By: Dr. Jumma Marri Baloch

“China Wants Russia to Calm India and Save CPEC”… This news shook up my brain. What games is Dragon playing in? Let’s try to see China’s real position in this party.

Russia China Gas deal

As we all know that Russia and China signed a historic May 21st 2015 gas agreement, the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the country’s largest integrated energy company, and Russian energy giant Gazprom, which controls Russia’s export gas pipelines, signed a thirty-year, $400 billion deal that will see as much as thirty-eight billion cubic meters (bcm) of Russian gas to China annually from around 2018 to 2047. Gazprom will send gas pumped from its Kovyktin and Chayandin fields in eastern Siberia to the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei metropolitan area in the north of China and the Yangtze River Delta in the east. The deliveries, which may take a few years to reach full capacity, will provide China with more than one-fifth of its present-day annual consumption of some one hundred and seventy bcm, although Chinese demand for natural gas is expected to rise above two hundred bcm by then.

The Russian government, which relies on oil and gas revenue to generate rents to pay key domestic and foreign stakeholders as well as for general public services, has been eager to send more gas and oil to Asia. Despite the West’s reaction to events in Ukraine, Russia continues as a major energy player in Europe, which accounts for seventy percent of its exports.

Many of Russia’s new and untapped hydrocarbon fields are situated in eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East, closer to China than the older fields that now provide energy primarily to consumers in Russia and Europe. Their proximity means that Russian oil and gas can directly enter Chinese territory without having to pass through international waters or third-party countries. China already derives large quantities of oil and gas from its recently built energy pipelines with Central Asia, but Chinese analysts question the stability of these suppliers given the upheavals in other Muslim countries and the vulnerability of Central Asia to adverse developments in Afghanistan.

Chinese energy managers want to obtain Russian oil and gas but will continue to strive to limit their dependence on any single external energy source. Policymakers in Beijing do not consider Russia a reliable long-term energy supplier. For its part, Russia has sought to limit its dependence on China by developing energy ties with other Asian consumers, although so far with limited success. Russia’s sole major energy deal with Japan has been that with Osaka Gas, which agreed to purchase liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Russia’s Sakhalin Energy company.

Neighbors' confrontation

China is a giant sleeping dragon getting stronger on Russian expense to fight the Russian Bear tomorrow. Here are few historical evidences that China is not Russian friend but low laying enemy.

There has been an intense competition between the two nations in their border regions for decades; a competition which led to military confrontation between the two countries along the Ussuri River. In May 1962 60,000 ethnic Uighurs (the same people who are today blowing up Chinese cities in the West and killing Han Chinese), crossed from China’s Xinjiang Province into the Soviet Union where they received assistance and materiel to liberate their homeland from Chinese occupation.

Chinese grievances over the stripping and annexing of Chinese land by the Russian and Soviet states since the late 1890s from the weak Qing Dynasty. This included the land in the Pamir Mountains and the territory of Tajikistan. In addition the Treaty of Beijing in 1900 had stripped away Outer Mongolia from China and drawn the riverine boundaries of the Argun, the Amur and the Ussuri Rivers so that the Chinese only controlled their own banks of these rivers.

On the Eastern Front, in March 1969, the Chinese PLA suddenly attacked the Soviet border guards on Zenbao Island, killing 59 soldiers. After about two weeks the Soviet troops forced the Chinese off the island. In August 1969 there were further incidents - this time in the West, in Xinjiang. There, after a few scuffles, the Soviets crossed the border and killed around 30 Chinese soldiers in Tieleketi. The Soviet presence on the
Chinese border was impressive, with 25 divisions, 1,200 aeroplanes, and 120
medium-range missiles.

Negotiations were resumed in 1991 and a partial treaty signed on May 29, 1994. This was completed in November 1997 at a summit meeting in Beijing where Boris Yeltsin and Jiang Zemin agreed a treaty establishing the border between the two countries. Finally, in October 2004 the two nations signed a Complementary Agreement returning some territory to China. This was confirmed at a meeting of the two nations 2008.

This current period of peace does not mean that much of the centuries-long hostility between the Russians and the Chinese have disappeared. Russia has a very serious problem with China. There are too few Russians in the regions of Khabarovsk and Primorsky Krai to match the Chinese. Russia is being depopulated at a prodigious rate with many of those who lived in Siberia and the Russian East (Far East) moving west to the cities across the Urals. When the Cold War ended, the Soviet Union had a total population of nearly 290 million; two decades later, Russia's population is
about 145 million and falling. There are not enough Russians to conduct the
business that will need to be done on a project as vast as the extraction of oil, the building of a pipeline and the establishment of roads and infrastructure in that region. Even the Russians admit that this work will be performed by Chinese labourers.

The politicians may think it makes sense to shift their focus to China but the
Russian military has no such compulsions. It is difficult to believe that the Russians of Siberia and the Far East are worried more about NATO (6,000 miles away) than they worry about the Chinese with billions of people a quarter of a mile away across the Amur and the Ussuri Rivers.

This new partnership is not a partnership of equals and no amount of pretending by the
Russians will make it so. It is not a flawed partnership but a partnership with a senior and a junior partner – not a position which enhances or guarantees, Russia’s security or prosperity?

