Putin’s Shame: Russia Is Becoming China’s Junior Partner

Russian President Vladimir Putin professes not to care about being ejected—temporarily, at least—from the Group of Eight community over his country’s seizure of Crimea. He says Russia has plenty of other friends in the world. One of them is China, the world’s emerging Communist superpower. Diplomatic and trade relations between Russia and China have strengthened notably over the last couple of decades. Bloomberg News reports today that the “Crimean crisis is poised to reshape the politics of oil by accelerating Russia’s drive to send more barrels to China, leaving Europe with pricier imports and boosting U.S. dependence on fuel from the Middle East.”

Notice, though, that what Russia is selling to China is oil—not, say, high-tech machinery. In what must be a source of great embarrassment to Putin, Russia has gone from being China’s tutor and guide to being a junior partner whose main value is as a source for raw materials. Look at these two charts, which I put together today using data from the United Nations’ Comtrade database.