Russian Policy towards China and Japan

The El'tsin and Putin Periods

Natasha Kuhrt

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2007
• Print ISBN: 9780415674881
• eBook ISBN: 9781134403516
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Diplomacy & Treaties
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Drawing on the most up-to-date sources, this book provides an in-depth examination of Russia's relations with China and Japan, the two Asia-Pacific superpowers-in-waiting. For Russia there has always been more than one 'Asia': after the collapse of the Soviet Union, there were those in the Russian elite who saw Asia as implying the economic dynamism of the Asia-Pacific, with Japan as the main player. However there were others who saw the chance for Russia to reassert its claim to be a great power, based on Russia's geopolitical and geoeconomic position as a Eurasian power. For these, China was the power to engage with: together China and Russia could control both Heartland and Rim, both Eurasia and Asia-Pacific, whereas accepting Japan's conception of Asia implied regional fragmentation and shared sovereignty. This book argues that this strand of thinking, mainly confined to nationalists in the El'tsin years, has now, under Putin, become the dominant discourse among Russian policymakers. Despite opportunities for convergence presented by energy resources, even for trilateral cooperation, traditional anxiety regarding loss of control over key resource areas in the Russian Far East is now used to inform regional policy, leading to a new resource nationalism. In light of Russia's new assertiveness in global affairs and its increasing use of the so-called 'energy weapon' in foreign policy, this book will appeal not only to specialists on Russian politics and foreign policy, but also to international relations scholars.

1 Introduction

Identity crisis

Russia’s relations with China and Japan are important for a range of reasons. First, in geographical terms, these two countries abut Russia’s Far East, which has increased in significance in the 1990s. Second, since Gorbachev’s famous speech at Vladivostok in 1986, the Asia-Pacific was widely expected to become a new opportunity for the Soviet Union in both economic and political terms. Third, these relations can tell us much about the new Russia’s foreign policy as a whole, as the debates over Russian national identity have tended to crystallise around relations with on the one hand, ‘the East’, and on the other, ‘the West’. What was particularly interesting about Russia’s policy towards China and Japan under El’tsin, in terms of the East/West debate, is that there were in effect two different ‘Easts’ in operation in the minds of the Russian elite, or at least they were used to mean different things in different contexts. For some in Russia the East implied the economic dynamism of the Asia-Pacific – with Japan as the main player. For others it meant a chance to reassert Russia’s claim to be a great power, based mainly on its geopolitical position as an Eurasian power: for these China is the power to engage with. Looking at the two powers from the traditional geopolitical perspective, China and Russia together could control both ‘Heartland’ and ‘Rim’¹ – both Eurasia and Asia-Pacific, while Japan and the Russian Far East sat on the periphery.

When Russian foreign policy players spoke of turning to the East, what was really meant was turning to China and away from Japan. The fact that the intensification of relations with China came when Russia was attempting to define its relationship with the new independent states on its borders provided a unique opportunity to present this as a coherent strategy borne of discontent with Western policies and with Japan in particular, as the West’s ‘representative’ in the East. The rimland idea (open regionalism) implied acceptance of shared sovereignty and possibly of Russia as a raw materials supplier, which was not a palatable scenario for most Russians to accept. Chinese notions of a ‘Northeast Asian coprosperity sphere’ or the Japanese idea of a ‘Sea of Japan economic zone’² did not come to fruition, in part because of latent suspicion among the powers here, but also because of Russian fears of losing control of key resource areas. This is reflected in the approach to security in the region, which has often continued to rely on bilateral dialogues rather than multilateral security mechanisms. As William F. Tow has pointed out this tends to encourage American unilateralism,³ which is resented by Russia and China. Russian proposals for multilateral security mechanisms are not welcomed by any party in the region. Thus engagement with the Asia-Pacific and therefore with China and Japan has been constrained by internal disputes regarding Russian national identity. As one Russian political scientist put it:

We understand that we are no longer the Soviet Union. We understand that we are not the Russian empire. We understand that we are not western Europe. But who then are we? Until we have developed a new identity we cannot conduct serious, reasonable, logical, consistent policies.⁴

