US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has spent the last several days in Asia explaining the US strategic pivot to the Pacific and dismissing concerns that the decision was driven by a US desire to contain rapidly expanding Chinese influence in the region.  Simultaneously, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been in Beijing meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao to reaffirm the two nations’ commitment to strengthening relations.

The meeting in Beijing is the latest indicator of increased cooperation between the eastern powers.  The neighbors share borders, a Communist inheritance, and a strategic interest in rebuffing US influence in the global arena.  Russia is the world’s largest energy supplier and China, the largest consumer.  Trade between the two nations has risen 40% annually for two years now and is on target to hit the US$100 billion mark well before a projected 2015 timeframe.

Despite a united front in external relations and seemingly cozy economic relationship, there is evidence Russia is growing increasingly uncomfortable with its neighbor due to issues that lie closer to home.  Over the past several years, Russia has occasionally shown concern for the expansion of Chinese influence.  The upcoming Asia-Pacific APEC summit to be held in Vladivostok this September has renewed Moscow’s focus on the issue, this time with a greater sense of urgency.

Chinese presence in Siberia has Russian officials concerned that the country’s Far East is “becoming an appendage to China’s growing industry.”  Between 2010 and 2011, Chinese investments topped US$3 billion in Russia’s east where local economies are coping with a massive influx of Chinese migrants resulting from an immense demographic disparity along the shared border.  Additionally, Russia’s waning influence in Central Asia has resulted in China emerging as a regional power player.  Russia’s attitude towards Beijing has recently led the nation to strengthen the borders it shares with China, form a state-owned enterprise to exploit domestic natural resources in the east, and create a new Ministry for Far East Development.

That Russia has so recently indicated mistrust toward Beijing is intriguing in the context of the US’ contentious relations with the Kremlin.  The purpose of the US pivot to Asia is widely believed to be a thinly veiled move to keep check on or curtail Chinese influence in Asia, a perception the US has refuted.  If Russian concern for China’s expanding influence proved significant, the US could potentially exploit this apprehension to aid its own efforts in containing China.

This possibility, however, seems unlikely given the current state of relations between the two nations: there are more external interests binding Moscow and Beijing to each other than there are bilateral issues driving them apart.  The nations have remained united in opposition to further international involvement in the Syrian crisis as well as intervention in the Iranian nuclear standoff, and have partnered against any plans for US missile defense systems.  The opportunity to fight what both Russia and China perceive to be a US attempt at projecting power is far too attractive for either nation to cave to bilateral misgivings.

This is not to say that things cannot change.  The situations in Syria and Iran are rapidly evolving, and fallout from Secretary Panetta’s Asian tour has yet to be seen.  Does this mean there is still a chance for a US-Russia partnership to contain Chinese influence in the near future?  Don’t count on it.

For more details on what the US can learn from the Beijing meeting, check out my colleague Zachary Miller’s post, “What can the U.S. learn from Putin’s trip to China?”

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