By Kumar David –

Prof. Kumar David

Revolting devastation and human suffering in this war is borne by Ukraine but profound changes will come in Russia. The overpowering player in the medium term will be China. Deeply significant will be the long-term alterations of global political-economy. Do I have ballpark notions of the three periods? Well let me stick my thumb in the air and say one, five and ten+ years, respectively. The war, Putin’s blackeye, dogged Ukrainian resistance, sanctions, refugees and the determination of Western capitalism and public opinion are the topics of conversation. The glorious democracy Germany will prosecute those who support Russia in public. The ultra-right-wing Economist of 27 March carries a lurid outburst of hatred and insinuation unsupported by evidence against Putin baked into three pages of venom (“Greyness, greed and grievance”). No attention is paid by intellectually handicapped Western media and “scholarship” to how the world will alter down the road.

Who is gaining the whole world?

Were you to call the deeply religious Christian-Orthodox Vladimir Putin (VP) a reincarnation of Vlad the Impaler, who am I to disagree? There will paradoxically however, be unintended benefits for the Russian economy, people and state. The opprobrium that VP has brought upon himself is the least of my concerns. What has he to show for reducing Mariupol to rubble, five million refugees, exposing his military as incompetent and its toolkit rusted, a 4000-long sanctions list (the harshest ever) and confiscation of Russia’s external assets by new-imperialism? Thousands of civilian deaths, maybe ten to twenty thousand soldiers as well. OK, it’s true that after this clobbering Ukraine will never join NATO, but this VP could have achieved by craft, diplomacy and threat. Six-gun Putin knows nought of the finesse of Sun Tzu and Machiavelli. So here’s my first punch-line: The bitter-sweet truth is that Russia for its economic survival has nowhere to turn but to China (unless sanctions are lifted). That’s point-one in my three-pronged hypothesis. [For a different assessment of Putin’s military objectives visit here and here. Two well-known American publications give a sharply different assessment of Putin’s war objectives.]

My second point is that the reign of the bloodsucking oligarchs, much wider than VP’s yacht sharing, dacha inhabiting buddies, who bled, robbed and corrupted Russia since America (and MIT) rigged its economic system in the Yeltsin years, is finished. The corrupt deals that made Roman Abramovich (Chelsea football club owner) a fortune is just one of many examples. After buying oil company Sibneft from the Russian government in a rigged auction in 1995 for $250m, he sold it back to the government for $13bn in 2005. (He magically materialised at the negotiations a few days ago; VP’s Rasputin?)! The list of bloodsucking oligarchs is long and sickening. The post-Putin era, irrespective of whether VP is kicked out in a palace coup, weakened or brought under supervision, will see transformations of economy, state and polity. Economic-power relationships will go upside down. Will political power be less dictatorial? Too much to hope for?

Russia has no choice; it has no fall back but China. This is a lesson for life even after sanctions are lifted. True only 3% of current Chinese exports are Russia-bound, the US and EU take about 15% each and the “developing” world 55%. This 3% may jump to 10% as sanctions bite and Russia struggles for consumer durables, chips, tech-stuff, luxury brands, Kentucky Fries and Big Macs. As Western investors of all complexion flee, Chinese equivalents can fill the gap. China will however will be wary of risking secondary sanctions for a small market and for a broke customer who will need to buy on tick initially. What the Chinese will eye are natural resources; Russia is the world’s resource-richest ($75 trillion) country, ahead of the US ($45 trillion) and China ($25 trillion). Its resource rankings are as follows timbre (1; its forest area exceeds Brazil’s), coal (2), gas (2), minerals (2), oil (3) and gold (3). Though in land area it is the largest of any country, arable land is only 7.5% of all land due to the harsh climate, hence it comes third behind India (57 % of all land is cultivated) and the US (17% cultivated) in total hectares of cultivated land.

Resource-wise this is El Dorado for the exploding Chinese economic engine seeking global investment opportunities. Young educated manpower and technological sophistication put Russia leagues ahead of basket-cases Africa, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The best part of the multibillion-dollar Sino-European railway passes through Russia. The needs of broke and broken Russia with quality manpower and potential resource benefits for ambitious China fit like hand and glove. Political-economic logic and its consummation are nevertheless, many pitfalls apart. But the contours of what may be viable within a year or two of the ending of hostilities in Ukraine are visible.

The Ukraine war has snapped shut the Thucydides Trap enmeshing Western neo-imperialism and China with unexpected suddenness. It was always there, always threatening, often taking a bite here and there; the ban on Huawei, charges of intellectual property theft and sanctions on individuals were signs. Upending Russia, isolating it from global financial and trade make it stark that this is China’s future when the Trap is fully sprung. Biden declares “NATO has never been so united”. German Fraus and their little kinder joyfully prepare to freeze for freedom (Really?). The Chinese have so far only been shocked into wakefulness, but who doesn’t see that the big match is yet to come; which Chinaman doesn’t feel in his bones that VP’s rout is a mere dress-rehearsal before politico-economic warfare against the real target? It is a last chance to pushback a China which has been gaining inexorably for three decades in economic clout and global influence. For neo-imperialism it is a final, a life or death encounter. But in a deeper sense it is not Putin, Biden, colourful clowns Britain’s BoJo or Ukrain’s Yellingsky that matter; they are puny catalysts. “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players”. A realignment of the world has become unavoidable – the French Revolution, WW1, WW2 and the fall of the USSR have left so much unfinished clutter. All that I say in this essay I say cold-bloodedly without taking this side or that, as far as possible.

So my medium-term argument: It is in China’s economic and political interest to turn Russia into a resource-rich partner in a new world order even after sanctions are lifted. If you are thinking of a new Cold War you’ve got it wrong. In USSR-times that block plus China accounted for a mere 15% of global output. Today it’s more than 30% and growing; more if you include Vietnam, the five landlocked Central Asian – Stans, the socialist inclined governments of South America and “left” dictatorships Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. I am selecting countries which will readily do business with a presumptive Sino-Russian alliance. China is already the largest trading partner of over 100 countries, nevertheless it will be wary and play its cards carefully. Midgets (not Vietnam), consume peanuts, are miniscule markets, and mere dollops as economic partners. Russia of course can absorb $200 -300 billion in annual Chinese investment in mining, timbre & land, infrastructure, tech-manufacturing-military, food processing and the service sector.

That was the third, global, last facet of my crystal-ball gazing: The longer-term two decades beyond the present. You may think me as wacky as Nostradamus but no matter, if you read up to this point you may as well persevere for one more para. The presumptive Sino-Russian Alliance espied here and others who cosy up to it, will constitute an assemblage more porous to cross-boundary economic flows and politically more elastic than the defunct Soviet Block of Cold War times. Political plasticity aside it will be porous in trade and investment. I envisage dollar-divested trade and investment, and as the group gains strength spurning neo-imperialist sanctions on each another. A new world has to be built; there’s no other way.

Aside from those named so far, potential collaborators are Iran (world’s largest gas reserves), India, South Africa, Nigeria, North Korea and perhaps at the margin Saudi Arabia (largest oil reserves) and some Gulf States. India, South Africa, the – Stans, North Korea and of course China abstained in the UN vote condemning Russia at the UN. The socialist-left and “left”-dictatorships voted with Russia. India is critical to securing the credibility of this ensemble and the key to that is Beijing. China will have to make boundary concessions to woo India away from QUAD and ease its security concerns. This oh dear is the fly in the ointment. The Chinese are said to be intelligent, but on territorial issues experience is entirely the opposite! Nationalists the world over are universal idiots. Oh, for a reincarnated Samuel Johnson.