I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. Democracy would be ideal, but I’d rather see Russia utterly dependent on Beijing than autocratic and warmongering as they are now.
- vlovich123 5y agoA North Korea-like Russia except actually militarily aggressive doesn't benefit the West. It benefits China because it keeps us distracted while they increase their global influence through BRI and other programs.
- dahdum 5y agoAn aggressive Russian vassal state would create an existential threat to China where none exists now, and disrupt China’s economic and soft power goals while driving greater Western military growth and solidarity. Seems better to drain the country of wealth and resources while taking credit for bringing stability to the region.
- vlovich123 5y agoIt's called a win-win situation. If Russia succeeds and America & it's allies have burned resources trying to prop up a fait accompli. If it fails, then it can act as a mediator. In both cases they've made money from Russia due to the sanctions. I still fail to see the existential threat to China though. Even if Russia launches nukes, any retaliation is going to be hitting Eastern Europe which is very far away from China.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> North Korea-like Russia except actually militarily aggressive doesn't benefit the West For all its bluster, North Korea isn’t invading anyone. China’s leash has kept the peace. Contrast that with Russia. It’s a fair bet that Putin (and his successors) will behave better under Beijing’s thumb.
- vlovich123 5y agoChina has kept a leash on North Korea because it doesn't want any military operations that aren't its own in it's area of influence. My point of comparison though was about the amount of news coverage that North Korea eats up & defocuses the US government from focusing on more important issues. Russia serves a similar purpose. As for why China doesn't give two hoots about Russia's military escapades, Russia's military focus is far enough away that this is significantly less problematic. Russia is also a much more serious player on the world stage than North Korea - they have a significantly more important economy, military, more technologically advanced, and not as isolated (not to mention one of the largest nuclear arsenals with ostensibly functional ICBMs). China can't just threaten to overthrow the Russian government if it doesn't behave like they do with North Korea. None of that matters though since what I said is that an aggressive Russia benefits China well enough in terms of the problems it causes the US.
- vkou 5y agoRussia will not have any states to be aggressive against once the rest of Europe joins NATO. Which is why I think concerns about their aggression in the future are just propaganda. Russia can barely bully the poorest country in Europe. It definitively can't fight NATO.
- vlovich123 5y agoWe'll see yet how NATO's membership changes in the wake of this. My bet is that it's not going to be a very significant change. Maybe Finland decides to join because they don't want to risk a military confrontation with Russia which would be a big get & hem them in on the Western expansion a bit. But it's not going to be the flood of new NATO members you're hypothesizing.
- beaunative 5y agoAll countries are concerned only with themselves.
- willis936 5y agoA country concerned with increasing wealth above all else wouldn't be risking a trillion dollars for a billion dollars. This is political.