It is ironic that the end of ideology in the Soviet Union made it easier for Gorbachev to make headway in rapprochement with China, but did not, at first, help to improve relations with Japan. If anything, the collapse of the Soviet Union made dialogue with Japan more difficult, partly because of Japanese domestic politics, which still viewed the Soviet Union, and later Russia, as a military threat. Of course Japan’s close ties to the United States also made dialogue more problematic. Despite the avowal by the new thinkers (found primarily in the Russian foreign ministry) that Russia now viewed the US–Japan alliance as a factor of stability, this notion took time to filter down through the armed forces. In any case the collapse of the Soviet Union increased sharply the salience of geopolitical factors in foreign policy and increased the sense of territorial vulnerability. The agreement on the border of the Sino-Soviet border had been initialled prior to the fall of the Soviet Union, and was therefore an existing obligation. In addition, the military build-up here had led to serious confrontation in the past, and now hindered cross-border trade. As it was not at all certain that concessions to Japan would inevitably bring with them economic investments, there was clearly less at stake. Thus, the foreign policy concept of 1993 noted the special status of the countries of the Asia-Pacific, West and South Asia in terms of establishing Russia’s ‘Eurasian status’ and exerting a direct influence on the situation in the CIS by virtue of their geopolitical position.⁵

Of course the dilemma for Russia in making a direct link between policy in Northeast Asia and Russian policy in the CIS was that while it went some way to addressing the Sino-Russian relationship, it left largely unanswered the relationship with Japan. In the past relations with Japan had been defined by their importance for the future of the Russian Far East, but the argument that geographical contiguity and economic complementarity would automatically signal investment by Japanese business proved illusory. This was the lesson of the El’tsin years, but it had to be learnt again under Putin.

Domestic factors

This book sets out to chart the progress of relations between Russia and China on the one hand, and Russia and Japan on the other. The analysis is conducted in the context of Russian domestic debates on internal and external policies, which have been closely intertwined. While acknowledging the importance of external factors, for example, Western financial aid (or lack of) and global financial markets, on Russian foreign policy, many of the problems of Russian foreign policy came from within and were closely related to the problems outlined above: that is, the future of the Russian state as territorial entity, and in particular the ‘fallout’ from the collapse of the Soviet Union in the shape of its relations with the ‘near abroad’. Russia’s ambivalent relationship to territory is well described by Pavel Baev: when ‘some parts of the state start to drift away, borders are declared sacred and inviolable, but when there is a chance to add a piece to the state – then borders are taken as conveniently expandable’.⁶

Thus, this account seeks to concentrate on Russian domestic political developments as a key to understanding Russia’s approach to the Asia-Pacific, and specifically Northeast Asia, because this can then encompass discussion of Central Asia, as well as the Russian Far East.

Scope

In too many analyses Russia’s policy towards Northeast Asia has taken second place after Russian policy towards Europe and the United States. Studies in the West of Russian policy in Northeast Asia or the Asia-Pacific tended to be by American academics who often viewed Russian interests here as peripheral. These analyses did not often make room for Russian internal politics, or if they did, such background was dealt with in a sketchy fashion, tending to look at Russian policy here principally from a security viewpoint. While this is a valid angle, too often this can become mired in defence-related concerns, which tell us little about the overall thrust of Russian foreign policy. In the 1990s the number of monographs dealing exclusively with Russian policy towards China or Russian relations with Japan since the fall of the Soviet Union were few and far between, in fact on Russia and China the only Western-published single-author analysis was Jennifer Anderson’s perceptive, if brief, Adelphi Paper.⁷ Most of the works published in the West focused on relations in the broader security context, usually with the United States as the central player. These were useful, but were not able to provide any insight into the domestic debates regarding Russia’s Asia policy.⁸