China is a hanging dagger over Russian throat

In Asia Russia see China as major growing regional and global threat to Russian interests and sphere of influences especially in former ex-Soviet central Asian states that border with China, keeping an eye on China and containing and balancing the United States is one of the key missions of Russian foreign policy around the world. This stems in large part from Russian leaders’ belief that Russia can be a global power only by limiting the influence of the United States. At the same time, despite the currently positive relations with China, Russian leaders remain concerned about China’s increase in power and long-term intentions, particularly given China’s efforts to develop the Silk Road project. They worry that China could replace Russia as the dominant power in Eurasian landscapes leaving Russia marginalized. For this reason, despite ongoing tension with the United States, Russian leaders are not averse to having the United States work to constrain Chinese ambitions in Asia and around the world. Russian sees CPEC “China Pakistan economical corridor” as major threat than an economical opportunity. On the whole, Russian objectives in Asia are preventative in nature: containing the United States and China, maintaining Russian influence in the region, and eroding US-led alliances without destabilizing the region, all while staying out of local conflicts.

Not with tanks, but with suitcases

The Chinese are invading Russia — not with tanks, but with suitcases. Chinese promised to caputure the world without firing a single bullet.

Alexander Shaikin, in charge of controlling the Russian-Chinese border, said on June 29 that 1.5 million people from China have illegally entered the Russian Far East over the past 18 months.

It’s impossible to know the exact level of Chinese migration into the Russian Far East. Russia has not run a census in over a decade. The Russian Federal Migration Service fears a flood. The service has repeatedly warned that the Chinese could become the dominant ethnic group in the Russian Far East in 20 to 30 years. An annual influx of Chinese is about 250,000 to 300,000 Chinese, less than one-third the rate that Shaikin currently claims.

China has more than 1.5 billion people — more than 10 times Russia’s population. Only 7.4 million Russians populate the entire Russian Far East, versus more than 90 million in northeast China. The Russian Far East is comparatively empty, with only 1.3 people per kilometer. China’s Manchurian population has increased 15 percent in a little more than a decade.

Any kind of Chinese expansion into the region will eventually bring about a question: What is Beijing’s claim there? Most of the border region — an area roughly the size of Iran — used to be Chinese. Russia took the territory in 1858 and 1860 with the Treaties of Aigun and Peking, respectively. Of all of the unequal treaties forced upon the Qing dynasty by outside powers in the 19th century, these are the only two China has not managed to overcome. China and Russia signed a border agreement in 1999, but the Beijing government has never formally accepted the Aigun and Peking treaties.

Resources and Valuable Ports

China dreams to own the Russian Far East that holds resources that are valuable to an ever-growing China. The region is rich in natural resources such as oil, gas and timber. The size of the Russian work force is shrinking as the country grows older. China’s young — and growing — population is more than able to fill the gap and exploit these resources.

But there is no reason to believe that, over time, Moscow will simply let the region slip from its grasp. The territory at stake includes all of Russia’s access to the Pacific Ocean. Vladivostok is Russia’s only warm-water Pacific port. Nikolayevsk, at the mouth of the Amur River, processes most of Siberia’s remaining exports. Both are well within former Chinese territory.

In one of its rare public objections, China made clear in 2010 it had little use for a western line, far from its key markets and industrial base. "China gets gas along several western pipelines already, including gas pipelines from Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan," said Zhang Guobao, vice chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission, according to Interfax. "Therefore, an increase in gas deliveries to Xinjiang is not so important."

Although Beijing keeps its own counsel, resentment and distrust are likely to be rising over Russia's tactics, despite the handshakes and high-profile events. Diversification of energy supply and markets may be in the long-term strategic interests of both China and Russia, however, medium-term economic hurdles are challenging and not easily masked by political theatre. In time, the two sides can yet succeed in significant energy connections, which could ultimately include greater Chinese equity participation in Russian oil and gas production. Meanwhile, the price of oil, followed by gas, has fallen steeply and Russian country risk has gone up. China need not hurry.

 CPEC - real threat to Russian gas interests

After having said all the above let us have an analyses of the CPEC on Russia China gas deal, after completion of CPEC China will have direction access to Giant Iranian and Qatari gas fields which are very close to Gwadar port from China giant pipelines will suck  gas to China, the distance is three times less compared to Russian which is more than 4500kms where as from Gwadar to Chinese terminals only 1400kms economically highly viable and cheap route with smooth climate 365 days per years except few places in Himalayan mountains.

Russian gas prices will be much higher due to distance, production and maintenance costs, under sanctions for many years cash striped Iran will sell her gas very cheap in order to get market share for her energy exports, Syrian war has broken the Qatari dreams to sell her gas to Europe, will egarely join the CPEC to sell her vast Ocean of gas to China.

CPEC branches are crossing the Balochistan Sibi Punjab road this road Pakistani army has built on priority bases since it passing Balochistan’s Marri area’s largest gas and Oil reservs, Gas and Oil deposits which are estimated back in 1974 by US oil and gas companies estimated gas 23 trillion cubic foots and oil 600 billion barrels Pakistan is ready to give these reserves to China on cheapest possible prices to remain protected by China.

China and Pakistan are very dangerous threat to the Russian interests in central Asia where China has already made serious gains both geopolitical and economical and pushing its own culture and pressing Russian language out from the region. Pakistan with its Pan Islamic agenda is the sword of Damocles for entire Eurasian region. No doubts Pakistan still harbors ‘large numbers of Chechens’ and other central Asian rebels. Together China and Pakistan are formidable existential danger to Russian federation and world security, Russian leaders and think thanks are aware of their encroachments but due to recent incidents in Ukraine and western unreasonable attitude at Russia, while western threats to Russia are political where as Chinese and Pakistani are geopolitical and economical and Russian territorial intergarity, western wrong polices have forced Russia to get closer with most dangerous Asian dragon. Chinese will black mail Russian gas prices once the CPEC becomes operational.

Its in prime interests of Russia – Afghanistan – India and western countries to play their active role to stop this new eastern expansion of China using occupied Balochistan as her permanent military and economical base to loot Baloch and regional resources and use her military might to subjugate the small and divided countries…another imperialism after Bristish empire is emerging with no human value simple one party communist rule…