A Panda, an Eagle & a Bear Walk into a Bar
Zaniness ensues... but who is playing whom?
They may not want to admit it, but it looks like Beijing and Washington are, like a lot of unhappy couples, realizing that they may just be better together. Or at least not trying to destroy each other. Delegations emerged from trade talks in London agreeing to a broad framework where everyone (sort of) gets what they want(ish). Which, you may recall, is exactly happened in London a few weeks ago.
And it’s going to keep happening as each has the other by the short hairs. China has a near monopoly on rare earths and magnets of the sort used in everything from AI to fighter jets. American has technological dominance in AI and the chips that make it happen, as well as a huge spendthrift market. So not only will both economies suffer from an embargo, but so will the monopolies being used for all that massive leverage.
So, like a bad, enduring marriage, practical considerations are masking deep distrust and blinding resentment. Big Panda and the Eagle agree to “try harder”, at least while sitting in the therapist’s office, but maintaining a truce at home is an entirely different matter. To bend the metaphor to the breaking point, the most interesting player in this arrangement is Moscow. Whether the Bear is “the other woman” or merely a spouse’s problematic best friend is up your profane imagination. And they are only involved because due to a classified leak, or as we say down here on earth, some nasty gossip.
A group of shadowy cybercriminals (is there any other kind?) known as Ares Leaks got a hold of an internal Russian Intelligence memo that warned that China is spying on Russia’s war in Ukraine, its presence in the Arctic, and recruiting journalists, researchers, arms-makers, and whomever else they find useful. Not much is known about Ares, but no fewer than six Western intelligence agencies have confirmed the memo is, in fact, real. Although, the source of a leak says a lot about what you should make of the information it contains.
For it’s part, the White House is loudly whispering that President Trump is successfully pulling a “Reverse-Nixon” by peeling Russia away from China’s orbit. To that end, Western intelligence may have been behind the leak. Maybe… but that’s a tricky maneuver that would require giving Russia a favorable cease-fire to rebuilding Washington’s ties with the country in the vague hope that it drives a wedge between it a China. It’s also the sort of Mean Girl subterfuge is a lot harder to pull off if you keep loudly whispering about it to anyone who will listen.
Whatever the providence of the leak, it’s worth asking if isn’t Beijing that’s laying the groundwork for a geopolitical switcheroo. Is it planning to ditch Russia without Trump’s help? That would be much simpler to pull off. For one thing, China and Russia have historically hated each without Nixon stirring the pot; it’s baked into their respective cultures. When it looked like Russia was going to march into Kyiv to dominate NATO and all of Europe, Moscow looked like a useful partner to tie the US in Europe while Beijing messed around in the Pacific and cornered the market with EVs and solar panels. It wasn’t a bad play at the time.
Now that it looks like Russia may be sinking into a military quagmire, keeping it afloat is a drag. The two may have bonded a shared belief that the West really screwed them over, but that will only get you so far with a friend you neither like nor trust.
Beijing’s resentment of America is a little more abstract: China wants to be top-dog in a world that already has one, and that has chapped their back-sides. Moscow still fears NATO, but that’s less of a thing for Beijing. Besides, the West appears to be cracking up as the US isolates itself - another game changer that no one could have predicted at the start of the war. So, from the point of view of Big Panda, why keep Russia afloat if it isn’t needed to break up the solid West?
As for the trade talks in London, Beijing will ease up on rare-earth export licenses, get the whiz-bang AI chips to Deep Seek US technical dominance and let America have its domestic market protected by trade barriers.
That’s not a bad play either.
Richard Murff is the founder of 4717 Insights. For more insight to tear things up, head to the 4717. Murff is the author of Haint Punch, Drunk as Lords, and the revised and updated Pothole of the Gods: Holy Wars, Proxy Wars & Fake News - coming soon.