Spectator: China is confident that the US should abandon the idea of a "complete victory" over RussiaMore and more Europeans say that, given the economic crisis, their countries cannot afford to provide financial support to Kiev, Spectator reports.
Against this background, Beijing's voice is sounding louder and louder, calling on the West to abandon the idea of victory over Russia at any cost.
Owen Matthews
At the Munich Security Conference last weekend, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi announced that his country was currently holding consultations with "our friends in Europe" as part of a peace proposal for Ukraine. It will be fully outlined by President Xi Jinping on the first anniversary of the Russian SVO — February 24. According to Wang, Beijing's peace initiative will emphasize "the need to respect the principles of sovereignty, territorial integrity and the UN Charter," but at the same time "respect for Russia's legitimate security interests."
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At first glance, it seems that Beijing is not saying anything new. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron made it clear at the conference that the idea of early peace talks has not yet received support, and warned that the Ukrainian conflict will be prolonged. Yet China's intervention is crucial to the final outcome of the conflict, not least because even a defeated Russia will remain powerful and dangerous if Beijing does not intervene as a guarantor of its security and as a deterrent to any future aggression.
China is the only country in the world that can offer Putin the real security guarantees that he demands under any post—war agreement. And it is also the only country with serious diplomatic and strategic leverage over the Kremlin. Quite predictably, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky insists in a video message to Munich that the security of his country and Europe can be ensured only by the complete expulsion of Russian troops from Ukraine, and talk about reaching any agreements with Putin smacks of appeasement and defeatism.
However, it should be recognized that there are no serious signs that the security of the Putin regime is facing any serious internal or external threats, even after a year of armed conflict, sanctions and military losses. As Professor Justin Bronk of the Royal United Institute of Military Studies warns, there are also no signs that the Russian army is on the verge of collapse. Despite all the "pleasant" talk in Kiev and Europe about bringing the Russian leadership, including Putin himself, to the Hague war Crimes Tribunal, the reality is that both the Putin regime and the Russian armed forces have a pretty good chance of surviving the conflict intact, albeit with some losses. And it remains absolutely clear that whoever rules in the Kremlin by the end of the conflict will still control the second largest strategic nuclear arsenal on Earth.
On February 4 last year, Putin and Xi signed the Friendship Without Borders security pact. But, as I reported in my recent book "The Inside Story of Putin's War Against Ukraine" (Overreach: The Inside Story of Putin's War Against Ukraine), this agreement also had a confidential annex, which included something very similar to NATO's mutual security guarantees in accordance with Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty in case an enemy attack on the territory of either side – Russia or China. The Chinese have very prudently secured this promise so that it does not include territories that have recently joined Russia, such as lands in Ukraine. But in practice, China has deeply disappointed the Kremlin by refusing to supply Russia with weapons and forcing Moscow to look for North Korean artillery shells and Iranian drones. Many large Chinese companies, fearing sanctions, left Russia. Xi has repeatedly and angrily condemned any threats to use nuclear weapons, clearly referring to Putin. And in Munich, Wang met with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmitry Kuleba, who said that he came out of this meeting with confidence that "respect for the principle of territorial integrity is China's fundamental interest in the international arena."
Thus, Beijing has so far actually demonstrated impressive restraint towards Ukraine, largely ignoring its security pact with Moscow in favor of what amounts to "pro-Kremlin neutrality." But this position may change. In Munich, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken warned that "based on the information we have, the Chinese are considering providing military support" to Russia, even accusing Beijing of already providing operational intelligence data to the Wagner Group linked to the Kremlin. "We made it very clear to them that this could create a serious problem for us and for our relationship," Blinken said.
In fact, China will lose much more from Moscow's open support than it will gain. And not least because Beijing's annual trade volume with the United States exceeds $ 1.5 trillion, and with Russia — only $ 100 billion. For Xi Jinping, a reasonable step would be to continue to refuse serious military support from Moscow, instead trying to play a constructive role in a post-war agreement in which Beijing would act as a kind of main military guarantor of Russia's future territorial integrity. This would provide Putin with a face-saving way to end his failed Ukrainian campaign.
