• China’s continued economic and diplomatic support for Russia enables the latter to sustain its war of aggression in Ukraine. 
• China and Russia are weakening the underpinnings of American leadership on the world stage and core elements of the existing rules-based international order. 
• China and Russia’s deepening military alignment poses a challenge to U.S. interests in the Indo-Pacific region. 
• China and Russia’s strategic partnership will persist as long as each continues to see the United States as its principal adversary. 
• The United States is limited in its ability to engineer a Sino-Russian split. Neither Beijing nor Moscow can be wholly co-opted or punished into submission. 
• Chinese and Russian interests are not fully aligned. While Beijing and Moscow share the aim of eroding Washington’s global influence and its alliance networks, the two states have fundamentally different strategic outlooks. As the world’s second-largest economy and largest trading state, China has a far greater stake than Russia in regional and global stability… Moscow, on the other hand, has no interest in serving as a junior partner to Beijing and seeks to expand its freedom of strategic maneuver, as evidenced by its outreach to Iran, North Korea, and India, among others… Despite their pronouncement of a “no limits” partnership, mistrust and rivalry run deep in the Sino-Russian relationship. 
• Beijing benefits from its respective bilateral ties with Russia, North Korea, and Iran, but it has no interest in joining or endorsing a four-way “axis.” 
• The United States’ key objectives for the China-Russia partnership should be to prevent the further deepening of this relationship and to actively counter Beijing and Moscow’s efforts to undermine U.S. global leadership and support for the rules-based international order. To advance these objectives, the Trump administration should:
  • Recognize the strategic challenges posed by China and Russia’s partnership as well as their respective ties with Iran and North Korea, without overstating the degree of their alignment and joint coordination. 
  • Keep open channels of communication. 
  • Signal to Beijing that its interests are better served by sharply limiting its support for Russia. 
  • Take the competition for hearts and minds in the Global South seriously. 

Opinions expressed herein are solely those of the author. Photo by AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster.