Kevin Rudd on the Decade of Living Dangerously | The Wire

Interview conducted by David Barboza.

Q: In the wake of the joint statement made by Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping in Beijing in February, followed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and what would appear to be Beijing’s tacit support of Putin, how should the world be thinking about China’s foreign policy at the moment? What is the China calculus, with regard to its relations with the U.S. and Russia?

There are several driving factors in the China calculus. One is structural, that is the Chinese deep calculus about the importance of the Russian Federation to their long-term strategic national interests. To break that down further, the Chinese say that under Deng [Xiaoping], “We had to pivot to America to deal with the Soviets. Now we don’t, because we have a benign relationship with Moscow. That’s good. Second, because we have a benign relationship with Moscow, we get to dedicate the bulk of our strategic energies to dealing with our principal regional and global adversary: the United States.” The third part of the calculus is that the Russians are useful around the world; that is, they’re an American distraction; they’re serious in the Middle East and in Europe, but they’re also a tag team operation with China in the UN Security Council, so right across the global policy agenda.

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