Prigozhin's uprising failed, but it triggered China's 'psychology about warlords,' top White House official says

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping in the Kremlin on March 21.

Xie Huanchi/Xinhua via Getty Images

• A brief, failed revolt by Russian mercenaries in June raised doubts about Putin's hold on power.
• It also worried officials in China, which has its own history with "warlords," a US official said.
• Experts say Putin's apparent vulnerability may lead China to temper its relations with Russia.

Yevgeny Prigozhin's uprising last month fizzled soon after it started, but it left doubts about Vladimir Putin's hold on power.

Putin and the military leaders who Prigozhin was targeting remain in place, but the incident stirred unpleasant memories in China, the biggest of Moscow's few remaining friends, according to Kurt Campbell, a deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for Indo-Pacific Affairs on the White House National Security Council.

"One of the big reasons they want to have a dialogue is to know what we think about Russia. They were unnerved by what happened two weekends ago in Moscow," Campbell said in an interview with The Wire China published on July 16, after several senior US officials visited China.

China is officially neutral on the war in Ukraine but has supported Russia in practice with expanded trade, frequent official visits, and continued military exercises. China presented a peace plan in April — shortly after President Xi Jinping visited Moscow — that was widely seen as vague and self-interested.

Wagner Group mercenaries are in Rostov-on-Don during a brief revolt on June 24.

REUTERS

There has been Chinese criticism of Russia's handling of the war, however, and the sight of mercenaries marching on Moscow struck a chord in Beijing, Campbell said.

"I don't need to tell you about the complex Chinese psychology about warlords. They have their own experiences of a warlord who got close to an emperor and basically toppled an existing order in China for 100 years. In Chinese councils of power, this has been deeply unnerving," Campbell said, referring to the An Lushan Rebellion, led by a general in 755.

Campbell said US officials have tried to convey to China that Russia's "horribly implemented war" is to blame for challenges like global inflation and increased refugee flows. China's "most important role, as really Russia's sole remaining partner and friend, is to encourage them to come to the realization that time is not on their side," Campbell said.

"We've tried to communicate directly with China, that they should use their good offices quietly to get Russia to reevaluate and to withdraw and to seek a peaceful solution," but US discussions with China are plagued by "substantial distrust," Campbell added.

China and Russia, post-Putin

Putin addresses security personnel at the Kremlin on June 27.

SERGEI GUNEYEV/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images

China's official response to Prigozhin's uprising was muted. A terse Foreign Ministry statement on June 25 called it "Russia's internal affair" and said China "supports Russia in maintaining national stability," and Chinese Communist Party tabloid Global Times accused Western media of trying to use the uprising to undermine Sino-Russia relations.

But China Daily, a newspaper owned by the Chinese Communist Party's Central Propaganda Department, quoted two experts expressing concern: "The conflict between mercenaries and the Russian army is only the tip of the iceberg about the inherent contradictions in Russian society," said Yu Sui, a professor at the China Center for Contemporary World Studies.

That commentary "may be a subtle way for Beijing to suggest to Moscow it needs to get its house in order" and to remind the world that they are not in lockstep on all issues, Joseph Torigian, an expert on China and Russia at American University, told The Conversation in June.

China's government likely still sees Putin as their preferred partner, Torigian said. Putin and Xi have been a driving force behind the strengthening of Sino-Russian relations over the past 15 years. Both want to revise the international order led by the US, which they see as trying to contain their countries.

Xi also still needs Putin, as Russia is the the only country that can meaningfully aid China "in diluting the role of human rights and democratic governance in the international system," Ryan Haas, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, wrote in The New York Times this month.

Putin and Xi leave a reception at the Kremlin on March 21.

PAVEL BYRKIN/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images

Beijing needs good relations with Moscow to keep their long border stable and to access Russian food and energy exports and military expertise, but Prigozhin's rebellion may lead Xi "to rebalance his foreign policy to account for Mr. Putin's vulnerabilities," added Haas, who was the National Security Council's China director during the Obama administration.

"Both sides can be expected to maintain the appearance of business as usual. But Mr. Xi has little to gain from doubling down on Mr. Putin, whose troubles are not helpful for China's grand plans," Haas wrote.

Putin's vulnerabilities may invite future challenges, other experts have said, and his downfall would likely lead to instability in Russia — a concern for China and the West — and usher in leaders with more extreme views and who may feel differently about China, according to Mark Galeotti, an expert on Russian security affairs and author of "Putin's Wars," which details how Putin rebuilt Russia's military.

China is "a fault-line issue within the Russian elite," with some, including members of the intelligence services, increasingly wary of their powerful neighbor, Galeotti told Insider in April.

"For the next political generation waiting in the wings — the 50-somethings, the early 60-something-year-olds — they have a different perspective" from Putin and those around him, a group in its late 60s and early 70s, Galeotti said. "They are a lot more worried about China. They're a lot more concerned about the risks of just falling into China's orbit, and I think that's going to be one of the crucial political debates in the post-Putin era, whenever that happens."

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