Could Russia side with the US and India against China?

[nahtanbob]

I don't understand what you are talking about. China has never had any claim to the Kuril Islands at all, unlike Japan who previously owned them.

And China could wipe out Russia too. MAD flows both ways. But make no mistake, the possibility of China going to war with Russia is about as high as going to war with North Korea, which is basically zero.

China cannot withstand all out Russian first strike. Russia is too big to be completely hit with the current size of chinese arsenal

 

[khansaheeb]

A wet dream. Russia is China's vassal state. China's Canada so to say.

Russia is not a vassal state but knows what needs to be done to maintain a balanced world order.

 

[Dalit]

China cannot withstand all out Russian first strike. Russia is too big to be completely hit with the current size of chinese arsenal

LOL look at this Indian. He thinks Russia is going to strike China. Don't even bother with this clown. This Indian is hallucinating. China and Russia are absolutely on one page with regards to tackling US influence in their region. Whether India is licking US boots to contain China makes little difference to Russia. Russia is laughing inside out seeing how the US is getting humiliated. A Cold War enemy is what the US is to Russia. Russia won't sit idle until it has extracted full dues.

The last time I checked Russians were busy hacking US elections. LOL at Russia will join US India camp. An absolutely stupid assertion. More like a feel good hallucination. Why not wish for something you can never have? Keep wishing.

 

[Uguduwa]

Russia is not a vassal state

no

 

[dbc]

China cannot withstand all out Russian first strike. Russia is too big to be completely hit with the current size of chinese arsenal

Nonsense, as with the erstwhile USSR, Russia is Moscow. Take out Moscow and Russia crumbles, same is true of Beijing.

 

[Figaro]

I think he means China claims Vladivostok. Although that argument is weak considering Outer Manchuria was ceded to Russia in exchange for Russia deploying troops to help the Manchu rulers crush the Han rebellion.

This is complete BS ... the Russians did not even participate in the Taiping Rebellion (which was not just a Han rebellion but also multiethnic). If you are talking about the Boxer Rebellion, Outer Manchuria was ceded decades prior in the 1800s.

China cannot withstand all out Russian first strike. Russia is too big to be completely hit with the current size of chinese arsenal

1000 Chinese nukes (current estimate) is more than enough to wipe out Russia. Even the former head of the Russian strategic missile forces (in charge of Russian nuclear weapons) says China has up to 1800 nukes. But as I said before, China going to nuclear war with Russia is about the same as going to nuclear war with North Korea, which is zero.

Underestimating China’s nuclear threat

Fiona Cunningham relies on unclassified sources to provide a well-researched summary of the mainstream view of academics, China scholars and even many military professionals of the PRC’s nuclear doctrine and C3 arrangements. Unfortunately, this mainstream view is almost certainly wrong.

www.washingtontimes.com

 

[Globenim]

The entire premise of this piece of **** is just fakenews, more fakenews and dumb spins of halftruths

Cant wait for the day the Hong Kong offices and homes of these America bootlickers at SCMP get raided by the police and all their dirty ties exposed

 

[madlemon50]

Unfortunately many Indians suffer from extreme inferiority complex, they cannot accept the fact that their country which have already been independence for more than 50 years still left way behind, it's sad that majority of her people still lives in extreme poverty without even access to the most basic hygiene which is toilet.

They would rather spend their comparing India to China or picking how they are doing better than Pakistan everyday and spending all their time finding needle in a haystack on how many Chinese causalities have the Chinese incurred over at the border clash. They even have to dig up old photos of Chinese tomb and make up fake death numbers to prove their point that their superior army inflicted large death to the Chinese side so they can boast how strong their army is.

This same goes to their media, its either these Indians have been completely brainwash by their media or its just they nature extreme inferiority complex and delusional. If they actually spend time building up their country they will be in better state than now.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Please tell me who is Russia's largest trade partner and where India stands in this list? Some people don't have any common sense.

I don't think you should underestimate the fallout from the Alexei Navalny poisoning. Remember the Russian Progress Party sent him to Germany for treatment...not China/India or any other so-called ally. This is very telling as to whom they trust (not to play the race card but when in desperate times the Russians are going to run to their fellow white man first...no matter how bad people think relations seem...this is in sickness and in war).

