US and Ukraine sign deal to create the Reconstruction Investment Fund — the long-awaited mineral deal that gives the US rights to Ukrainian rare earth.
I could be badly wrong, but I imagine if the Ukraine’s resources are significant, China might discuss things with Russia behind the scenes and push for the offensive to continue. Both China and Russia need to start cutting at U.S. access to resources if they want an advantageous position in the next 10-20 years.
This depends on the extent of the actual resources and Russia’s current military-industrial capacity, manpower, and morale, though; but keep in mind that, from the Russian perspective, Zelenskyy has just sold off Russian natural resources to the Americans. There’s a lot of reason to not allow it.
I don’t think China needs to puppet Russia here. If the US attempts to operationalize its resource rights in Ukraine, it will be deploying logistics, mercenaries, and security forces directly under US command. Some Ukrainian forces will continue their connection with ISIS and become stochastic threats in the region, requiring US military escalation. This will be just another way to field an active military on Russia’s most vulnerable border, and Russia cannot allow this, which was the whole reason for Russian aggression in Ukraine in the first place.
So without China at all, Russia has every incentive to prevent the US from landing extractives operations in Ukraine and may need to fight all the way to Kiev, which is incredibly risky for Russia. Based on that, it may actually be Russia asking China for support because it fears over extending itself.
So what, now more arms again? The impasse seemed like it was moving Ukraine closer to its eventual capitulation
Probably a treaty with Ukraine getting divided up
The US was fighting against that the entire time, and I think Russia is still open to negotiation
I could be badly wrong, but I imagine if the Ukraine’s resources are significant, China might discuss things with Russia behind the scenes and push for the offensive to continue. Both China and Russia need to start cutting at U.S. access to resources if they want an advantageous position in the next 10-20 years.
This depends on the extent of the actual resources and Russia’s current military-industrial capacity, manpower, and morale, though; but keep in mind that, from the Russian perspective, Zelenskyy has just sold off Russian natural resources to the Americans. There’s a lot of reason to not allow it.
I don’t think China needs to puppet Russia here. If the US attempts to operationalize its resource rights in Ukraine, it will be deploying logistics, mercenaries, and security forces directly under US command. Some Ukrainian forces will continue their connection with ISIS and become stochastic threats in the region, requiring US military escalation. This will be just another way to field an active military on Russia’s most vulnerable border, and Russia cannot allow this, which was the whole reason for Russian aggression in Ukraine in the first place.
So without China at all, Russia has every incentive to prevent the US from landing extractives operations in Ukraine and may need to fight all the way to Kiev, which is incredibly risky for Russia. Based on that, it may actually be Russia asking China for support because it fears over extending itself.