This week, our guest is ZHAO Hai, Director of the International Politics Program in the National Institute for Global Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). We discuss US policy toward China, Sino-Russian relations, the war in Ukraine, and China’s vision of global order.
This week, our guest is ZHAO Hai, Director of the International Politics Program in the National Institute for Global Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). We discuss US policy toward China, Sino-Russian relations, the war in Ukraine, and China’s vision of global order.
*The Trialogue Podcast is hosted by the Stimson Center and produced by University FM.
**The first twelve episodes of this podcast were published by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey.
(Transcripts may contain a few typographical errors due to audio quality during the podcast recording.)
[00:00:00] Peter: Hi, I'm Peter Slezkine, Director of the Monterey Trialogue, a program hosted by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey. Since the middle of the 20th century, relations among the United States, Russia, and China have had an enormous impact on each country separately and on the world as a whole. The purpose of the Monterey Trialogue is to better understand these extraordinarily complex and consequential relationship by directly engaging with experts from all three countries.
Hello, a quick clarification before we get to today’s episode. We recorded this conversation in person in Beijing. So, when I say “here,” I’m referring to China, not the U.S. All right, on with the episode.
Our guest today is Zhao Hai, Director of the International Politics Program in the National Institute for Global Strategy at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Welcome to the podcast.
[00:00:58] Zhao: Thank you for having me.
[00:01:00] Peter: Your given name is Hai, which means ocean. Your grandfather and your father both served in the Navy. Can you tell us a little bit about the two of them?
[00:01:09] Zhao: Yeah, okay. My grandfather was a revolutionary. He joined the so-called Red Army during the anti-Japanese war. And he led a small guerrilla group fighting the Japanese in the Shandong area. And after that, because he had some education equivalent to today's like high school education, in the early days of the People's Republic, he was needed in the Navy, which was considered a high-end military and need educated people to help to construct a new navy.
So, he was transferred from the Army to the Navy and stayed in Qingdao for a while to build the base for the northern fleet. And then he was transferred to the headquarters and ended up with deputy chief of staff of the Navy.
After that, my father also joined the Navy during the Cultural Revolution, actually. He actually studied at the Peking University in history. But during that time, he has no use for his historian learning. So, he was forced to join the Navy, but he loved the Navy. And he was in the first missile guided destroyer and acted as a missile controller. After that he transferred back to do more research study and ended up as a chief strategist at the Navy Academic Research Institute.
So, my family, as you can see, have this legacy of help to build the modern Chinese Navy. Also, currently, I have my cousin also in the submarine academy. I have the whole family, actually, serving the military. But my ground is quite different. I follow my father to study history. I then go to the United States to continue deepening my learning, and then come back to China to join the think tank.
[00:02:52] Peter: What was the Soviet influence on your grandfather's professional career, both positive and negative? Were the Soviets present in Qingdao as instructors, technical or strategic?
[00:03:05] Zhao: Well, as you know, in the 1950s, the Russians helped in many areas to help Chinese industry and build modern military. And they were deeply involved in the early days of the construction of the new navy. So, there were Russian engineers and consultants present in Qingdao. And during that time, they had very close relations with my grandfather.
I don't know the details. At that time, I wasn't born yet. But I saw family pictures. And my grandfather was sitting with those Russian advisors.
[00:03:34] Peter: Did the Sino-Soviet split leave a psychological mark? What was his attitude towards the Soviets when you remember him?
[00:03:42] Zhao: He never talked about the Russians. I think he is a very orthodoxy sort of Chinese communist. So, he followed the party line and followed the government's directions. In the early days, he was instructed to cooperate with the Russians. He did that. And then, in the later days, because of the ideological breakup, he also followed the orders.
From my father's memory, he said, in the early days, they had parties with the Soviets, they had very good conversations. But from time to time, they also complained about the chauvinism from the Soviets. The Chinese called them, at the time, big brothers. So, sometimes they were condescending, sometimes showing that they were trying to direct Chinese to do this and that. And it's hurting Chinese pride from time to time.
But overall, I think, back then, the Soviets sent their elite to China. And they were having a really good working relationship. And they impressed the Chinese as very professional, as Chinese-loving. And also, they believed they're all true communists who has this internationalist sentiment. And they were not reserving anything in terms of helping China.
Later on, they all believe it's because of the politics that stand in the way of having a better and warmer people-to-people relations. When I was little, I looked at the bookshelf. It's all Russian literature. The whole 1940s and ‘50s generation, they were grown up in this environment, and they were very familiar with the Russian songs, Russian literature, Russian movies, everything Russian. And also, my father studied Russian when he was in college. So, that's why, you know, I speak English and he spoke Russian. So, we read a very different kind of literature and grow up with very different academic background.
[00:05:26] Peter: Interesting. So, your father taught at the Naval Academy, you said.
[00:05:29] Zhao: He was in the Naval Academic Research Institute. It's also a think tank for the navy.
[00:05:34] Peter: What sort of materials did they use?
