Key Points and Summary – Despite recent displays of unity, like last week’s military parade in Beijing, the Russia-China partnership is showing serious economic strain.
-New data reveals that trade between the two countries plunged in August 2025, the steepest decline since the Ukraine war began.
-Putin’s visit was reportedly an attempt to reverse this trend, with Russian sources admitting their war effort depends on Chinese support.
-While China is not a formal military ally and is wary of Russia’s actions, it continues to test U.S. sanctions by importing Russian LNG, revealing a complex, transactional relationship, not a monolithic bloc.
Are Russia and China in Trade Trouble?
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin visited China to participate in a military parade hosted by Chinese President Xi Jinping, to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. The two leaders were photographed together, along with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, who made a rare trip out of North Korea.
This led President Donald Trump to declare, in a Truth Social post, that India and Russia had been “lost.”
“Looks like we’ve lost India and Russia to deepest, darkest, China. May they have a long and prosperous future together!” the president declared last week.
Putin declared at the summit, held on the eve of the military parade, that his ties with his Chinese counterpart were now at an “unprecedented level.” However, there are indications that all might not be perfect in the Russia/China relationship.
Not Quite an Alliance
A Wall Street Journal report over the weekend noted that while Xi and Putin were chummy at the Beijing summit, China’s relations with both Russia and North Korea “remain, for now, far short of a military or political alliance.”
China’s axis with Russia and North Korea is now, at least at the moment, “far short of an actual military or political alliance that could impose its will on the Eurasian landmass, the world’s wealthiest and most populous region.”
One expert told the Journal that China, which has not fought a war in decades, is more interested in stability.
“China is very cautious about working with these two countries. Unlike what is depicted in the West as them being allies, China is not in the same camp. Its view of warfare and security issues is very different from [Russia and North Korea],” Tang Xiaoyang, chair of the department of international relations at Tsinghua University, told the newspaper.
Trade Troubles
There’s another indication that the Russia-China alliance isn’t quite as rock solid as it might appear.
As reported this week by Euromaidan Press, which cited Reuters, trade between China and Russia has plunged in recent months, with Russian imports from China dropping 17.8 percent, year over year, in the month of August. In addition, Chinese exports to Russia dropped 16.4 percent.
Reuters called it “the steepest monthly decline since Moscow began relying on Beijing as its economic lifeline after invading Ukraine.”
A Reuters story before the Beijing meeting stated that a goal of Putin’s for the visit was to reverse the declining trade trend.
“Ahead of the visit, officials on both sides are looking into ways to increase trade because the current numbers do not look good,” an unnamed “person involved in preparations for Putin’s trip” told Reuters.
Another Russian source noted just how important China has been as an ally.
“Without them, we would not have been able to make a single missile, let alone a drone, and the whole economy would have collapsed long ago,” the person told Reuters. “If they wanted it, the war would have been over long ago.”
And another Russian source accused China of not behaving like an ally.
Here Comes LNG
Meanwhile, per Bloomberg News, China “appears to be setting up a system to import regular cargoes of liquefied natural gas from a Russian project sanctioned by the US.” This was described by the report as a “test” for the Trump Administration on whether to punish China. China received its first cargo from the Arctic LNG 2 project in August, the Bloomberg report said, just before the Beijing summit, and will receive more shipments at the Beihai terminal in southern China.
“China’s first cargo from Arctic LNG 2 came ahead of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s meeting with his Chinese counterpart, and so was largely seen as a symbolic gesture,” Bloomberg News reported. “By continuing to accept deliveries, Beijing is sending a stronger signal and also threatening to get caught up in Washington’s efforts to pressure Moscow over the war in Ukraine.”
About the Author: Stephen Silver
Stephen Silver is an award-winning journalist, essayist, and film critic, and contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review, and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. For over a decade, Stephen has authored thousands of articles that focus on politics, national security, technology, and the economy. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) at @StephenSilver, and subscribe to his Substack newsletter.
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Jim
September 9, 2025 at 11:44 am
That’s right, it’s not an alliance.
But there is a commonality, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Let’s face it, there are many American voices who want to confront China, the same voices who welcomed the conflict in Ukraine as a way to weaken or fracture the Russian state (and welcome a war against Iran, too).
Trying to pry Russia and China apart is likely to be frustrated as long as both China and Russia think the U. S. is out to get them.
Is there a better way?
Controversial in many circles, but perhaps, the best way forward is actually counter-intuitive; have positive relations with both countries instead of trying to ‘break them up.”
There are frictions in almost any relationship between Great Powers, and potentially that’s also true regarding Russia and China.
Identifying points of friction between the two, such as this article reports on, is useful, as information and food for thought.
But how to effectively use such information?
Face it, as long as both see the U. S. as a threat, they will work together, but if both don’t see the U. S. as a threat, natural frictions between the two could become more pronounced and build over time.
We’re in a pickle, now that we’ve forced Russia and China together because of our foreign policy choices, it’s going to be tough to reverse the result of those policy blunders.
(Yes, blunders, as serious geopolitical analysts have warned for over a century not to have the “World Island,” Mackinder’s phrase and concept, coalesce into a meaningful, unified whole in world politics.)
Of course, those responsible for this historic debacle will deny it, and want to continue giving foreign policy advice… likely, more of the same: failed strategies of confrontation ad nauseam (it’s all they know).
That will only drive Russia and China closer together.
When digging a hole of trouble, the first rule: stop digging.
Can those wanting evermore confrontation learn this simple rule?
Swamplaw Yankee
September 9, 2025 at 5:33 pm
Hey, am I watching the new Yankee opera, Keyboarder on the Roof”? Must be the same star, the op-ed guy above.
Oh, my gosh, gee Golly: the guy is a lexicographer in hiding. The reader is asked to believe Farms with Olive trees in Israel operated by Farmers for centuries, vanish overnight and magic trailers appear on the farmers property. So, the allegation is that tsarling Putin does not have a real Alliance. Fine, that’s OK!
Military hardware shipped FREE of cost from Xi’s regime is killing Ukrainians daily. The PRC CCP has their HAN intelligence all over the line of Genocide. The Han want to know exactly how the Ukrainians respond to their latest revised “Killing of Ukrainians” hardware.
Perhaps the Dictionary definitions are radically different for each religion inside Israel. Xi’s CCP regime is blatantly 24/7 butchering Ukrainian families as if the Ukrainians were mystery humans living inside GAZA.
This op-ed agit prop keyboarder can call the ancient 1000 Genocide of Ukrainians by russkies whatever he wants. It’s like Israel, the same thing but the two religions speak different words about the same uprooted Olive trees.
The op-ed needs to speak about who exactly butchered the 20,000,000 Ukrainian kid + familes in 1932-33 in the biggest genocide, the HOLODOMOR , of the last 100 years.
Who moved into the homes and took over the farms without even wanting to know who the Ukrainians were that they butchered? Yes, the Grandchildren of those who killed to get FREE real estate now scream that it is their turn in 2025 to get FREE real estate from the left over Ukrainians that they did not kill in 1933.
The tragedy: The MAGA POTUS Trumpkins did zip in his first term! The new tragedy, “Keyboarder on the Roof” alludes that MAGA POTUS Trumpkins hands over Ukrainian real estate and “Lolita” packages to the established russkie Genocide Ethnics as if the world was back to 1933 again. -30-