Germany then says the Russian doctors were lying about him not being poisoned...and more importantly Navalny's Party didn't question the results (they blanketly trust their non-ally's word MORE than their ally's). This poison finding is not going to go over well with Party members.

All it takes is some big screwup by Putin which gets himself ousted and the next thing you know some guy like Navalny gets in office and with a Thanos finger-snap declares detente with the West...and don't think that can't happen easily.

 

[BHAN85]

If Navalny someday could be president, he wont be killed with Novichok, he would be killed by the hands of some Russian general personally.

Russia is not a democracy, and it will never be, and it's the better for them, it's a matter of survival for Russia.

In west democracies, high-treasion is not a crime, be side with foreign elites instead own people is the common way of work.

That way of work in Russia in the current context means the end (physically) of Russia.
Russia can't afford another Yeltsin.

And I think Navalny issue, like Skripal issue, has nothing to do with those things, it's a way for USA to know in what side are their allies (UK, Germany), maybe in the future we will have another "Russian" poisoning related with France.

USA must know that a Russia regime change is a impossible thing, but I think that propaganda is useful to calm down USA allies.

 

[Figaro]

I don't think you should underestimate the fallout from the Alexei Navalny poisoning. Remember the Russian Progress Party sent him to Germany for treatment...not China/India or any other so-called ally. This is very telling as to whom they trust (not to play the race card but when in desperate times the Russians are going to run to their fellow white man first...no matter how bad people think relations seem...this is in sickness and in war).

Germany then says the Russian doctors were lying about him not being poisoned...and more importantly Navalny's Party didn't question the results (they blanketly trust their non-ally's word MORE than their ally's). This poison finding is not going to go over well with Party members.

All it takes is some big screwup by Putin which gets himself ousted and the next thing you know some guy like Navalny gets in office and with a Thanos finger-snap declares detente with the West...and don't think that can't happen easily.

Oh yeah for sure but I was making this assumption under someone like Putin or Medvedev or one of his cronies maintaining power. Of course if someone like Navalny went into power, then ties with the West would immediately improve ... but that is something that just will never happen. People routinely underestimate Putin's influence, control, and even his popularity.

Also even if Navalny went to power, unless Russia withdrew from the Crimea, the West would refuse any normalization of relations. And I doubt Navalny could stay in power if he withdrew from the Crimea considering that over 90% of Russians support the annexation (i.e. consider Crimea Russian territory). So in short, any relationship reset with the West is impossible for the time being.

 

[BHAN85]

How many Russian people has poisoned/killed Russia in the west without public knowing? (There cases that go out to light years after that it happened and anybody dont give a sh*t for them).

The news of Skripal/Navalny (specially Skripal, because he was not a public person) is not the poisoning, the news is that the poisoning become news and a massmedia circus.

And that massmedia circus was made by west countries (by UK in Skripal, by Germany in Navalny).
Germany could have hidden (or dont invent) Novichok issue, but they choose the massmedia circus.

 

[Figaro]

How many Russian people has poisoned/killed Russia in the west without public know? (There cases that go out to light years after that it happened and anybody dont give a sh*t for them).

The news of Skripal/Navalny (specially Skripal, because he was not a public person) is not the poisoning, the news is that the poisoning become news and a massmedia circus.

Because the Russians only poison their own people rather than let's say some foreign person.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Oh yeah for sure but I was making this assumption under someone like Putin or Medvedev or one of his cronies maintaining power. Of course if someone like Navalny went into power, then ties with the West would immediately improve ... but that is something that just will never happen. People routinely underestimate Putin's influence, control, and even his popularity.

Also even if Navalny went to power, unless Russia withdrew from the Crimea, the West would refuse any normalization of relations. And I doubt Navalny could stay in power if he withdrew from the Crimea considering that over 90% of Russians support the annexation (i.e. consider Crimea Russian territory). So in short, any relationship reset with the West is impossible for the time being.

I'm sure we could reach a deal to compensate Ukraine handsomely in return for normalizing relations. If they balk they risk being thrown under the bus...

 

[GHALIB]

This Week in Asia / Politics
Could Russia side with the US and India against China?

• Cracks are opening in the Russia-China relationship, from the status of Vladivostok to Russian arms sales to India
• The biggest crack involves New Delhi’s suggestion that Moscow join the US-led Indo-Pacific grouping, which is widely seen as anti-China

Maria Siow
Published: 12:00pm, 22 Aug, 2020

China and Russia have often described their relationship as “special” and “unprecedented” and have recently promised to maintain what they call a “comprehensive strategic partnership”.