[00:05:37] Zhao: My father transferred to his position in the late 1980s and early 1990s, so, by then, most of the research materials are English. I mean, my father still do a lot of research in terms of World War II Soviet strategy. And also, later on, the 1960s and ‘70s, a lot of the Soviet so-called expansion, the war in Afghanistan and other areas, in what they're doing in the Middle East, in Africa. But mostly, in terms of more advanced technology and the future of the naval development, they were looking at the United States.
And back then, if you remember, most of the Chinese military leaders have already traveled to the United States, and there's been military cooperations between China and the U.S. in the 1980s. So, more and more materials are coming from the U.S.
[00:06:29] Peter: Right. So, your father's Russian language abilities were good for reading great literature, but not fantastically useful for his professional career?
[00:06:37] Zhao: Exactly.
[00:06:37] Peter: And then you learned great English, went off to the University of Chicago, right? And what did you study? And whom did you study with?
[00:06:46] Zhao: I first went to the China-U.S. Research Center. It's called China-U.S. Cultural Center at Nanjing University. It's a cooperative organization between Nanjing University and Johns Hopkins University.
[00:06:58] Peter: When was that?
[00:06:59] Zhao: That was 2000 to 2001 is the master program. And then, after that, I decided to look further because I think I need to learn more. And back then, I think many Chinese students wants to go to the United States to get their master’s or PhD. So, I applied and got a number of offers, and I believe that University of Chicago is my dream school. So, finally, I ended up there, and I also have a wonderful, academic advisor, Bruce Cummings. Bruce Cummings is both an expert on Korean Peninsula, and also, an expert on East Asia political economy. So, I'm not an expert on the Korean Peninsula affairs, but I followed him in terms of East Asia political economy.
[00:07:44] Peter: I was an undergrad at the University of Chicago, I think, as you were finishing your PhD. So, some of these names are familiar. I certainly knew about Bruce Cummings. I read his books but didn't take his classes. So, when you were finishing your PhD, did you ever consider staying in the U.S. and finding an academic or some other kind of job there? Or did you already know that you were coming back?
[00:08:04] Zhao: No. At the time, it's, it’s not been decided. I had some wishes to stay in the United States because some of my classmates already stayed in the United States and teaching in various universities. So, I was thinking about staying, but then I'm always interested in think tank jobs. So, I spent a year, actually, in D.C. for internship and trying to go to different think tanks and find a position for myself. But later on, I believe there's a, sort of, a glass ceiling or a barrier for a Chinese like me to work in American think tank because, ultimately, I realized think tanks are serving national interest and they have a clear ideological difference.
So, finally, I decided, if I want to pursue my dream, I'd better come back to China. But back then, particularly, like, 10, 15 years ago, in China, there wasn't a Western style think tank. There was, sort of, government organizations that are advising the government, just like the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. But their way of organizing and operating is not really a Western-like think tank. But ultimately, I think, in 2014 and 15, President Xi calling for a more modernized form of think tank. So, finally, I decided, I think in 2015, to come back and find my own position here.
[00:09:26] Peter: And so, you were at Tsinghua for a couple of years, and then moved on to the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, otherwise known as CASS.
[00:09:33] Zhao: Right, right. I returned, but back then I'm not very familiar with the Chinese system, so I first came to Tsinghua. There's a think tank affiliated with Tsinghua called National Strategy Institute. I was a senior researcher there. But then, after two years, I think Chinese Academy of Social Sciences has a closer relationship with the government. So, maybe, my advice would be more valued. So, I decided to transfer onto the current position.
[00:09:59] Peter: So, can you tell us a bit about CASS? It's a sprawling system built on the Soviet model, from what I understand, that contains many different divisions and subdivisions that work in different ways.
[00:10:10] Zhao: Right, the current Chinese Academy of Social Sciences is very unique. On the one hand, as you said, it’s born out of the Soviet tradition. It was part of the Chinese Academy of Science, and then later on it split and became independent. And right now, as you said, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences has 40-some institutes. In the international studies area, we have eight institutes, mostly divided by geography. So, we have institutes of American studies, of Japanese studies, of European studies, and also Russian studies, such like that.
But my choice was, ultimately, the Institute of World Economic and Political Studies because I'm always interested in political economy and I always wanted to have a more broader strategic perspective instead of focusing on one country or one area, because I think, you know, as a system, particularly after the globalization era, we have to view the world from a holistic view instead of just looking at one country or one area.
[00:11:10] Peter: How much of the work of CASS, or of your institute, in particular, is directed at the public and how much at the government?
[00:11:17] Zhao: Well, it's hard to say, because the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences is a dual mission. So, on the one hand is the highest institute to lead Chinese research on social sciences. So, it covers most of the disciplines in social sciences, directly facing the academic circle, directly and indirectly facing the media, and then the public.
So, a lot of the work are public and academic. Many experts in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, particularly in the economic area, has influence in the society. So, when they speak publicly their voice and their opinions, their ideas have quite a big influence in the Chinese society.
But at the same time, the second mission of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences is to advise the State Council, which is a direct leader of CASS. In many areas, we provide expertise reports to the State Council and try to provide our individual or group research products to the government and try to advise government to make better choices, optimal choices.