A valuable work, albeit superseded by events, was the collection of chapters edited by Ramesh Thakur and Carlyle Thayer, which took a comprehensive look at Russia in the Asia-Pacific. However, this was published in 1993, and therefore necessarily had to rely on predictions of future Russian policy in the region.⁹ On Japan, and the territorial dispute, the high optimism in the late 1980s and early 1990s, regarding a possible breakthrough in relations meant that Russo-Japanese relations received far more attention: Joachim Glaubitz’s overview of Soviet/Russo-Japanese relations is an invaluable resource in terms of untangling the history of the dispute, but also the problems of economic cooperation in the Far East. Unfortunately the analysis ends in 1991, with just a brief epilogue. Jonathan Haslam and Andrew Kuchins published a collection of articles on the Russo-Japanese relationship, which tried to get away from the territorial issue, but again this account stops in 1993. Here at least there was comprehensive background to Russian domestic influences, albeit mainly on the Gorbachev period.¹⁰ Similarly the volume by Kimie Hara, while published in 1998, has little of substance to say on developments under El’tsin, as its main focus is the Soviet period.¹¹ In 1996 a US–Japanese–Russian edited volume appeared, with articles covering diverse aspects of the Soviet/Russo-Japanese relationship, including issues of economic cooperation, and the wider regional security context.¹² This volume was more even-handed, containing contributions from several Russian politicians and academics, but again, the analysis stopped at the end of 1993/beginning of 1994. In addition there was no overall context of Russian foreign policy into which these separate analyses can be fitted. Since 2001, there has been a burgeoning interest in Sino-Russian relations in the West (in sharp contrast to the 1990s when interest was scant). On China, Jeanne Wilson’s book is a welcome addition to the scarce body of work on Russo-Chinese relations, and one of the first to offer coverage of Putin’s China policy.¹³ Other works that appeared towards the end of the El’tsin era included an excellent volume on Russia–China relations and another edited work on Russia and Asia, that sought to address Russia’s relations with Asia, very broadly con-ceived.¹⁴ Fortunately the Russian Sinologist Alexander Lukin and the Japanese scholar Akihiro Iwashita have also sought to remedy this deficit, Iwashita’s monograph on the Sino-Russian border being an admirable example of detailed and painstaking research on a neglected issue of bilateral relations.¹⁵ Andrei Voskressenski, the prolific Sinologist at IMEMO (now at MGIMO) was a mine of information on Russia–China relations, both historical and contemporary, throughout the 1990s.¹⁶

On the Russian side, Mikhail Titarenko’s volume gave a throughgoing account of Russian policy in Northeast Asia, dealing with China, Japan and Korea, and including discussion of Russian concerns in Central Asia.¹⁷ Unfortunately, little substantial work has been completed on Russo-Japanese relations by Russian academics, barring the occasional article, while the account by the nationalist Igor’ Latyshev (Pravda’s Tokyo correspondent for 15 years, and a member of the ‘Committee for the Defence of the Kurils’) of the Russo-Japanese dispute is highly subjective and frankly hysterical and extreme in tone. The title alone, ‘Who is Selling Russia and how. A chronicle of Russo-Japanese Territorial Deals (1991–1994)’, says it all.¹⁸ In Russia, analysis and discussion of Russo-Japanese relations in both the media and academic press tapered off after the 1993 summit, having become almost a taboo subject. Moreover, the sparseness of Russo-Japanese interaction and dearth of diplomatic successes, by contrast with China, led to a lack of interest. Amongst Russian diplomats being assigned to work on Japan was often seen as a thankless task, and this perception has increased under Putin: indeed I was told by one Russian diplomat in 2005 that he ‘felt sorry’ for his colleagues who worked on Japan. Russian academics wishing to write extensively on this theme were obliged to seek funding in the United States or Japan, and were often openly derided in Russia for doing so. The financial costs of publication in Russia were also prohibitively high in the 1990s, which, in addition to the dire financial straits experienced by many Russian academic institutes, severely constrained research in Russia. (There was often resentment of those who were able to obtain lucrative posts in the West, reflecting the poor pay and conditions of Russian academics.) Thus Vladimir Miasnikov’s account of the Russo-Chinese border, ‘Confirmed by articles of agreement. A diplomatic history of the Russo-Chinese border, from the XVII– XX century’, was initially self-financed, resulting in a very small print run and making it almost impossible to find in Moscow.¹⁹

