The Long Sunset of Strategic Partnership: Russia's Evolving China Policy

The strategic partnership between Moscow and Beijing is arguably the greatest Russian foreign policy achievement of the post-Soviet period. In just over a decade, the relationship has grown from a barely civil interaction to one of political and strategic convergence and flourishing economic cooperation. Once divisive issues such as border demarcation and Chinese 'illegal migration' into the Russian Far East have been largely defused, while bilateral trade has tripled during the past four years. Nevertheless, despite these successes, the strategic partnership remains fragile and vulnerable to bilateral and international developments. A negative historical legacy, enduring cultural prejudices and strategic suspicions, and even commercial disagreements threaten, over time, to undermine many of the gains of the recent past. In the transformed global environment after 9/11 there are signs that Moscow is rethinking its approach towards China as part of a more general evolution in Russian strategic calculus in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. China's emergence as the next super-power, the spectre of increased Sino-American tensions, the changing balance of power between Moscow and Beijing, and rival agendas in Central Asia all have the potential to rekindle once dormant political differences and security fears. Although the breadth of common interests means there is no early prospect of confrontation, the much-vaunted Russia–China strategic partnership may be giving way to a growing strategic divergence.