Not tigers and monkey

The figurative expression of the founder of the modern Chinese state, the "great helmsman" Mao Zedong, who once compared the relations between Washington, Moscow and Beijing with a duel of two tigers, watched by a wise monkey sitting on a mountain, on the threshold of a new year, 2022, makes us wonder if we can and then follow this formula by inertia. Or, in order to define the modern model of relations in the USA-Russia-China triangle, the Chinese folklore rich in genre scenes this time will have to suggest some other, unbroken plot?

Mao's catchphrase about two tigers and a monkey who did not join their fight has formed more than one generation of politicians, diplomats and experts.

And to this day, often sounding on television and wandering from article to article, it looks like a comprehensive formula for all times.

A formula that, perhaps, only needs one or another adjustment, given that the situation in the world is changing rapidly.

With regard to China, the main change is that, following Donald Trump, the current US President Joe Biden is actively reconfiguring relations with allies in the West and East for a global confrontation with Beijing, recognized as the main strategic threat in the 21st century.

Given this tectonic shift, as well as the Western speculations about Russia as a "dying power" that, with all its will, cannot create as many problems for the United States and its allies as China, many were quick to conclude that there was a role reversal in Mao's formula.

That is, now Russia should be in the role of a wise monkey sitting on a mountain watching the fight between two tigers (the United States and China).

And all her "wisdom" will have to be to resist the temptation to rush to the aid of the "Chinese tiger", because then Moscow and Beijing will automatically pass for the West on the same scale of threats, become for the United States and its allies two "enemy number one ".

However, on the eve of a new year, 2022, a completely new intrigue appears in the US-Russia-China triangle, promising to soon bury Mao's textbook geopolitical parable.

First, the understanding of who should be considered the same monkey on the mountain and, accordingly, who next year claims to be a tiger preparing for a duel with the United States, or who may be forced to be in this role, finally disappears.

Second, there is less and less reason to believe that the original “two fight, the third is watching” scheme in relation to the Washington-Moscow-Beijing relationship will prove viable in the third decade of the 21st century.

A fundamentally new intrigue was created by the Russian proposal, promulgated on December 17 and addressed to the United States and NATO, to conclude an agreement on security guarantees as soon as possible, which Moscow is proposing to the West as a kind of new global non-aggression pact.

In his draft, one by one, those points are listed that can form the basis of new, non-confrontational relations between the West and the East.

In general, this is a draft roadmap for de-escalation and the creation of a new architecture of international security, which has never become a reality, while the risk of a full-scale confrontation has grown exponentially.

By putting forward this proposal, Moscow has thus led the West to a strategic fork. The United States and its allies will have to make a decisive choice in the near future either in favor of continuing the dialogue and gradually eliminating the main irritants of recent decades, such as the further expansion of NATO to the east, or risk playing for aggravation. In the second, unfavorable scenario, further escalation will be inevitable, given that Moscow has already warned about its readiness, if it refuses to dialogue in response to threats to its security, to move to creating counter-threats to the West.

It should be noted that the proposal for a security guarantee treaty has become an exclusively Russian, and not a Russian-Chinese proposal, despite the fact that Moscow and Beijing take a common or similar position on key international problems.

It reminds us that it is Moscow and Washington, not Washington and Beijing, that bear the main responsibility for strategic security in the world.

If we follow Mao's formula, then it is Russia and the United States that remain the two tigers, which, however, are not fighting yet, but are sending signals to each other, clenching their muscles and deciding whether to engage in a fight or not.

The Russian initiative puts China in a very delicate situation, which, on the one hand, is formally neither a party nor an invited party to the treaty on future security guarantees for Moscow and Washington, but, on the other hand, cannot pretend that this does not concern it at all ...

That is, he cannot try to pretend to be that very wise monkey on the mountain, given the statements made in Beijing about China's global responsibility for the "humanity of a common destiny" (as defined by the President of the People's Republic of China Xi Jinping).

