In an earlier item, I noted how developing economies were eager buyers of Russian oil – providing Russian strongman Vladimir Putin with a tidy cash flow to help underwrite his invasion of Ukraine. (RELATED: Russia Finds Foreign Customers to Prop Up War-Ravaged Economy)
The idea that Putin is a “strongman” or that Russia is a major global player are still hotly debated topics. Writing in Foreign Affairs, the Carnegie Endowment's Alexander Gabuev says Putin's Russia is now little more than China's vassal…and perhaps more pointed for the diminutive Putin, a “junior partner” in China's globe-spanning plans:
Beijing is unlikely to bail Moscow out or significantly help modernize the Russian economy. China will, however, do enough to sustain a friendly regime in the Kremlin—and advance Chinese national interests—by purchasing Russian natural resources at knockdown prices, expanding the market for Chinese technology, promoting Chinese technological standards, and making the renminbi the default regional currency of northern Eurasia. Given its growing leverage, Beijing will be able to extract from Moscow something that was unthinkable a year ago: access to the most sophisticated Russian weapons and their designs, preferential access to the Russian Arctic, the accommodation of Chinese security interests in Central Asia, and Russia's support—as a permanent member of the UN Security Council—for China's positions in all regional and global issues, most notably in territorial disputes between China and its neighbors. In effect, the Kremlin will have protected itself from Western pressure at the expense of losing a very high degree of its strategic autonomy. This state of affairs is likely to persist potentially beyond Putin's rule.
In other words, China gets the resources it needs to fuel its ambitions, while Russia gets…more economically and politically dependent upon that big friend. (RELATED: China's Supersized Marines Could Invade Taiwan)
That's how vassal states work. And for Russia, it puts them on a level of the old Warsaw Pact nations, say, East Germany (where Putin was a KGB agent in the last years of the Cold War), or Hungary, or Bulgaria…utterly dependent on a larger, stronger, richer patron.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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this is cool thing
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The idea that Putin is a “strongman” or that Russia is a major global player are still hotly debated topics. Writing in Foreign Affairs, the Carnegie Endowment’s Alexander Gabuev says Putin’s Russia is now little more than China’s vassal…and perhaps more pointed for the diminutive Putin, a “junior partner” in China’s globe-spanning plans:
You’ll really know the answer to that question when the Chinese start demanding water from Lake Baikal, by volume the largest freshwater lake in the world.
Article is more western Russophobic propaganda. Russia is a superpower, totally independent in energy production which is the second leading cause of global conflict, only second to USA global arms racketeering. U.S. hegemony is near total collapse with BRICS taking global command of world economy. U.S. and its NATO attack dog will be put to rest soon.
What has China done for the United States ? Steal our technology, Buy our farm land, ship into Mexico for delivery to the US, all the fentanal they can make, China gets our oil reserves Why? Biden owes China? What is it? Hunter? Americans owe China nothing. Last thing we received was poison pet food, leaded paint toys, fxxxed up drywall, the virus. We should not be supporting them with reserve oil, paid for with their slave labor profits.Because Joe and hunter Biden are compromised with their China corruption does not mean we should stand by and let our Country sold out from under us. Midterm’s are near vote them out ,keep them out, make them return all monies made illegally and then have them jailed for all the federal laws they broke.
What has China done for the United States ? Steal our technology, Buy our farm land, ship into Mexico for delivery to the US, all the fentanal they can make, China gets our oil reserves Why? Biden owes China? What is it? Hunter? Americans owe China nothing. Last thing we received was poison pet food, leaded paint toys, fxxxed up drywall, the virus. We should not be supporting them with reserve oil, paid for with their slave labor profits.Because Joe and hunter Biden are compromised with their China corruption does not mean we should stand by and let our Country sold out from under us. Midterm’s are near vote them out ,keep them out, make them return all monies made illegally and then have them jailed for all the federal laws they broke.
Interesting point about Russia becoming China’s vassal state. I always described the USSR as a 3rd world country masquerading as a superpower. Russia now, stripped of many of it’s previous socialist republics, is a shadow of what the USSR was. All because of one incompetent autocrat too many. ( And people thought Nicholas ll was hopeless!)
Sort of reminds me of what NATO and the EU and the Us will do. The point is?
Beginning to think Biden is trying to head the US in that direction.
Can they rerun the 1960s border wars with then USSR??