By Deniz Benli

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is horrible. On 24th February 2022, Russian troops marched into the country. But could it have been a decoy? Russia has been slowly but surely invading Georgia under the cover that it is ‘supporting independence movements in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Meanwhile, Russia is drawing ever closer to Belarus, thus threatening Poland, Finland, and the Baltic states. It is becoming increasingly possible that Putin is planning a Soviet reunion. He wants to live in a world where the USSR won the Cold War and the USA collapsed. He wants to live in a world where the British and French are weak. He wants to live in a world where the Warsaw Pact reigns supreme and NATO is a word of the past.

But this world is the opposite of what he wants: capitalist domination, a Western dream. Russia has few allies in this war, the biggest being China, the growing East Asian country that has dreams also of destroying the West and dismantling the Quad pact in East Asia (USA, Australia, South Korea, and Japan). But China has one more dream, one more wish. And that is regaining the lost lands of Outer Manchuria.

The Russians have owned Outer Manchuria since 1850, due to a treaty that ceded much of Qing Manchuria to the vast Russian Empire. Even after the Soviets collapsed, Outer Manchuria was never ceded to China, as the Russians refused to lose their largest Siberian city, Vladivostok.

Russia has refused to give away even the smallest islands on the river, as a territorial dispute still remains.

But China has its own problems to fight a war far away in Europe. Tibet, Xinjiang, Taiwan, Manchuria, Hong Kong, and Taipei are all pushing for their independence; China cannot afford to fight in Europe or North America, with strain from major NATO allies in the Pacific region and India. China cannot juggle fighting Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and India while also putting down rebellions and aiding Russia at the same time. This leaves Russia almost on its own apart from one or two minor allies. A war with NATO may capsize Russia and possibly lead to an eventual collapse of all the West’s enemies.