Xi’s gamble on Putin may be the most dangerous and short sighted of his

It becomes clearer every day that Chinese President Xi Jinping's decision to double-down on his "no limits" strategic bromance with Russian President Vladimir Putin, just days before the Russian dictator launched his war in Ukraine, marks the most dangerous and short-sighted gamble of his nine years in power. If Europe's bloodiest conflict since World War II produces Putin's military withdrawal, failure, or his political ouster, it has all the ingredients to pose the biggest threat yet to President Xi's leadership, coming as it does in the leadup to his decisive 20th Chinese Communist Party Congress in November. Geopolitical odds-makers still expect a carefully choreographed outcome at the Congress that would anoint President Xi for a third term and perhaps even as "leader for life." That said, a Putin failure of whatever stripe could "create the chemistry necessary for a rethink of Chinese leadership inside the party," Kevin Rudd, the former Australian prime minister, tells me. Though Xi's control remains "comprehensive," Rudd said, "it's not "complete."There's no doubt that President Xi must begin to consider the consequences of Putin's ruin. In perhaps the most significant speech of his long political career, U. S. President Joe Biden in Poland departed from his prepared text to suggest what price Putin should pay for his unjustified, unprovoked and criminal war on Ukraine's civilians."For God's sake," Biden said, "this man cannot stay in power."Three days earlier in Brussels, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg tagged Xi as Putin's enabler. "Beijing has joined Moscow in questioning the right of independent nations to choose their own path," he said. "China has provided Russia with political support, including by spreading blatant lies and disinformation."What's at stake in Ukraine's survival is nothing less than the future of the global order and who will shape it. It's time for world democracies to translate their reactive response to Putin's challenge in Ukraine to a proactive embrace of a strategic opportunity. Putin's failure in Ukraine could reverse the world's authoritarian momentum, disrupt the Xi-Putin strategic common cause, and expose the hypocrisy that taints Xi's global ambitions. The problem for Xi, in this most important of years for his historic legacy, is that his problems are self-inflicted, cumulative, and growing. None on its own would be enough to turn party comrades against him, especially after a series of purges that have removed potential opponents. Taken together, however, they have dramatically changed the mood. Xi's inability to anticipate Putin's military failures and mounting war crimes could increase doubts about the Chinese president's judgment across a number of other fronts as well.1) Xi's more assertive and aggressive global approach, casting aside the guiding international philosophy of Deng Xiaoping's leadership of "hide your strength and bide your time.


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Article Link: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/27/xis-gamble-on-putin-may-be-the-most-dangerous-of-his-9-years-in-power.html


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