Answering the question whether the Chinese factor has any influence on the Russian-American consultations on strategic stability, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov urged not to link one with the other and at the same time tried to carefully remove the ground for future fantasies about two tigers and a monkey. “I have seen reports that influential experts, including retirees and analysts, have published several stories about the Chinese factor, and this, of course, creates a certain background and context. But in the course of those meetings and discussions, just communications that we had in the outgoing year with the United States after the June meeting of the presidents, this topic did not arise, "said Sergei Ryabkov.

And he added: “With regard specifically to our strategic dialogue, the dialogue on strategic stability with the United States, there the Chinese factor, as they say, emerges from the filing of the Americans.

But our line is the same - we respect the position of the PRC and consider it a sovereign choice of this country, as well as the UK and France, in whose participation we are very interested in this process. "

It is highly symbolic that the publication of the Russian proposal for a security guarantee treaty was preceded by the second Russian-Chinese summit this year, held on December 15, in the format of a video conference.

The talks between Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping finally removed the fears of the Chinese side that Moscow, behind Beijing's back, will reach some kind of separate agreements with Washington, after which China will be left alone in its confrontation with the United States.

Recall that in September, Xi Jinping turned down President Biden's proposal to hold a face-to-face US-China summit in order to begin the process of de-escalation in relations between Washington and Beijing, thereby expressing his rejection of the continuing rude pressure on China.

Not limiting themselves to summing up the results of 2021 and demonstrating personal friendship, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping made it clear that Moscow and Beijing, which have not entered into formal allied relations, are actually already acting as allies.

Speaking with his Chinese counterpart, Vladimir Putin confirmed his plans to attend the 2022 Winter Olympics, which will be held in Beijing in February.

Thus, he struck a blow at the idea of ​​a political boycott of the Olympics, which the United States and its allies are calling for.

“The world has entered a period of turbulence and great change.

Sino-Russian relations, having withstood all kinds of tests, have shown strong vitality, acquired a new breath, ”Xi Jinping said addressing Vladimir Putin.

The Chinese leader also thanked the Russian president for not letting the West drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing.

On the eve of the Russian-Chinese summit, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said: "We hope that the upcoming summit will further strengthen trust between the two countries, bringing it to a new level, and promote the strategic partnership of the two countries in which they stand back to back." ... Commenting on the words of Wang Wenbin about “strategic partnership between the two countries, in which they stand back to back,” Deputy Director of IMEMO RAN Alexander Lomanov defines their meaning as follows: “This comes from martial arts. Each side realizes that it is fighting off its opponents: Russia - in the western direction, China - in the Indo-Pacific region. It is fundamentally important that, standing back to back, Russia and China cover each other's rear. "

What does it mean?

Without entering into a formal military alliance, under pressure from the West, Russia and China are moving towards a new stage of cooperation, which was predetermined by two key factors - the efforts of the United States and the West to bring NATO infrastructure closer to the western border of Russia and the building of an anti-Chinese "cordon sanitaire" on the southern and eastern borders of the PRC ...

“Russian-Chinese relations are built on the finest nuances and reflect the situation around each of the countries.

As for China, it found itself surrounded by a mass of conflicts.

Not only confrontation with the United States, but also growing tensions with India, the insoluble situation around the islands in the South China Sea, conflict with Japan and, most importantly, the explosive situation in the Taiwan Strait, ”says Alexei Maslov, director of the Institute of Asian and African Studies at Moscow State University.

According to the expert, in this situation, not only China is the most important trading partner of Russia, but, above all, Russia for China is the only absolutely reliable partner.

In general, as we can see, the relations between the United States, Russia and China, which are in such a complex and undergoing radical transformation, in the new year, apparently, will finally cease to look like two tigers and the monkey of “the great helmsman Mao”.

The Russian-Chinese standing "back to back" creates a fundamentally new geopolitical reality that does not leave America a chance to remain the same tiger in a rapidly changing world.

The point of view of the author may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.