Recently, Russian Vice Premier Ovechuk stated that Moscow must balance its relations with Beijing and Washington. Even when attending the Boao Asia Forum in China recently, Russia’s relationship with China and the United States was described as: “We should not develop relations with one country at the expense of another, and vice versa.” This statement is enough to show that the recent Russian imperialism is not entirely aligned with Chinese imperialism. Since Trump took office this year, he has frequently signaled “diplomatic normalization” with Russia. On the Russia-Ukraine issue, the Trump administration changed its previous strategy of supporting Ukraine, even temporarily suspending military aid and intelligence sharing, and proposed “re-elect democratic government after ending the Russia-Ukraine war” as a condition, effectively selling Ukraine’s sovereignty to end the conflict. Additionally, the US is willing to relax sanctions on Russia, and these series of actions have led Russian imperialism to reconsider the pros and cons, rapidly warming relations with American imperialism, contrasting sharply with the relationship during the Biden administration. This indicates that American imperialism is actively trying to win over Russia.
Meanwhile, while courting Russia, the US continues to spread the Chinese threat theory and hostile Chinese imperialism. In the context of US-Russia relations, this is undoubtedly an attempt to sow discord between China and Russia, adding potential hidden dangers for Chinese imperialism amid recent US trade wars and strategic deployments in Asia (such as the Taiwan Strait issue). Currently, Chinese imperialism is also striving to win Russia over to strengthen its own imperialist camp, with Foreign Minister Wang Yi scheduled to visit Russia next week for talks with Russian leaders, reflecting China’s unease about the normalization of US-Russian relations. These series of events further confirm that imperialist groups are also riddled with contradictions; as private owners, they are not monolithic. Studying the relations among China, the US, and Russia helps us better understand the international situation and view the interests of these three countries through a lens of contradictions.
However, the US’s seemingly conciliatory behavior toward Russia on the Ukraine issue is somewhat perplexing. The large-scale aid previously provided by the US and the mineral agreements signed in eastern Ukraine (now controlled by Russia) seem too costly to abandon easily. It’s unclear how everyone perceives the current US-Russia relations.
I remembered a factory where I used to work, which produced steel plate cutting machines. Their products were labeled with Russian marks and shipped to Russia. In terms of import and export and industrial production, the connections between China and Russia are still stronger than those between the US and Russia.
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