And also, we divide our reports into two sets of directions. One is called vertical, so we submit our reports to the higher leadership, or the other type we call horizontal. We can provide expertise to other ministries, like Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or Ministry of Finance. So, when they need our advice or opinions on certain subjects, they also send inquiries to us.
[00:12:52] Peter: But why wouldn't ministries also be vertical? I imagine that ministries are as high as it gets.
[00:12:57] Zhao: Because CASS is a ministry-level organization. So, other ministry is horizontal and the State Council is vertical.
[00:13:05] Peter: Got it.You came back to China in 2015, is that correct?
[00:13:08] Zhao: By the end of 2015, yeah.
[00:13:11] Peter: So, you leave the United States, you come here, and Trump enters the stage. What did you make of him? What did you tell people here about what was happening there?
[00:13:21] Zhao: Most of my years in the United States are Obama years. So, my view of the United States is mostly the Obama year America, particularly 2008. When Obama was running for the highest office in the United States, I was in Chicago, and also as a teaching assistant, I have class. I still remember this very inspiring candidate in the United States. And actually, some students quitting class to join his campaigns. I was also excited and finding Obama's ideas are very inspiring. And also, interestingly, my little humble apartment is only a couple hundred feet away from Obama's house.
I still remember one time my car was missing when I parked along the streets, and then I called, I thought my car was stolen. But actually, it's because Obama coming back to his home, for security reasons, they removed all the cars from the streets. Anyways. So, when Trump came out, I was first surprised that he, I mean, actually, he was in American politics for quite some years. But most people don't treat him like he's going to be an obvious candidate or even eventually won the White House. So, I really didn't pay much attention to him, personally. But on the other hand, Trumpism or populism's rising is not surprising, because I really loved traveling the United States. I spent a lot of time traveling back and forth between Chicago and New York. So, I go through those countryside, in Indiana, you know, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. So, I saw firsthand how this kind of industrial decaying is happening in the United States, the so-called Rusty Belt.
Actually, my PhD dissertation writing about China's Northeast had a very similar phenomena in the late 1990s. So, when I compare these two regions, I realized something was going to happen. What happened to China is that over 20 million workers are laid off and then had a great transformation of the region. So far, the region hasn't fully recovered yet. The United States has the same problem, but has no obvious solution. America as a democratic society needs to have a respond to that problem. And I think, in many ways, Trumpism or this white populism is the respond to that decay. And obviously, today, you have JD Vance as the vice presidential candidate. And his book, very famous, Hillbilly Elegy, is a very interesting and quite accurate depiction of what happened in the region and how those people reacted.
I think many here in China, including me, believe that many of the domestic issues in the United States became unresolvable due to America's own structural problem. But then, those problem was transferred onto China and that domestic problem was somehow redirected as a national competition problem.
[00:16:21] Peter: So, when that happens under Trump, what was the reaction among the expert community here in 2016, ‘17, when they suddenly realized that Trumpism was coming to D.C. and that China was a big part of the picture?
[00:16:38] Zhao: It came as quite a shock. I still remember, at the end of 2016, when Trump won the election, a lot of people in China couldn't believe what happened. I think, in East Asia, in general, I heard stories of what happened in Japan, in Korea, in many other countries. People back then firmly believed that Hillary Clinton would won that election. But then, of course, it’s Trump. And then, I think we're disoriented. Nobody knows exactly what he's going to do. Everybody is going back to read his book, like, Art of the Deal, and trying to figure out who is this guy and what his policy could be.
And then, very quickly, you can see that 2017 moves very fast. You can see the change of, right after the Mar-a-Lago meeting in April, the United States has already started in secret the 301 investigation. And then, by the end of the year, already, a new national security strategy came out. So, the whole China-U.S. relations was turned upside down in a very short period of time.
We were warned. I mean, American diplomats told us what would happen. But I think many in China believed that this new president can be handled just like the previous Republican presidents or Democratic president, when campaigning, they spoke hard about China, you know, get very tough on China. But once they were sitting in the office, they realized how China-U.S. ties are so valuable, and therefore, if you destroy this relationship, it's going to be very difficult. And also, at that time, I think many Chinese believe American business would help to ameliorate this relationship and try to prevent a hard decoupling.
[00:18:16] Peter: So, the Chinese first believed that Trump couldn't possibly win. And then once he had won, they believed that he couldn't possibly do what he said he was going to do.
[00:18:24] Zhao: Exactly, exactly.
[00:18:24] Peter: And then once he did start doing it, well, what changed here? What was the response among these think tanks, big institutions?
[00:18:33] Zhao: Well, honestly, I think the feeling is from unbelief to some sort of disappointment, and then anger, and then fear. So, there's multiple feelings here in China. On the one hand, people are getting very angry because some of the charges laid on China from President Trump was baseless and sometimes even unthinkable. It's like what has been written in 301, in my institution, the former director has wrote a very long rebuff of what's been said by, like, Peter Navarro and Lighthizer. The accusations of China of, like, robbing jobs, taking meals from Americans, it's just not a good way to describe the bilateral relationship, because we firmly believe that, in this globalization era, America benefited even more than China. It's just like—
[00:19:23] Peter: Economically.