In fighting the coronavirus pandemic, the “specialness” of this relationship has been clear for all to see. In February, Moscow sent medical supplies to Wuhan, then the epicentre of the outbreak, and when the virus peaked in Russia, China repaid the favour by delivering to its neighbour millions of masks and other protective equipment.
What’s more, the leaders of the two countries seem close, having met more than 30 times since 2013. Last month, in what appeared to be a veiled dig at the
United States, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for China and Russia to jointly “oppose hegemony and unilateralism”, while Russian President
Vladimir Putin said the two countries’ ties had reached an “unprecedented” level.


Even so, in recent months, however hard the two countries have tried to paper over them, cracks have been appearing. Among the divisions: historical differences over Vladivostok; sales of Russian arms to India;and delays in the delivery of Russian missiles to Beijing.


But perhaps the most explosive issue of all is the suggestion in recent weeks that Washington wants to embrace its old Cold War adversary as a way of countering growing Chinese might. Unthinkable as that might once have seemed, asked about the possibility last month, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeoreplied: “I do think there’s that opportunity.”

RULER OF THE EAST?

Divisions over Vladivostok spilled into the public domain last month, when the Russian embassy caused an online backlash in Chinaby posting a video about the commemoration service for the city’s 160th anniversary.

Chinese feelings over Vladivostok, which once belonged to China, remain high. The modern-day territory of Primorsky Krai, of which Vladivostok is the administrative capital, was part of the Qing dynasty’s Manchurian territory before it was annexed by the Tsarist empire in 1860 after China’s defeat at the hands of
Britain and Franceduring the second opium war.
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/dip...-vladivostok-celebration-prompted-nationalist
Many Chinese criticised the embassy’s blog as a painful reminder of their country’s historical humiliations at the hands of foreign powers.

Hu Xijin, the editor of the nationalistic Chinese tabloid Global Times, even went as far as refusing to refer to the city as “tongzhi dongfang” or “Ruler of the East” as its name means in Russian, calling it by its old Chinese name of Haishenwei instead.


Some of the more strident posters suggested China should respond to the embassy’s blog by rethinking its stance on Crimea.

Russia seized Crimea by force from Ukraine in 2014 and annexed it the following year after a referendum, a move which drew international condemnation. China has so far chosen to remain neutral.

The outcry over the embassy’s blog was one of the first real signs that the territorial dispute was not dead and an indication that “Sinocentrism is becoming a problem in this relationship”, according to Asan Forum editor Gilbert Rozman.
“A supremely confident China in 2020 is witnessing an upsurge in impatient calls to settle scores steeped in grievances nurtured by its leaders. Deference towards Russia observed since 1992 may not be an immutable principle”, Rozman wrote in an article titled Multipolarity vs Sinocentrism: Chinese and Russian Worldviews and Relations.

Elaborating on his article, Rozman said China’s confidence came from the sense that it was rising fast while the reverse was true for the US, a sense that was reinforced by the coronavirus pandemic.

“Yet, such confidence was building for many years and 2020 only accelerated it,” Rozman said.
As for deference towards Russia, Rozman said this was a strategic decision made by Beijing to win Russia to China’s side against the US.

Indian troops guard a highway leading to the Ladakh region, where India and China are locked in a stand-off over the border. Photo: DPA

ARMS TO INDIA

Moscow also found itself in hot water with the Chinese public when it increased its arms sales to New Delhi soon after a deadly
stand-off
between Chinese and Indian troops along their disputed Himalayan border.

The month after the June 15 clash, in which at least 20 Indian soldiers and an unknown number of Chinese were killed in hand-to-hand fighting, New Delhi rushed through a deal to buy new Russian warplanes and upgrade its existing fleet.

As one Chinese internet user put it: “While fighting your opponent, how would you feel if your friend handed over a knife to your opponent?”
However, Dmitry Stefanovich, a research fellow with the Centre for International Security at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of World Economy and International Relations, pointed out that Russia had been supplying arms to India since long before the clash in the Himalayas.
Most of India’s strategic weapons, from its aircraft carrier to its nuclear attack submarine, are imported from Russia.
“The Russian defence industry, obviously, would like to remain in the Indian market, which is getting more and more competitive, with France and the US being the most obvious challengers,” Stefanovich said.


