Putin’s Ukraine Folly Is A “Canary In The Coal Mine” For Xi And China

As I wrote yesterday, you can tell that China is royally pissed at the US for floating the story about Putin Asking China for military assistance, whether he actually did or not. Because it puts China in the middle of a bright spotlight that they’d really rather stay out of.

And you can tell he’s pissed because today he had his Foreign Minister making an extended comment clarifying China’s position on Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. He denied that Russia had even asked for military aid, China was not considering it, and condemned the Russian of Ukraine.

But then he went where nobody else was even looking, much less going. He strongly insisted that there was no resemblance between Ukraine and Taiwan. He pointed out that the Ukraine has been a sovereign country since the 1990’s, then went on to explain that China does not recognize the sovereignty of Taiwan. They consider it a breakaway province. Gee, where have I heard that breakaway province bullshit before? Umm, maybe Putin talking about Ukraine?

But if the Chinese Foreign Minister went to the extent of even mentioning Taiwan when nobody else was even thinking about it, then you know sure as shit that Xi Jinping is thinking about it. Because that statement came from him. And as I wrote yesterday, when the Chinese plan, they don’t plan in years, they plan in decades. And if Xi is thinking about Taiwan in terms of decades, then he may be thinking that he may well already be competing in the international-dirt-surfing-competition before China re-integrates Taiwan, if ever.

Here’s why. Ukraine and Taiwan are not as different as you think. True, Taiwan is not a NATO member, hell, they’re not even in the same hemisphere. But you know what? Neither is Ukraine! And that hasn’t stopped the US from bucking up NATO into forcefully supporting Ukraine, and instituting punishing sanctions against Putin and Russia. But let’s step back and simplify things for a minute.

Stop thinking of it as NATO. After all, exactly what is NATO? It is an organization of some 30 European nations that have banded together for collective security. But they are still independent nations, with individual leaders and individual governments. And because Ukraine is not a member of NATO, each independent government had to vote to go along with the sanctions. And they did.

But now step outside of NATO for a moment. Putin’s war atrocity has re-energized and refocused western style democracies worldwide in a way nothing else could. Countries with absolutely nothing to do with NATO, such as Australia, Japan, South Korea, South Africa, Monaco, and even Switzerland have decided to join in on the sanctions. Switzerland especially hurts, since they have frozen Russian, Putin, and oligarch funds in their banks. And more than 130 US based companies have closed down their operations in Russia, denying goods and services everyday Russian citizens have become used to.

And so Riddler, riddle me this? Why should Taiwan be any different from Ukraine? Western democracies are resurgent, and they’re sick and tired of tinpot dictators stepping all over everybody else. If China made an aggressive move on Taiwan, what would stop the US and even the UN from rallying the world to the same crippling sanctions that are tearing into the Russian economy, leaving their stock market apparently permanently shuttered for the duration of the war.

And the simple fact is that China can’t afford the kind of crippling sanctions that Russia is under. Both their domestic economy as well as their GDP took a bloodletting with the Covid crisis they unleashed. From everything I’ve been able to read and hear, the Chinese economy is entering a contraction. Which is not good. A set of punishing sanctions could send the Chinese economy into at least a recession, if not ionto a full blown depression. Stick that in your ten year pipe and smoke it, Xi. And try not to cough.

So there you have it. Putin’s ill advised little farago into Ukraine turned out to be much more than he had anticipated. How many times have I written about the law of unintended consequences? Putin’s war atrocity re-energized the western democracies to get off of the mat and fight for what they value. And so far, they’ve been incredibly successful. And in doing so, they may have just bought Taiwan more peace of mind and security than they’ve known in a long time. Don’t touch that dial.