[00:19:24] Zhao: Economically, yeah. The internal distribution is so uneven. I mean, there's winners and losers of globalization, but you can't say that you're a total loser from this bilateral relationship and China is the only one benefiting from this. Otherwise, if you just, you know, go through stealing and go through this unfair practice, it should be shut down a long time ago, if no one from the American side benefited from this bilateral relationship.
[00:19:50] Peter: So, disbelief that he would win, disbelief that he would implement the policies that he promised, then a period where the arguments made by his advisors were being met by Chinese counter-arguments. And then what followed? Was there then a period of adjustment where economic policy changes were made here in order to react to the economic policy changes in the U.S.?
[00:20:15] Zhao: I think, after the, the first stage disorientation, very quickly, China trying to find a new footing on exactly what strategy should be adopted to deal with this new reality. And back then, I think there are a number of different ideas of how to deal with the U.S. One is that, we need to follow the old institutions and mechanisms, you know, go to WTO, and address these issues to the global international community, and try to exert pressure on the United States for its unilateral action.
But then, people realized that it's a new day. Americans, particularly, you know, people like Lighthizer and Peter Navarro, they don't care about WTO. They only care about how to achieve what they believe is U.S. national interest.
So, in order to counter that, more people thinking that it's better to find our own leverage to counter American assault on the bilateral economic relationship. But then, in terms of exactly how to use that economic tool to try to force the United States to come back to negotiation, people have different ideas. Based on different understanding of American politics, some people believe that we need to step back and have a, a calm negotiation with the United States to achieve a new rebalancing. But some believe that, because this Trumpism based on, you know, populism is so fixated on maximum pressure, we need to also exert Maximum pressure back to force the other side to realize that you can't have a unilateral strategy against China.
[00:21:50] Peter: And wolf warrior diplomacy, so called, is evidence of that second approach.
[00:21:54] Zhao: Yeah, I think, in a way, that this very nationalistic sentiment and this idea that we can't be bullied by this bully won the day, and China, very forcefully fought back. But I think the two ideas are going in parallel. On the one hand, we have a very obvious reciprocal fight with the United States. But at the same time, we kept the channel open. So, you can see that, through 2018, ‘19, until early, the first month of 2020, negotiation kept going. And President Xi never refused to find any opportunity to talk with President Trump and try to find a common solution. So, the met, in all those possible arenas of G20 in Argentina, in Osaka, in Japan, I think, finally, they settled down and reached a very interesting deal, phase one deal.
And that is very important. Even though we may not meet all the requirements, but it's going to, at a certain stage, stabilize the China-U.S. relationship. And moving forward, probably, we will have a phase two deal.
[00:22:57] Peter: Was there a sense that Biden's election was a good thing because it would bring the relationship back to a previous,, better period, or that this was an interruption in what had been slow progress?
[00:23:11] Zhao: Well, there are two things happened. One is that what happened in 2020. Basically, after March and April, when the situation of COVID-19 in the United States deteriorated so fast and endangered the whole campaign of Trump getting re-elected for his second term. And then, you know, you can see the China hawks came out and basically pushing the Trump administration towards a new Cold War.
So, the Pompeo speech at the Nixon Library in, I think, July, August of 2020, is so obvious and so threatening to China. I think, back then, China believed that, if the Trump administration continues to the next stage, we were bound towards a very serious conflict.
[00:23:56] Peter: And you don't think this would have happened without COVID. You think COVID was the catalyst.
[00:24:00] Zhao: I think COVID changed President Trump's mind and make him believe that COVID is China's fault. And COVID is one of the major reasons that he lost the election. Well, he believed he didn't lost. He lost the election. Anyways, but then, when President Biden came to the campaign, and he said something more rational, and from China's perspective, making more sense, like, he talked about the unreasonable tariff and how tariff is actually a tax on American people, and it sounds like, back then, that he is going to get rid of the tariff. Of course, China would welcome that position. And actually, there are people in China has quite some hope that, if Biden was elected, the situation that the basic relationship between China and U.S. will somehow move back towards the later years of Obama.
But of course, March of 2021, everything falls apart and people realized that Biden is not only going to continue Trump's policy in most of the areas, he's going to actually have a new strategy that is even more threatening or, in terms of strategy, it's more like the Cold War.
[00:25:09] Peter: So, what does that mean? So, it's more like the Cold War. So, things were on a bad track with Trump toward the end. It looked like it was going to escalate. Biden seemed like he might put the brakes on the deterioration of the relationship, but in fact, just put it on a different plane. So, in what way was Biden's Cold War different from the one that Trump was heading toward?
[00:25:30] Zhao: Well, in Trump's 2017 national security strategy, if you compare that to the 2022 national security strategy, you can see the strategy towards China is evolving very rapidly.
So, in the previous version, the United States needs to have some strategy to compete with China. But in terms of exactly what to do, it's not very concrete.
But then, later on, I think, the Biden people has a very clear strategy when they came into office on how to deal with China. First, they came out with the three C strategy, you know — competition, cooperation, and confrontation — some sort of a divide, which is actually coming from Europe, because Europeans are developing and creating this compartmentalized strategy towards China first.
