Terry Su

Opinion | On China and Russia, the US should no longer expect the world to follow its policy of confrontation

US pressure on European countries to derail the bloc’s investment deal with China and cut Russia out of Europe, so as to maintain its own sphere of influence, will not succeed in a changing world order

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Chinese President Xi Jinping meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on June 5, 2019. The China-Russia relationship, while not a formal alliance, has been described as being more than an alliance. Photo: Kremlin/dpa

Terry Su

Published: 1:30am, 19 Jan 2022Updated: 2:04am, 19 Jan 2022

“Stuff happens,” former US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in 2003 at the height of US power, in response to the looting in Iraq following the US-led invasion.

Such a cavalier attitude from America will seem out of place in the changing world order today. The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which covers about 30 per cent of the world’s population and GDP, came into effect on January 1, and an EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment is expected to follow.

While much has been said about the significance of these two pacts, their deeper ramifications on the world’s sinews of power might not have been adequately appreciated.

Those who sounded the alarm on Japan toeing the US line against China, typified by former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe’s provocative statements on Taiwan, for example, should be reminded that Japan is also an enthusiastic party to the RCEP.

Tokyo signed up to the pact in November 2020, taking quiet advantage of the highest-pitched moment of US-China wrangling during the last days of the Trump administration, got it passed in parliament and finally ratified it discreetly in June last year – all the while keeping pace with Washington’s anti-China rhetoric.