Chinese exercise in Tibet after border clash with India

Indeed, said Delhi University’s Institute of Chinese Studies visiting fellow and assistant professor Rityusha Tiwary, Russian arms sales to India had in fact fallen since the peak in 2005 when sales reached US$3.2 billion. Still, analysts acknowledged that defence matters had created fault lines in the Russia-China relationship.

Alexey Muraviev, an associate professor of National Security and Strategic Studies at Australia’s Curtin University, said Russia was uneasy about Chinese cooperation with Ukraine in both military and business matters.
“The Chinese are also engaged in reverse engineering Russia’s military technology and then trying to sell indigenous platforms based on Russian designs, thereby competing against Russia on the global arms sales market,” Muraviev added.

Tiwary said Russia saw selling arms to India as a way of balancing out China’s growing power.

MISSING MISSILES

Another fault line appears to have opened up over a deal for Russia to supply the S-400 anti-aircraft missile system to China.
The S-400 is considered the most advanced of its kind in Russia, capable of destroying targets at distances of up to 400km and heights of 30km.
Last month, the Chinese websites NetEase and Sohu reported the deliveries had been “delayed” due to the coronavirus, but Moscow said later the deliveries had been “suspended”.
According to Russia’s TASS news agency, China received its first batch of S-400s in 2018 but further deliveries were suspended when Moscow accused Valery Mitko, president of the St Petersburg Arctic Social Sciences Academy, of spying for Beijing.


The move incensed many Chinese, not least because Russia’s defence minister Sergey Shoygu had agreed with his Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh to fast-track the production and delivery of five S-400 systems purchased by India in 2018. (The first of these are expected to be delivered in October).
Many Chinese said this proved Russia was putting the interests of India before those of China, which had placed its orders in 2014.
“Is this not a clear-cut case that the Russians are unreliable? China has to wake up!” wrote one Chinese internet user.
Describing the S-400 suspension as an “intriguing development”, Derek Grossman, senior defence analyst at the Rand Corporation, a Washington think tank, said the suspension ran counter to the narrative that Sino-Russian security relations had strengthened in recent years.
He also questioned Chinese media claims that the problem was due to the coronavirus, noting that it came less than two weeks after the deadly clash in the Himalayas on June 15.
“This strongly suggests that Moscow’s decision was in response to the [Himalayan] incident,” Grossman said.

Russia and China band together to ‘reduce world’s reliance on US dollars’


Russia and China are ‘working together to reduce the world’s reliance on US dollars’

He noted that throughout the Cold War, the Soviet Union had been a close friend of India, and the relationship remained warm today.
“I suspect that the S-400 decision largely was the result of Russia deciding to punish China for its actions against India, and to demonstrate to New Delhi that Moscow can still be trusted to support its interests,” Grossman said.

INDO-PACIFIC PARTNER?

Still, perhaps most divisive of all the issues facing the relationship is the recent claim in Indian media that New Delhi wants Moscow to join the US-led Indo-Pacific initiative, a strategic grouping widely seen as being an attempt to counter China.

The matter was reportedly discussed during a phone call between Russian deputy foreign minister Igor Morgulov and the Indian ambassador to Russia, D. Bala Venkatesh Varma.

Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov. Photo: AFP
India reportedly told Russia that just as it supports Moscow’s Greater Eurasia project – in which Russia’s foreign policy is intended to pivot to the East and greater engagement with Asia – so too should Russia support the Indo-Pacific grouping, and not see the idea merely as a strategy by Washington to divide the region.
Some Chinese commentators said the idea – a “betrayal of China”, according to some – was as explosive as asking Russia to join Nato (the Western military alliance originally set up primarily to counter Russian aggression).
But while some analysts questioned whether the US would agree to Russian membership, others thought that given the right incentives Moscow could be convinced.
Tiwary said the idea was in line with the strong India-Russia partnership of recent decades, and would further cement the relationship.






Maria Siow
Maria Siow is a long-time China-based correspondent and analyst with keen interest in East Asia. Maria has a masters degree in international relations.

Could Russia side with the US and India against China?

Cracks are opening in China-Russia ties, from Vladivostok to arms sales to India and – most explosive of all – New Delhi’s suggestion that Moscow join the US-led Indo-Pacific grouping.

www.scmp.com

yes russia will side with india .