But then, more and more, this kind of strategy is evolving towards more of competition. And that competition is becoming more adversarial. And particularly, what Biden is doing different from the Trump administration is alliance. They're developing new alliances, like AUKUS. And they're also linking this alliance together into a more broad alliance against China, So, that is more like Cold War strategy, meaning that they're dividing countries into different camps and using ideology like democracy versus autocracy as a basic framework to understand the world and organize their state machine.
[00:27:02] Peter: So, how does China respond to this? You were saying that, during the Trump years, there were two possible reactions, one strong, one soft, one can say. It seems like the wolf warrior diplomacy, in its most aggressive form, has been toned down, somewhat, but a soft Chinese approach, certainly, has not been adopted. So, what is the current Chinese policy toward the U.S.?
[00:27:23] Zhao: Well, if you recall, there was a period of Wolf Warrior diplomacy. It's because of this anger reaction to this Trump shock. But then, after a while, I think people are coming down, trying to figure out exactly how to develop a new China-U.S. relationship for this new era. And I think President Xi and, you know, think tankers in China are trying to figure out what's the intention of the United States. And the conclusion is that the U.S. is getting China's intentions wrong. So, that's why China repeatedly calling for the United States to have a correct understanding of China's strategic intentions.
In the beginning, if you remember, there's a very famous book called the Thucydides’s Trap, whether or not China and the U.S. is going to fight a war by Graham Allison from Harvard. And there's a lot of discussion in China about whether China and the U.S. is destined towards a conflict or even a hot war.
I think, even though many IR scholars in China believe there's a possibility, but most of them refuse to accept the fatalistic idea that China and U.S. is bound to have a conflict. So, many of us are trying to do one thing, and one thing only, which is trying to design a new way of dealing with this bilateral relationship, so that we won't fall into the trap of war.
[00:28:45] Peter: But what can China do on its own? So, obviously, China would hope to change perceptions in Washington. But assuming that that is a hopeless endeavor or one that is not bound to succeed, what can China do without influencing Washington?
[00:29:02] Zhao: I think, ultimately, we ended up with strategy so-called self-improvement. So, if you look at current China's state document and, also, many of current China policy, it's all about how to self-improve. There are separate parts of the strategy. One part dealing with the U.S. suppression in terms of technology. So, without U.S. supplying the most advanced technology, China has to develop its own innovative ability and, also, try to create its own technology to try to fill the void. On the other hand, in terms of trade and tariff, China would have to accept that reality and transfer some of the supply chain outside of China to circumvent the tariff. But at the same time, China's trying very hard to open up new markets in the developing world and, also, trying to improve its relations with the European Union, in particular. That's why, before the disruption in China actually reached agreement with the EU of bilateral investment agreement.
[00:30:01] Peter: By disruption, you mean war in Ukraine?
[00:30:02] Zhao: No, actually, that was interrupted before Ukraine. Well, the real reason I don't know, but it was started by mutually sanctioning each other. The Europeans sanctioned China on the issue of Xinjiang, and then China sanctioned back, and then that, sort of, tanked the whole deal. And then came the Russian-Ukraine conflict. And then, after that, the deal was never mentioned.
[00:30:22] Peter: So, let's turn to Russia. Much has been made of the no limits partnership. We don't have to focus on the phrase; too much has been made of it already. But what was the perspective on the China-Russia relationship in Beijing before the war in Ukraine. What was the significance of Russia to China's position in the world?
[00:30:43] Zhao: Well, there are several things. I think we need to go back a little bit to the end of the Cold War. By the end of the Cold War, China's relation with Russia, instead of with the Soviet Union, has been completely transformed. So, China is trying to find a new footing for the bilateral relationship. And the new footing is, of course, trade and good economic relationship and good neighborhood. I think China used about 10 to 20 years to fix the relationship, and also to reach a treaty with Russia to, basically, draw the line between the two countries.
[00:31:17] Peter: Because there had been all sorts of border issues, border clashes. So, all of those disputes were formally resolved.
[00:31:23] Zhao: Formally resolved. Because, historically, that's a huge headache. Imperial Russia, you know, expanded eastward and, actually, took a huge chunk of land from the Qing dynasty. And then, later on, there's lot of unresolved issues. And that happened, you know, reoccurring in the 1960s, both in the northeast area, but also in the Xinjiang area. Because Mongolia was pushed towards independence in the 1920s, that becomes a problem as well. So, historically, from the 19th century, China has, you know, facing the threat from the north. Deng Xiaoping's idea of getting closer to the United States against the Soviet Union is also because of this real or imagined threat from the north.
So, resolving that issue, making sure that China's northern and western border is secure is essential to China's national security. And that got resolved gradually in the 2000s. I think China had a treaty with Russia and with all the Central Asia countries. So, except only a number of small places, China basically resolved all the border disputes with the land countries, except India.
In many ways, that becomes the foundation of the good relationship. And then, in the 2000s, there's growing border trading. If you travel to the border towns in Northeast China, you can see that there's still a lot of trading spots where Russians cross the border to trade and Chinese going there.
