Russia and China to Hold Joint Maneuvers

Newsday ^ | Dec. 27, 2004 | VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV

[FairOpinion]

MOSCOW -- Russia and China will hold unprecedented joint military maneuvers on Chinese territory next year involving both nations' air forces and navies, Russia's defense minister on Monday.

Sergei Ivanov, speaking at a Cabinet session chaired by President Vladimir Putin, said that the exercise would involve submarines and possibly strategic bombers, the Interfax and ITAR-Tass news agencies reported.

"For the first time in history, we have agreed to hold quite a large military exercise together with China on Chinese territory in the second half of the year," Ivanov said, according to ITAR-Tass.

"The Russian side will not bring big numbers of servicemen, but mostly state-of-the art weapons -- navy, air, long-range aviation, submarines to practice interaction with China in different forms of military maneuvers," he reported to Putin.

[FairOpinion]

I seriously wonder, if this would have been planned, even if we stayed out of the Ukrainian elections.

[William of Orange]

communism is still alive, it didn't die, it just morphed itself. THEY WILL TRY AGAIN!

[FairOpinion]

I guess this is Putin's response to us: if the US seeks influence against Russia right next door to it, they go and form an alliance with the Chinese.

I think it was a very poor decision on the part of the US, to get involved in the Ukrainian elections.

I think we'll live to regret it, which is Putin's message to us.

I think this wouldn't have happened with Condi Rice as Secretary of State. Powell made some strong statements, which started the whole US support for Yushchenko and attacks on Russia. (Condi has been helping Bush form an alliance with Putin, which was coming along nicely, until Powell had to meddle publicly criticizing Russia)

[contemplator]

Russia has been trying for quite some time to develop closer ties with China and India militarily, even before the Ukraine elections problems. They claim these alliances are to act as a counterbalance to the military power of the U.S. and Japan's growing desire to have a military amongst other reasons. Personally I find these developments disturbing.

[FairOpinion]

I find these developments disturbing too.

But don't you find the timing of the announcement, right on the heels of this third rerun of the Ukraine election, just a wee-bit curious?

[contemplator]

If the timing has the added bonus of sending some sort of message to the US, then all the better from Putin's standpoint. I think this has long been a part of his overall plan for re-making Russia into the world power it once was, and would have happened regardless of how the Ukraine election situation turned out, or who was involved in it.

[The Spirit Of Allegiance]

paging Gog and Magog...

[sukhoi-30mki]

India & Japan already have a strategic dialogue going on how to take on China.India & China won't be in the same camp,unless the US openly sides with Pakistan against India(provided China drops it's oldest ally,Pakistan).

[contemplator]

I agree. I have a hard time envisioning India aligning itself with Russia & China even with the pressure the Russians have been giving them to do so.

India has a history of siding with Russia, but I don't see the relationship continuing. India is fast becoming a strong ally of the US, and her economy is becoming tied more and more with ours every day.

[dougiefresh]

Russia will be embroiled in a Ukranian civil war during that time...games will be cancelled.

[dougiefresh]

Russia will be embroiled in a Ukranian civil war during that time...games will be cancelled.

[ChinaThreat]

Good point. China and Russia both have a long history of trouble with Japan. Good insight.

[contemplator]

From China's standpoint, the timing is also nice considering China's plans for Taiwan.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1309098/posts

[nw_arizona_granny]

"The Russian side will not bring big numbers of servicemen, but
mostly state-of-the art weapons -- navy, air, long-range aviation,
submarines to practice interaction with China in different forms of
military maneuvers," he reported to Putin.<<<

How nice, another military weapons info exchange with China.
(sarcastically said)

Where is Clinton, he needs to get his cut.

Is this a method of selling weapons to China?

Will they have small accidents? and leave the weapons in China?

[4moreyears4bush]

I must agree that the development of joint Sino-Russian military maneuvers is disturbing, especially given the confluence of China's recent threats directed at Taiwan and Putin's anger towards the West for its perceived interference in Ukraine's disputed election. Even during the Cold War, the longest armed boundary between nations was between the former Soviet Union and China.

Yet, I do not think that these military maneuvers necessarily signal the beginning of an era of alliance between the two countries against the U.S. We have to view this development in the context of trends in world history, above and beyond the Taiwan issue and the Ukraine-election controversy.

Some developments admittedly support the view that China and Russia will forge an alliance of sorts, perhaps because of Japan's reemergence as a significant military power; Russia's decline and loss of satellite states, many of which have integrated themselves economically and politically with the West and sought to curry favor with the United States in its war against terror (e.g., Poland, Bulgaria, and Hungary); and the fear of American military power in both countries, as demonstrated so effectively in Iraq twice in two decades.

Yet, we need to remember why a Sino-Russian alliance will not endure. Russia will fear for its Asian territory as China continues down the road of imminent ascendancy to superpower status. Moreover, like the United States, Russia has been victimized by Muslim terrorism in the recent past, which is fueled by separatist movements. While the United States can offer Russia partnership, China's military ties to Pakistan and Iran, its interest in countering India, and its self-image as the leading power of the emerging Third World nations, will keep China in alignment with the Muslim world. Also, India (a rival of China) and Russia have had relatively close relations for the last half-century. Also, Russia has partners other than China to counter the United States because it can ally itself with France and Germany, as it did in the UN before the second war with Iraq.

I think a military alliance is likely if one of these two happen:

1. Japan becomes a military threat and takes an aggressive stance towards both nations.

2. Russia elects to re-absorb former republics like the Ukraine, Lithuania, etc., and restore the Warsaw Pact at the same time that China attacks Taiwan to restore "one China." These events would prompt the United States to counter both threats and become a common enemy to China and Russia.

I do not know where in China these maneuvers will be conducted, but I will venture to speculate that these joint maneuvers could be equally motivated by a desire by both countries to make plans for a coordinated response against North Korea if that nation takes on the suicidal path of provoking a nuclear confrontation with Japan, South Korea, and/or the United States. This would be a Sino-Russian form of our Monroe Doctrine, designed to keep the U.S. from military action within their spheres of influence, and to prevent Japan from resurrecting its dormant military ad expansionist tradition.

In the end, though, one thing remains: only God knows the path that princes will take and where that journey will lead.

I enjoyed your comments! Have a great New Year!

[ken21]

interesting take.

but secy state colin powell has made it clear that we will not support taiwan?

[pierrem15]

Russia has to be careful that it doesn't get swallowed in its embrace of China. In short, Russia has a natural adversary in the Chinese, not in the US. Most of the yammering about Ukraine is the wounded pride of a fevered chauvinism, a paranoid nationalism which is and has been the biggest obstacle to Russia being able to match the West for the past 3 centuries.

Russia will continue to be weak as long as she continues to be dominated by a cabal who distracts the masses with dreams of imperial glory while they loot the country, whether in the Tsarist form, the Soviet form or Putin's neo-Soviet nostalgia.

Finally, I find the notion of two armed forces with zero effective combined arms training and without a command structure with the skill and C3 needed to integrate a modern army to be rather comical. They will avoid killing each other only if each side sticks to carefully rehearsed scripts.