Russia and China make a show of force with joint military exercises during the cover of the Quad in Japan
If Donald Trump took any trophy in foreign policy, it was the Abraham Accords. With them, the son-in-law of the president, Jared Kushner, brought about the normalization of relations between Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Morocco with Israel. If Trump had achieved a second term, they said at the time in the White House, he would have signed up to include Saudi Arabia in those agreements, an inheritance that Joe Biden has received.
His government is secretly negotiating the deal that could give him a bit of foreign policy, an aspect of his mandate that, despite all the experience he brought as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was fatally damaged by the chaotic exit from Afghanistan. Biden also tried for months to prevent a Russian invasion of Ukraine and convince China to condemn Putin’s “special operation,” but to no avail. Everything indicates that the president, who had already known Xi Jinping since he was Secretary General of the Chinese Communist Party, underestimated the friendship that he had forged with Putin. If anything, the Ukraine war has brought them closer.
In these three months, both countries have accelerated the signing of agreements that will allow Moscow to sell its crude oil in Asia and even build a gas pipeline to replace the European market. As if that were not enough, coinciding with Biden’s visit to Japan, Russia and China have initiated joint military maneuvers for the first time since the invasion of Ukraine in what appears to be a test of strength. The day before, Biden had also sent them his own message, ratifying that the US is prepared to defend Taiwan militarily in the event that China threatens its precarious sovereignty. However, it is not plausible to believe that it was a response to his statement, since military exercises of this caliber require a lot of planning.
South Korea, which saw two Chinese and four Russian military planes dangerously approaching its airspace, even dispatched fighters to respond and launched “emergency tactical measures.” Japan also sent its fighters to watch them while its prime minister received the heads of state of the US, India and Australia for the Quad summit. The episode seemed to be taken from the Russian manual, which in kyiv received the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres, with the impact of two missiles, and invaded Ukraine during a meeting of the Security Council. “The fact that this activity occurred in the middle of a Quad summit is considered much more provocative than previous maneuvers,” Japanese Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi interpreted. “When the international community is responding to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and China is acting with the aggressor, we cannot help but be concerned and should not ignore it,” he added.
Washington had prepared to respond to a North Korean missile test that would force it to put that country on the agenda, but it was China that chose to speak with a show of force.
Biden wants to show that Ukraine has not made him lose focus on other international needs. The White House is preparing another trip to Saudi Arabia for the end of June, but would like to be able to announce earlier the achievement of normalizing relations between that country and Egypt with Israel, Axios published on Tuesday. At the moment, two uninhabited islands, Tiran and Sanafir, are blocking the agreement. Israel invaded them twice in 1956 and 1967 to protect the naval passage but returned them both times to Egypt, after arduous negotiations, since Saudi Arabia did not have a naval fleet to protect them until 1960. Since 1988, Riyadh has asked for their return. In 2016, he had the support of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, who ran into the objection of his country’s courts.
An intermediate option would be the deployment of a multinational force, which Israel opposes. The Hebrew government also demands as part of the deal the establishment of direct flights between Saudi Arabia and Israel, always according to Axios. Saudi Arabia, for its part, wants Washington to give it free passage in Yemen and forget forever the murder of Washington journalist Jamal Khashoggi, before presenting Biden with such a political achievement and receiving him as a guest. The US president hopes that Saudi Arabia will help him stabilize the oil market, so the confluence of interests is a complex diplomatic puzzle that still has to be squared.
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