Opinion | Is China’s tilt towards Russia in Beijing’s best long-term interest?

China is the big deal now – or so goes the talk in Beijing’s corridors of power – and the United States must learn to live with it. And if it can’t, then too bad: just like their predecessors over the centuries, Westerners are, after all, barbarians.

To be sure, nothing said in public suggests that President Xi Jinping is comfortable with, much less delighted by, the possibility of Russian President Vladimir Putin giving the green light to Russian troops who are already amassed on the Ukrainian border.

Over the weekend, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the Russian invasion of Ukraine could come “any day now”. Beijing’s ersatz and informal alliance with Russia – as Putin’s well-armed ground forces hover over the hapless ping-pong ball that is Ukraine – prompts concern that Xi’s government has abandoned hope of reviving a more pragmatic relationship with Washington.

An imagined outflank of the US by gaming geopolitically with Putin is a very risky business. However popular the former KGB officer might be inside Russia, his image in the rest of the world is mixed at best. There is therefore the question of whether the tilt toward Putin reflects wisdom.

One might suggest that, with so many mouths to feed, citizens to house, medical care to provide and so on, a policy of determined detente rather than “wolf warrior” gamesmanship might better serve Beijing’s interests. Meanwhile, the US itself is struggling with political rancour.