Russia Says Trump Win 'Useful,' China to 'Continue Respect'

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev posted an interesting note on Telegram around the time of Donald Trump’s speech claiming victory in the US election.

Now deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, Medvedev failed to congratulate the President-elect, noting the “bipartisan anti-Russian consensus on Capitol Hill” – but confirmed reports that Moscow sees Trump as a potential game-breaker who could help end its nearly three-war in Ukraine, according to a report by Newsweek.

“But Trump has one quality that is useful for us — as a businessman to the core, he hates spending money on … idiotic allies, stupid charity projects and voracious international organizations,” Medvedev said, suggesting that his remark refers to ‘global support for Ukraine’.

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Trump’s friendly ties with Putin are infamous. Nonetheless, it was a revealing remark, given Medvedev, who was president from 2008-2012, is better known for threatening Kyiv’s allies with nuclear strikes.

In June, when a new round of US Treasury sanctions caused trading on the Moscow Exchange to be suspended and the ruble to plunge, Medvedev called for Russian citizens to “inflict maximum harm” on Western societies.

“Every day we should try to do maximum harm to those countries that have imposed these restrictions. Harm their economies, their institutions and their rulers. Harm the well-being of their citizens, their confidence in the future,” Medvedev wrote on his official Telegram channel, which has over 1.3 million followers.

Critics had, by that stage, said Medvedev had become a “scaremonger, whose job is to deter Western action over Ukraine.”

Now, with a changing of the guard looming in Washington, Moscow appears to hope that Trump can force Kyiv into a deal to end the war.

Even so, Newsweek said Medvedev hinted that the path to peace could still face hurdles, with the Russian adding: “The question is how much Trump will be forced to give to the war — he’s stubborn, but the system is stronger.”

Putin is said to have congratulated Trump on his electoral victory through ‘mutual friends,’ Newsweek said in a separate report, which cited Russian news outlet Verstka. That clashed with the official Kremlin position “that Putin has not communicated with Trump,” Newsweek said.

China: Policy towards US will stay ‘consistent’

Meanwhile, China said on Wednesday it will work with the US on the basis of mutual respect, although strategists say Beijing is bracing for bitter superpower rivalry over trade, technology and security issues.

“Our policy towards the US is consistent,” foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a regular press conference in Beijing, when asked how Trump returning to the Oval Office would affect US-China relations.

“We will continue to view and handle China-US relations in accordance with the principles of mutual respect, peaceful co-existence and win-win cooperation,” she added.

Chinese strategists, however, told Reuters they expected more fiery rhetoric and potentially crippling tariffs from Trump, although some said his isolationist foreign policy could give Beijing a vacuum to expand its global influence.

“Beijing anticipated a close race in the US election. Although Trump’s victory is not China’s preferred outcome and raises concerns, it is not entirely unexpected,” Tong Zhao, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said.

“The Chinese leadership will likely strive to maintain an appearance of a cordial personal relationship with Trump, while intensifying efforts to project China’s power and strength.”

Trade, tariff threat worries Beijing

Trump has proposed tariffs on Chinese imports in excess of 60% and ending China’s most-favoured-nation trading status, and analysts say the prospect of a trade war has rattled China’s leadership.

China sells goods worth more than $400 billion annually to the US and hundreds of billions more in components for products Americans buy from elsewhere.

“Beijing is particularly wary of a potential revival of the trade war under Trump, especially as China currently faces significant internal economic challenges,” Zhao said.

“China also expects Trump to accelerate the decoupling of technologies and supply chains, a move that could threaten China’s economic growth and indirectly impact its social and political stability.”

In response, China is likely to intensify its push for greater technological and economic self-sufficiency, while feeling more pressure to bolster economic ties with countries like Russia, he added.

Da Wei, director of the Center for International Security and Strategy at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said Trump’s victory “may pose a relatively large challenge to Sino-US relations” based on his campaign policy proposals and actions in his previous term.

“Due to Trump’s high unpredictability, I think it is difficult for China to say that there is a fully formed plan to do “x” when Trump comes to power. It also depends on what policies the Trump administration implements.”

Beijing ‘considering trade-offs’

Brian Wong, assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong who studies grand strategy, said: “Going forward, Beijing would likely be drawing up a list of clear bargains and interest trade-offs that it could float with Washington, in hope that it can focus on its much needed domestic economic concerns whilst Trump’s attention is occupied elsewhere.”

China is likely to shore up ties with the Global South, Europe and Northeast Asian countries, given Trump’s “transactional, isolationist, anti-globalist and anti-multilateral foreign policy”, Wong said.

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached a rare rapprochement last month, while Beijing has tentatively reached out to the new Japanese administration this autumn following years of strained ties.

“China expects the second Trump administration to further disengage from international agreements and commitments, creating opportunities for China to expand its influence in emerging power vacuums,” Zhao added.

Trump has unnerved democratically governed Taiwan by saying it should pay Washington for its defence and that it had taken US semiconductor business.

“The Biden administration applied high-pressure tactics to China on Taiwan, with US troops stationed in Taiwan and even giving weapons to Taiwan … in a huge break with the former Trump administration’s Taiwan policy,” Shen Dingli, an international relations scholar in Shanghai, said.

Washington last month approved a US$2 billion arms sale to Taiwan.

“Trump is not too likely to give Taiwan the same support in future,” Shen said.