Does the “boundaryless” relationship have limits?
Russian President Vladimir Putin is embarking on his first foreign trip since his splashy inauguration for a fifth term, and his destination is no surprise: China.
The two-day state visit that begins Thursday is expected to be filled with pomp and ceremony, with effusive toasts and carefully choreographed gestures of friendship and mutual respect.
But status matters, and Putin is clearly Chinese President Xi Jinping's junior partner. As the Economist magazine put it after the visit was announced: “Vladimir Putin will meet his older brother in Beijing.”
Despite the inherent imbalance in their dealings (China is Russia's largest trading partner, while Beijing's biggest export market is the United States), Xi has done his best to imbue the visit with a sense of historical importance.
The two leaders are expected to sign a joint statement after their talks and there will be a gala celebration to mark 75 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries.
Putin, known for sometimes making haughty displays of making them wait when other leaders make the trip to the Kremlin, has adopted a remarkably deferential tone toward his host.
In a pre-trip interview with China's official Xinhua news agency, he expressed admiration for elements of Chinese culture, including martial arts and philosophy.
“Our people are united by a long and strong tradition of friendship and cooperation,” he told Xinhua.
Putin's expressions of gratitude are well justified. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Xi has shored up his Russian counterpart in several crucial ways.
China has helped Putin weather Western wartime sanctions, extending a particular lifeline to Russia's lucrative oil and gas industry. Over the past two years, Russia's energy exports to China have easily made up for the breakdown of what had been the cozy pre-war energy relationship between Moscow and Europe.
In many ways, the strategic relationship serves both Beijing and Moscow and represents, in the view of many analysts, the unified challenge of two autocrats to the West.
“China and Russia are forging a partnership that increasingly resembles a great power alliance,” military intelligence analyst Chels Michta wrote in a commentary this week for the Center for European Policy Analysis.
But while Xi and Putin share disdain for a U.S.-led world order, their interests are not identical. And the war in Ukraine is sometimes a complicating factor.
China does not provide weapons to Russia. But the Biden administration has pressured Xi's government over its sale to Russia of so-called dual-use items: components such as machine tools, microelectronics and rocket propellant, which have civilian and military uses.
This emerged last month when US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken visited Beijing and rebuked China for “fueling Russia's brutal war of aggression against Ukraine.”
Washington has also said it will take a tougher line against China-based financial institutions and companies that help Moscow circumvent wartime restrictions, warning of secondary sanctions against them.
Even as China publicly professes neutrality toward Ukraine, many observers believe Putin was encouraged in his war goals by a joint pact reached with Beijing days before the invasion, proclaiming a “boundless” partnership.
However, some points of friction have emerged during the Ukrainian war. China has been made uncomfortable by Putin's occasional strident nuclear threats, the latest of which came this month when the Kremlin announced it would hold exercises simulating the use of tactical (or battlefield) nuclear weapons near Ukraine.
On various international stages – most recently during a high-profile European tour last week – Xi has expressed hopes for peace in Ukraine, even as he has refused to condemn Russia's ongoing attempt to subjugate its neighbor.
Ukraine has been careful not to publicly denigrate China's peace proposals (a 12-point plan presented more than a year ago, followed by additional “principles” laid out last month), but the government in kyiv and its allies believe that if Beijing would genuinely like to play the role of conciliator, it could use its influence to rein in Putin.
On the eve of the visit, Putin praised Chinese proposals, which were lukewarmly received elsewhere, calling them “realistic and constructive.” The Russian leader also draws frequent parallels between his claim that Ukraine rightfully belongs to Russia and China's claim to Taiwan.
During last week's European tour, Xi joined French President Emmanuel Macron in calling for a “global truce” during the Summer Olympics in Paris, one that would theoretically apply in Ukraine, where the pace of fighting has intensified.
Ukrainian military officials acknowledge that, at least for the moment, Russia has battlefield momentum on its side, making new territorial grabs in northeastern Ukraine and making gradual, steady advances on the eastern front lines.
Despite elaborate displays of Sino-Russian friendship, in some parts of the world the two are seen as rivals rather than partners.
Xi is well aware that Putin's international isolation leaves him at a disadvantage and, in some places, such as Eastern Europe, that gives China greater economic freedom.
“The full-scale invasion of Ukraine is accelerating the process by which China is displacing Russia from Central and Eastern Europe,” wrote analyst Dimitar Bechev of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center after Xi's visit last week to Hungary and Serbia. .
Putin, he wrote, “has become toxic in a way that Chinese leaders are not.”
