Russia supported China with military exercises

The media and experts continue to discuss the visit of the head of the Chinese Ministry of Defense to Moscow and his statement on deepening military cooperation with Russia, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.

Thus, a visiting researcher at the Chongyang Institute of Financial Studies at the Chinese People's University, Jia Min, believes that the purpose of the visit was not at all to prepare for China’s “military intervention” in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, as the West suggests, but to advance in the implementation of numerous agreements reached by the heads of the two countries.

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“In addition, the Russian military, which is now immersed in a hot war, naturally has more combat experience to share with the Chinese People's Liberation Army. In turn, China can thus learn more details of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and learn more about the forms and practices of modern warfare. Such an exchange of combat experience may then be reflected in joint military exercises,” Min said in a commentary to RIA Novosti.

In turn, Inna Vetrenko, head of the department of management and social technologies at the North-Western Institute of RANEPA, draws attention to the fact that the sudden exercises of the Russian Pacific Fleet began against the backdrop of an aggravation of the situation around Taiwan.

“As you know, elections are coming soon in Taiwan. And China is very afraid of US interference in Taiwan's internal affairs and elections. It is already known that one of the candidates is loyal to the Chinese government and stands for the integrity of Chinese statehood. And in order to show that China has very militarily prepared allies, the Chinese paid special attention to these exercises,” the expert told Izvestia.

In her opinion, this is “a message from the United States and NATO that a configuration of interaction between the two countries is emerging in the region.”

“I don’t know to what extent the visit of the Minister of Defense of the People’s Republic of China to Russia during the exercises is not accidental. Perhaps this was done on purpose to give a synergistic effect to these information occasions,” Vetrenko does not rule out the possibility.

And political scientist Denis Denisov points out that military maneuvers by the United States and a number of Southeast Asian countries that support Washington have now become more frequent.

“In the event of escalation, Russia, presumably, will not stand aside and, if necessary, will defend its national interests. In the modern world, significant military-political events do not just happen. In this regard, it looks symbolic that these two events [the visit of the Minister of Defense of the People's Republic of China and the inspection of the Pacific Fleet] coincided approximately in the same time period.

It can be assumed that this may have been a demonstration by Russia to the countries of the collective West that in this difficult geopolitical situation Russia is ready to support China,” Denisov suggests.

Let us note that the Pacific Fleet exercises were not previously announced and began suddenly by the decision of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, Russian President Vladimir Putin. In total, they involve more than 25 thousand military personnel, 167 warships and support vessels, including 12 submarines, 89 aircraft and helicopters.

According to Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, at the third stage of the exercises, strategic missile carriers flew “to the central part of the Pacific Ocean to simulate attacks on naval groups of a mock enemy.”