And because of the legacy of the Cold War, the Russians still lack lot of manufacturing goods, clothing, furniture, all kinds of things. So, they purchase from China. And then China, of course, needs Russian oil, natural gas, and more and more materials from Russia because of China's growing economic development.
So, I think, in the past 20 years, China and Russia actually mutually needed each other. From people to people, from economic perspective and political mutual trust, it's naturally growing. But I think something happened in, let's say, 2008. When the U.S. has a financial crisis, Russia is also having a geopolitical crisis. So, 2008, 2014, when Russia's geopolitical situation deteriorated, Russia started having this eastward policy and trying to get closer to China.
[00:33:39] Peter: And by Russia's geopolitical situation deteriorating, you're referring to the war in Georgia and the beginning of the Ukraine conflict.
[00:33:47] Zhao: And the Ukraine conflict, yeah. And then, at the same time, China's facing more and more U.S. pressure. Actually, before Trump, you have this pivot to Asia policy from the Obama’s administration, particularly the second term. And then, with the growing pressure on both sides, China and Russia, I think these two countries found a mutual interest of resisting the U.S. pressure, and that gives them a very strong incentive to increase their coordination and cooperation.
[00:34:18] Peter: The Ukraine war, obviously, changes matters. So, what was your reaction in February 2022 when Russian troops crossed the Ukrainian border?
[00:34:30] Zhao: Personally, I think it's madness, truth be told. And many of my colleagues also believe that this is not a rational move. From any point of view, trying to find a military solution on the Ukraine issue is not the right way to go. And China, historically, is against any use of military force to resolve international political disputes.
And of course, this is against the United Nations Charter. It's not Russia that broke this first, it's the United States. When the United States invade Iraq, without UN authorization, it's the first one breaking the international law. But then, Russia following the suit is also… China cannot support that sort of action. That's number one.
And number two, if you want to use military solution, you use it right. But the Russians are using a very limited number of troops, believing that they can achieve a very quick victory within days or weeks. So, once they were repelled very quickly, things are quickly falling apart, and that reinforced our idea that this is a wrong move. However, on the other hand, many in China believe, if you look back to 2014, the Ukrainians are not blameless, let's say. They are the victim, but they are not blameless. They have policy problems, policy fallacies. And their relationship with Russia has not been handled properly, in a way.
So, on the one hand, we do not agree with Russians launching this attack. I mean, even if you can say the Russians didn't launch this during the Winter Olympics, but still, very quickly after Winter Olympics, it's still, from China's perspective, an appropriate move, and particularly, after China and the Russians signed this joint declaration. So, that's our first reaction.
The other thing is that we all know Russia's military expenditure every year, and Russia's total reserve, and Russia's military capability, and China has been exercising with Russia over the years. So, we know the basic capability of Russian military, what they can achieve, right?
So, once Russia launched this, first, we don't know exactly what is their strategic target. Like, if they're trying to annex the whole Ukraine, it's impossible. So, if they want to overthrow the regime in Kiev, they couldn't achieve that. If they want to push forward the border of Donbas, there's not enough troops to achieve that.
So, we got confused from the very early days about what they want to do and how can they achieve that with the current financial and military capability. So, overall, we're thinking that this is irrational, unsustainable, and very confusing, from the early months of this invasion.
[00:37:28] Peter: So, after Russia's original plan met with clear failure, and the war, then, after a year or so, transformed into what it has become, after the shock of the sanctions, and, sort of, a new stabilization, what does China make of those two dimensions of the conflict? How are they studied? They must be studied very closely, both what is happening in the battlefield. This is the first major war in a long time, and this is a massive application of sanctions to a major economy.
[00:38:03] Zhao: First, this link back to China on a number of things. First is the negotiation. I think, March, just one month after the initial military operation, we had hopes that the two countries can reach agreement and have a settlement.
[00:38:20] Peter: This is in Istanbul.
[00:38:21] Zhao: This is in Istanbul. But then it failed. And later on, there's a leak talking about how Boris Johnson disrupted and collapsed the whole negotiation and pushed Zelenskyy to continue fighting.
And then, when the war continued, some in China believed that this is an overall strategy. This is no longer about Ukraine, this is about weakening Russia and, ultimately, deprive China of a strategic partner. So, that linked back to China, number one.
Number two is that, very quickly, in Western media, there's a linkage between Ukraine and Taiwan. And that immediately becomes China problem. That gives a lot of pressure on China to, sort of, abandon Russia, to disconnect with Russia, and joining the sanctioned regime from the West, or China itself can face sanction.
And then there's this talk about, if there's a war, like, across Taiwan Strait, how the Western companies can withdraw from China and how Western government can sanction China. So, there's a lot of talk that, even though this is a regional war that has nothing to do with China, and it's all of a sudden coming back around is all about China.
[00:39:33] Peter: So, you're saying, among the experts here, there was a real fear that China would become embroiled in the Ukrainian conflict, would experience some blowback, and that it might actually be good to distance a bit from Russia in order to avoid any linkage to Taiwan, any sort of sanctions.
