New Cold Wars: China's Rise, Russia's Invasion, and America's Struggle to Defend the West

by David E. Sanger

The third risk is that, through some combination of America’s overheated rhetoric and its enthusiasm for new sanctions, America and its allies unintentionally drive Russia and China closer together. Washington already has a severe case of anti-China animus, bordering on unchecked xenophobia. As elections approach, there is no easier political target than the Chinese Communist Party. At the end of 2023, there was talk among some in Congress that the combination of Russia and China, along with Iran, constituted an “axis of evil” that America needed to “deal with.” (It was never made clear what “deal with” meant, exactly.) What’s missing in that overheated debate is discussion of a real strategy for driving a wedge in the emerging partnership between Beijing and Moscow. That will require a combination of cunning and diplomatic nuance: an updated and improved version of what Kissinger and Nixon pulled off half a century ago by focusing American diplomatic efforts to exploit existing differences and natural tensions between the two nations.