What Heightened Chinese and Russian Military Drills Expose About the United States
After a recent naval drill, Russia and China are intensifying their cooperation on military matters. While the western media may paint the relationship between the two competing regional hegemons as confrontational at times, these joint-military training events show that they understand the potential threat that a U.S. lead NATO confrontation would do to one if the other would be attacked.
On October 25, the Japanese government voiced its discomfort with China and Russia’s recent naval exercises, in which 10 warships made their way through international waterways between its northern and southern islands. For context, imagine how it would appear if Chinese warships were visible from San Francisco. This posturing isn’t by accident, and Japan certainly knows it.
The ships were spotted by the Japanese on October 18 going through the Tsugaru Strait that lies between Japan’s main island of Honshu and the northern island of Hokkaido. On October 21, the Russian and Chinese vessels went through the Osumi Strait right off the southern island of Kyushu, thus completing a circle-like motion around Japan’s main island before making their way back to China.
These actions by Russia and China were not just spontaneous incidents. Russian international relations specialist Artyom Lukin noted that Japan was involved in US-Ukraine war games (Sea Breeze 2021) in the Black Sea.
The Military Times points out “Beijing generally follows Moscow’s lead on matters such as Iran, it has grown increasingly assertive in defending what it considers its vital interests regarding Taiwan, the South China Sea and throughout the Indo-Pacific.”
On top of that, the US is beginning a genuine pivot to Asia, where it’s shifting military resources to contain China, while building alliance structures such as AUKUS (composed of Australia, the UK, and US) to balance China.
The recent drills by Russia and China should serve as a wakeup call for policymakers in the United States. The years of NATO expansion on Russia’s borders have pushed Russia into China’s arms, thus creating a de facto alliance between the two nations.
To avert a geopolitical crisis, US policy makers will need to exercise restraint and recalibrate their approaches with both countries.
With regards to Russia, it will need to stop NATO expansion and eventually let Europe handle its own security affairs. These are all First World countries who should be investing in their own national defense and finding ways to co-exist with Russia
For the China question, the strategy to tackle it is by restricting immigration from China, in light of the increased cases of corporate and university espionage that Chinese nationals perpetuate, and also gradually decoupling trade with China, especially in sensitive sectors that could potentially boost China’s military capacities. This is far overdo, especially when considering China’s impact on the world thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic and how it impacted every level of day to day life throughout the globe.
With regards to its policies with East Asian partners, US policy should be focused on the full remilitarization of Japan and even consider it developing a nuclear arsenal so as to provide a deterrent against potential Chinese aggression
With a per capita GDP of slightly over $42,000, Japan is more than capable of converting its wealth and translating into hard military power for the purposes of national defense. Any post-WWII military restrictions over Japan should be lifted in order to give them a chance.
Overall, the US should not stumble into another Cold War, or worse yet, a hot war. With economically nationalist policies selectively implemented with China and granting greater autonomy to strategic partners like Japan, the US can create a realist foreign policy that does not involve the mass spilling of its own blood and treasure.