[00:39:52] Zhao: Well, there's a lot of discussion about how much pressure this could become, exactly. And also, there's discussion of what position China should take under the circumstances. But I think, when the war deepens and also gradually escalates, China's first reaction is saying that this war is hurting everybody and we should stop the war. China's natural reaction is to advocate for peace. Because both sides, I talked about this before, is that Russia is our strategic partner, and then EU and European countries is our top customer. So, China cannot make the choice, and it's very difficult. The best option, of course, for China is to stop the conflict and try to restore our relationship back to the pre-war status.
[00:40:42] Peter: I understand that's a good thing to say. But after a certain point, certainly, after the failed negotiations in Istanbul, it must have become clear in Beijing that the war was not going to stop. So, you can make nice-sounding declarations in favor of peace. But that's not going to create peace on the ground.
[00:40:56] Zhao: I think, back then, we still believe in peace. We know that peace is very hard to achieve, but back then, I think, particularly, six months into the war, we also believe that both sides will very quickly exhaust their war capabilities and resources and try, at least, to sit back on the table and try to reach another deal. But of course, we’ve made the mistake of underestimate the Western resolve. And also, we underestimated the potential capability of war fighting from Russia. And then, of course, the war continued for two years. And so far, there's no sign of ending, and continued escalating.
[00:41:35] Peter: So, you mentioned the conundrum of picking between the EU and Russia. I've spoken to people here who are clearly frustrated by Putin's move, who seem to think that they had a good thing going with Europe, that the United States may have taken an anti-Chinese turn, Europe might follow to some extent, but basically, that China could maintain a relationship with Europe, and that that was then ruined by the war in Ukraine. And China was lumped in with Russia. And now, they're stuck.
And some of these people seem to suggest that, if only the Chinese leadership would take a more explicit position against Russia, they could reestablish previous relations with Europe. Do you think that was ever possible? Is there an alternative Chinese response that could have maintained a better state of relations with Europe?
[00:42:30] Zhao: Well, I really don't know, again, because of this very intense relationship between China and the United States, and particularly, with Biden administration not reversing the Trump policy but deepening the tough-on-China policy.
I think China's thinking is mostly going through the lenses of China-U.S. relationship. And because there's no way that even China step back that the U.S. will lessen its pressure on China, and therefore, I think the thinking here is that, even if we do what the West says, it's not going to benefit us in any way. So, I think that is the priority.
[00:43:06] Peter: Basically, that Europe cannot be separated from the U.S.
[00:43:10] Zhao: Precisely. I think China has had this idea of EU autonomy for some time. And that autonomy, meaning more independent from U.S. control. But with the start of the war in Ukraine, NATO has been reinforced, and NATO even expanded, including three more countries, and also now trying to step back into the Western Pacific area, having closer relationship with Japan and Korea.
And because of that, we're thinking that, without the war having a more plausible ending, it's almost impossible for China to achieve anything without a major disruption of relationship between China and Russia. Some of the people in China here also sees the discontent in Western society. Like, in the United States, Trump and many of his followers believe that the Ukraine war should stop because the United States is actually subsidizing the war without foreseeable benefit from Ukraine. And also, within the EU society, there's a lot of people from the right — also opposed the war in Ukraine and continued military and economic aid to Ukraine without a limit.
Because of this, I think, many in China believe that we should hold on to our current position, wait until both sides are so exhausted or to the brink of a total mutual destruction that they realize the only possible solution is coming back to the negotiation table. And by then, of course, China can play a bigger role in terms of mediating and try to bring the two sides to a mutually acceptable solution.
[00:44:52] Peter: Would China consider playing the role of guarantor of whatever the line becomes between the two sides?
[00:45:00] Zhao: I think that's possible. It depends on how the deal is structured.
[00:45:04] Peter: I mean, guarantor, along with a number of other Western and non-Western countries.
[00:45:08] Zhao: With Western countries, but also with BRIC countries. China has always been trying to push the idea of a multipolar world where developing countries has a bigger saying. And in this war of Ukraine conflict, I mean the West, of course, is talking about a global south. But actually, global south is a group of developing countries who just want a bigger saying in this global distribution of power, and China trying to let those voice out so that they can balance the past hundreds of years of Western dominance.
And this is a good opportunity to actually insert a bigger voice of BRIC countries and other countries to say that what happened in European continent has a bigger influence of the global market of, food security, energy security, and has influence in Africa, in the Middle East, and in other parts of the world, and therefore is a global problem, and it needs a global solution.
[00:46:04] Peter: So, you can see some sort of resolution to the Ukrainian war that rests on guarantees by Western countries and BRICS countries and, maybe, other non-Western countries.
[00:46:15] Zhao: Exactly, guarantee of some sort. And that guarantee, again, China repeatedly said that this needs to address the security concerns of Russia.
[00:46:24] Peter: Guarantees not just that Russia wouldn't move the line westward, but that Ukraine wouldn't try to move the line eastward.