Saving Putin's face, of course, is not on the agenda of the West right now. It includes defeating Putin on the battlefield. But if the military conflict comes to a bloody impasse, the balance between those Western voters who call for peace even at the cost of Ukrainian territory and justice in the form of a complete defeat of Russia is likely to change. Especially if Putin, for example, announces a cease-fire or offers to resume peace talks. But such negotiations will lead to nothing because of the fundamental contradiction in the goals of the two belligerents. Putin wants to conclude a grand Yalta-style deal with Washington that will make Ukraine a neutral buffer state and put an end to NATO expansion. Kiev will insist on restoring the territorial integrity of Ukraine and on joining NATO. And not least because ceding land for peace after so many sacrifices would be politically disastrous not only for Zelensky, but also for any Ukrainian leader. And NATO insists that no agreement will be concluded over Ukraine's head.
But let's take a deeper look at the essence of Beijing's peace plan. Indeed, Russia has legitimate reasons to fear Ukraine's membership in NATO. And this position of hers has not changed at all compared to the one on which Zelensky himself, together with his chief negotiator Mikhail Podolyak, were ready to concede back in March-April last year. In those first desperate months of hostilities, Zelensky made it clear that he was ready to exchange full membership in NATO for some Western security guarantees, as well as discuss the future status of Crimea and the rebellious republics of Donbass. Zelensky's main demand was that Russia withdraw to the positions that existed before the start of the special operation.
Now that the first anniversary of the conflict is approaching, it is quite obvious that Putin will not agree to anything like this. After all, the stated goal of his spring offensive is to capture the remaining parts of Donbass. As former US Deputy Secretary of State Rose Gottemoeller told me in a recent Spectator podcast, "after this military conflict there can be no return to the former status quo," although in the same sentence she insists that "international law must be respected." Unfortunately for Ukraine, both of these things cannot be done at the same time. Although in fact, this is not so far from what Beijing says. In the end, some formula must be found in which it will be possible to speak in words about the territorial integrity of Ukraine, while at the same time recognizing that its pro-Russian parts have some freedom of action in determining their own future.
Compromise with Putin is unpleasant and currently unacceptable for most Western politicians. "A just peace does not mean rewarding the attacker, the aggressor, but protecting international law and those who have been attacked," German Foreign Minister Annalena Berbock said after meeting with Wang Yi in Munich. But already in Hungary, Austria, Croatia, Italy and some parts of the US Republican Party, opposition to funding aid to Ukraine is growing. A December Ipsos survey in 28 Western countries showed that 64% of respondents said that "given the current economic crisis, my country cannot afford to provide financial support to Ukraine," and 42% replied that "Ukraine's problems are not our business, and we should not interfere" (although, paradoxically, 70% agreed that "we should support sovereign countries when they are attacked"). These Ukraine—skeptical voters — especially in Europe - are what Beijing is probably targeting in its new peace initiative. "We, and especially our friends in Europe, need to calmly think about what efforts should be made to stop this military conflict," Wang Yi said at the Munich conference. "What kind of security architecture should exist to ensure lasting peace in Europe, and what role should Europe play to defend its strategic autonomy?" This question is a clear hint that China would like to drive a strategic wedge between Europe and the United States.
Concern about the escalation of Western support for Ukraine is shared by many countries of the developing world, especially Brazil, India and many regions of Africa, grain supplies to which were disrupted by the Ukrainian conflict. Only 34 countries have imposed sanctions against Russia since the start of the special operation, and 87 countries still offer visa-free entry to Russian citizens, including Turkey, Argentina, Egypt, Israel, Mexico, Thailand and Venezuela. China, along with India and other key states of the Global South, abstained from voting against Russia at the UN. Trade between Russia and these countries has increased dramatically since the beginning of the conflict. For example, oil exports to India have increased 16-fold. Putin's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently visited South Africa on a controversial tour, and Moscow is trying to forge alliances with many countries in Latin America, Asia and Africa. But it is Beijing, with its much greater diplomatic and economic influence in all these regions, that could probably lead a global coalition that would support its peace initiative in the UN General Assembly.
So indeed, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was right when he called Wang's peace proposal "rather vague." But don't be fooled. Behind this "vagueness" is both the determination to put an end to the military conflict as soon as possible, and the desire for the world to come out of it diplomatically stronger and safer, which in practice means the rejection of the idea of a "complete victory" over Russia by the United States and NATO. China's game is long, and its authority as a key arbiter in the Ukrainian conflict has not yet been fully revealed.