Structure

Chapter 2 is the first of three chapters on the development of Russia’s China policy after the collapse of the Soviet Union until the resignation of El’tsin at the end of 1999. The first of these looks at the broad development of bilateral political, economic and military relations in chronological fashion. The political relationship has been the driving force in relations, as economic developments failed to live up to expectations, while the military relationship became an important source of legitimacy for the Russian armed forces and the military–industrial complex. Arms sales began to be touted as a means of competing with the West, so much so that Russia even lowered its prices in order to secure its position in lucrative arms markets. Chapter 3 examines a new factor in relations: the Russian Far East in the context of the demarcation of the joint border. To a large extent this demarcation has been successful, but it is a case study in problems of centre-periphery relations. Various institutions, in particular the newly created Border Guards Service profited from the problems surrounding the border, such as the influx of Chinese migrant workers. Secessionist governors in the Russian Far East played on Moscow’s fears of separatism in order to extract financial concessions from the centre. The final chapter on China and Russia in the El’tsin period, Chapter 4, examines the evolution of interaction between Russia and China in the wider context, a crucial element of the vision of a multipolar world, which the two countries have so fervently embraced. There were shared concerns regarding regional security, in particular in Central Asia, and a sense of resentment vis-à-vis the West: but ultimately Russia tended to focus too much on China’s role as a counterweight to the West.

Chapter 5 addresses Russian policy towards Japan since the collapse of the Soviet Union until the end of 1999 and El’tsin’s resignation. This chapter looks at the whole panoply of relations within the context of the territorial dispute, which has constrained relations for so long. The section seeks to measure how successful El’tsin’s administration was in steering Japan away from its insistent focus on the territorial issue and towards a broader canvas of cooperation. It examines also the competing influences of the different institutions for control of Russia’s Japan policy. Chapter 6 takes a look at Russo-Japanese bilateral relations in the global context. Previously Russia and Japan’s relations had been subordinated to their relations with the United States, but the emergence of China changed this constellation. In this second section, I suggest that the convergence of Russia and China may have a beneficial effect on the Russia–Japan relationship in the long term. However, the disequilibrium between the two states’ political and economic profiles may continue to hamper relations.

To sum up the El’tsin era, I argue that the core of the problem in Russia’s relations with China and Japan was still predicated on Russian domestic politics. Russian resentment regarding Western economic pre-eminence and the perceived attempts to marginalise Russia as a great power continued to lie beneath the surface of Russian foreign policy. At the same time Russia did make some progress towards forging a new national identity and its own national interests, interests which did not always coincide with the West. The eastward enlargement of NATO after the Cold War exacerbated the sense of marginalisation, making cooperation with China a tempting prospect.

The Putin era

Putin has been one of the most active presidents in diplomatic terms, attempting to pursue a ‘multivectored’ foreign policy, which entailed engaging on all fronts. His policies have been seen as taking Russian foreign policy to a more pragmatic level by contrast with the emotional unpredictability of the El’tsin years. The domestic in-fighting and clashes between different interest groups in the bureaucracy were less visible, mainly because Putin moved to ensure that the administration was peopled by those loyal to him – the so-called ‘Petersburg circle’. Putin has clamped down on the oligarchs who rose to influence under El’tsin, and this has been particularly noticeable in the economic sphere, specifically energy, where the state has moved to reassert ownership of strategic resources. This pragmatism has entailed a more hard-headed view of economic relations allied to the protection of national interests.

Putin did not forsake the notion that Russia should be a great power, but it was as if the geopolitics and great power rhetoric of the El’tsin era had been str...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• List of illustrations
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations and acronyms
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Russian policy towards China under El’tsin
• 3 Russian policy towards China under El’tsin: redefining the joint border
• 4 Russian policy towards China under El’tsin: the broader context
• 5 Russian policy towards Japan under El’tsin
• 6 Russia and Japan under El’tsin: problems of international cooperation
• 7 Russian policy towards China under Putin
• 8 Russian policy towards Japan under Putin
• 9 Conclusions
• Notes
• Bibliography