If we didn’t know any better, we might flip through the newspaper and conclude that the international order the United States helped construct after World War II was coming apart. We might also be led to believe that four countries, China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, are not only contributing to its demise but also forming an alliance to destroy the so-called rules-based order that senior U.S. officials crow about.
Since the war in Ukraine erupted in February 2022, U.S. foreign policy experts have used the word “axis” to describe the blossoming relationships among Beijing, Moscow, Tehran and Pyongyang. Some refer to the bloc as an “axis of upheaval”; and others frame it as an “axis of revisionist powers” or the wordier “axis of growing malign partnerships.” Even the phrase the “axis of evil,” which President George W. Bush famously cited during his 2002 State of the Union address, is reappearing in popular discourse.
But is any of it true? Is this “axis” framing correct? Or is the U.S. dealing with a collection of adversarial states whose interests at the moment are temporarily aligned?
Yes, cooperation among China, Russia, Iran and North Korea is in fact happening. They may be very different countries with different languages, cultures and history, but all four view the United States as a hostile adversary. The U.S. has sanctioned Iran and North Korea to the hilt, and the sanctions have grown only stronger over the last few years. China sees the U.S. as its primary competitor and a country seeking to corral allies to contain Chinese power and development. Russia, of course, has even bigger gripes; were it not for more than $60 billion in U.S. military aid, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s troops would likely be in a more advantageous position in Ukraine than they are today.
But we shouldn’t overstate the similarities and ignore the nuances. What the U.S. and its allies are confronting is less an “axis,” per se, than a temporary alignment that is shallower than it appears.
Take the Russia-North Korea relationship, which is making news at the moment. According to officials from the U.S., South Korea and Ukraine, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un deployed approximately 12,000 of his troops to Russia, where they are undergoing training before being sent to the Kursk region to fight off the ongoing Ukrainian offensive. On the surface, this looks like a big deal: One country, North Korea, is putting its citizens in harm’s way on behalf of another, Russia. The deployment comes four months after Kim and Putin signed a comprehensive partnership agreement that binds both to come to each other’s defense if either one is attacked or invaded.
Even this dramatic development, however, is driven by pragmatism. Kim isn’t lending thousands of North Koreans to Russia out of the goodness of his heart or because he buys the Kremlin narrative that Ukraine is an artificial creation. He’s doing it because, presumably, Russia will pay North Korea back down the line. Indeed, Pyongyang appears to be getting some returns on its investment in the form of desperately needed food aid, energy assistance, support at the United Nations Security Council and transfers of military technology that could improve Pyongyang’s satellite program. For example, Russia killed off an extension of a U.N. panel monitoring North Korea sanctions in the spring.
The cost-benefit ratio is in North Korea’s favor at the moment.
What about ties between China and Russia? Even before the war in Ukraine, relations between these two former antagonists were improving quite well. The Russian and Chinese delegations have frequently teamed up at the Security Council to stonewall or block U.S. initiatives. The Russian and Chinese militaries are exercising with each other more regularly and even poking the U.S. in the eye on occasion — in July, the U.S. Air Force intercepted a few Russian and Chinese bomber aircraft operating in Alaska’s Air Defense Identification Zone. Of most concern to President Joe Biden’s administration, China continues to serve as a lifeline for the Russian economy and the Russian war effort, with Beijing receiving discounted oil from Moscow and exporting dual-use items, such as microchips, that could be reapplied to military systems.
But even the strategic partnership between Beijing and Moscow has its limits, notwithstanding what Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Putin may assert otherwise. While there’s no question that Russia would be in far worse shape were it not for China’s support — Secretary of State Antony Blinken said as much in April — Beijing is careful not to throw all its eggs in its Russian basket.
The last thing Xi wants to do at a time when the Chinese economy is starting to slow down is jeopardize relations with the West, which remains China’s major trading partner. Russia, whose own trade with China reached a record $240 billion last year, simply can’t compete with markets in the United States and the European Union.
Geopolitically, China likely isn’t particularly happy with Russia’s closer relationship with North Korea. Beijing is used to being the predominant external powerbroker with respect to the North and aims first and foremost to maintain balance and stability on the Korean Peninsula. One can’t say the same thing about Russia, whose appetite for risk is higher now than it was. With the war in Ukraine churning on, more U.S. focus on East Asia works for Russia. Not so with China.
International politics are too complicated for neat binaries.
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Daniel DePetris is a fellow at Defense Priorities and a foreign affairs columnist for the Chicago Tribune.
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