[00:46:31] Zhao: That line needs to be mutually recognized. And it needs to be a stable line. We don't want, you know, the future solution becomes another 38th parallel. Because until today, it's a frozen Cold War legacy on the Korean Peninsula. So, if we want to find a solution in Ukraine and we don't want that to have a embedded problem that could be reignited in the future. I mean, today, in the world, if you look at Israel-Palestinian issue, that's a recurring issue. It's going to happen every 5 or 10 years without a solution. So, again, China also applied that Global Security Initiative to that incident and calling for international peace conference to, basically, having a two-state solution in the area.
Otherwise, I mean, right now, the Israeli force is basically bombing Gaza into a whole area of rubbles. That's not a solution, right? Ultimately, we have to find a peaceful solution for the people to have a peaceful and respectable life there. Same thing applies to the Ukrainian people. They need to maintain their sovereignty and territorial integrity, but at the same time, making Russia believe that NATO is not going to further east and expand eastward and having a direct threat to Russia's national security.
[00:47:52] Peter: So, finally, let's look to the future. You mentioned China's preference for multipolarity. You said that, in some sense, multipolarity is a reaction against centuries of Western domination. So, can you unravel this a little bit? China has any number of initiatives, global, civilizational, security, and otherwise, that don't always seem entirely transparent to outsiders. So, in positive terms, can you describe China's realistic vision of a world order?
[00:48:26] Zhao: I think, right now, China likes two organizations, which we think we can play a role and is relatively fair and the mechanism should continue. The number one, of course, is the United Nations. United Nations has a very high respectable position in Chinese people's mind. And that is very different from the United States. I think, in the U.S., people always think that United Nations is a useless, fractured, and not really usable sort of international organization. But in China, we believe that UN is the ultimate solution to everything, because if people follow the rules by international law and, also, going to United Nations Security Council to resolve their disputes peacefully, that is ideal. Of course, we know the weakness of the United Nations, but still, in the foreseeable future, we think UN is irreplaceable.
And number two is G20. We think G20 developed from a financial crisis and now more and more developing into a multilateral organization that are quite inclusive because we have 20 of the biggest economies in the world sitting together to try to find solutions.
So, that's the best things, so far, that we can work with. But unfortunately, because of the war in Ukraine, because Russia has been so isolated and trying even to expel from the United Nations Security Council or G20, it's getting more and more difficult to protect and to continue to build on that existing institution.
So, in the future, exactly where we should head towards is a difficult question to answer. So, right now, China is, on the one hand, trying to build a better Shanghai Cooperation Organization to improve on the BRICS nations to be more inclusive and adding more members.
[00:50:16] Peter: Wait. So, it was just interesting because I… when you said that there are two organizations that China likes, I thought you were going to say BRICS and SCO.
[00:50:23] Zhao: Yeah.
[00:50:24] Peter: And you mentioned neither. And now, you've gotten to them only after saying that the UN and the G20 haven't lived up to expectations. So, does that mean that BRICS and SCO are a sort of secondary effort …
[00:50:36] Zhao: No, it's not secondary. What I'm saying is that, in terms of global governance, from a systematic perspective, UN and G20 is more like a global, more multilateral inclusive organization.
[00:50:50] Peter: To what extent is there still hope that that first layer of global governance will function? You say the Chinese, ideally, would like G20, the biggest economies, to get together and come up with rules of economic exchange for the UN to function as a place for conflict resolution. But first of all, there's a big call for UN reform. And as it stands now, the UN is not seen to be terribly legitimate. The G20, again, is not functioning perfectly.
So, is there a sense that that has, more or less, failed for now and the focus needs to be on these alternative institutions like BRICS and SCO?
[00:51:26] Zhao: Yeah, I think it's going to be a historical process. It's going to be long term. Again, these two are complementary, as I said. So, when the developing countries are getting stronger, having more share of global GDP, more population, develop faster, they're going to naturally require a bigger voice on the global stage.
So, that's going to push for further reform in the UN and G20 and other international institutions. So, again, this is the bottom-up process where you have a change of balance of power on the global stage and then, gradually, the upper infrastructure is going to change accordingly. But again, this is a very long process. I don't think a UN reform or other global governance structure is going to change instantly overnight. It's going to take a long time and, probably, going through very tough times.
And right now, the problem is that a previous structure of United-States-dominated Western-led international sort of system is gradually eroding. But at the same time, the new structure is nowhere to be found. People still don't know exactly what we can achieve, a stable, sustainable structure in the future. So, this, again, this is a process. That's why President Xi is calling our current time a very testing 100 years. And ultimately, the outcome, I think, nobody knows exactly what the outcome should be.
One thing, one factor I haven't mentioned yet is technology, right? Other than our geopolitical competition, other than all those things that are happening in the world, the undercurrent is that artificial intelligence and all this new technology, new materials are emerging. And the new threat, new challenges are also on the table. So, all these things is going to come together and ultimately brew out a new international system that probably is going beyond our imagination.
[00:53:18] Peter: Well, the greater the uncertainty, the more cause there is for more conversations between us.
[00:53:23] Zhao: Okay. Thank you.
[00:53:36] Peter: Thanks for listening to the Monterey Trialogue Podcast. Make sure to subscribe to the show, so you don’t miss out on any episodes. I’m Peter Slezkine. The Monterey Trialogue Podcast is hosted by the Middlebury Institute of International Studies and produced by University FM.