Over three months, senior Biden administration officials held half a dozen urgent meetings with top Chinese officials in which the Americans presented intelligence showing Russia’s troop buildup around Ukraine and beseeched the Chinese to tell Russia not to invade, according to U.S. officials.
Each time, the Chinese officials, including the foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States, rebuffed the Americans, saying they did not think an invasion was in the works. After one diplomatic exchange in December, U.S. officials got intelligence showing Beijing had shared the information with Moscow, telling the Russians that the United States was trying to sow discord — and that China would not try to impede Russian plans and actions, the officials said.
Historically speaking, Russia and China have had a complicated, often contentious, relationship, but they are probably closer today than ever before. The two recently signed a huge energy pact that allows Putin to weather the pain of Western sanctions. Then again, China also helped Russia endure sanctions after Crimea went the way of Tibet. So why would anyone believe that “President” Xi Jinping, who views the existence of Taiwan much in the same way Putin views the existence of Ukraine — or rather, non-existence — do anything to dissuade an invasion in the first place? Every justification by Putin for why he could invade Ukraine could just as easily be made for a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. What’s the downside for Xi?
Per the Times:
[American officials] also pointed out they knew how China had helped Russia evade some of the 2014 sanctions, and warned Beijing against any such future aid. And they argued that because China was widely seen as a partner of Russia, its global image could suffer if Mr. Putin invaded.
Hey, I’m not Dag Hammarskjöld, but I suspect that a tyranny that crushes political opposition, has never resembled anything approaching a liberal democracy, and that threatens to annihilate its neighbor on a weekly basis, is unlikely to harm its best relationship over some bad publicity. Then again, we can hardly get anyone in the government, the NBA, or the business world to criticize Chinese slave labor, so maybe the Chicoms, like Putin, know we’re just bluffing.