A game of Chinese whispers

China’s ambassador to the EU, Mr Fu Cong (careful how you pronounce it) said something no one expected. Even my uniquely unfailing clairvoyance proved to be not so reliable (just this once!).

As you recall, Fu’s ventriloquist, Emperor Xi, visited Moscow the other day, where he co-signed some sort of agreement with Putin. The document had 14 paragraphs, most of which had to do with economic cooperation.

If you don’t speak Sino-Russian, in this context ‘economic cooperation’ means confirming China’s control of Russia’s Far East and Eastern Siberia. It also means that Russia accepts her role as China’s de facto vassal. And oh yes, I almost forgot: on that basis they also swore undying, limitless friendship.

The document reiterates both sides’ opposition to siting nuclear weapons in countries that don’t have their own. They also agree that using, or even threatening to use, nuclear weapons is unacceptable.

I wonder how Russia goes about that part. The only way to abide will be banning Russian politicians from making any public pronouncements on foreign policy. So far not a single one over the past couple of years has omitted the threat to reduce the West to radioactive ash or some such.

The two chaps also had a private chat that went unrecorded. No details have been released, but it doesn’t take my clairvoyance to know what they talked about.

Putin begged Xi to rearm Russia and start providing the military electronics for her to begin to rearm herself. He must have thanked Xi for his surreptitious help provided through third parties, but lamented its naturally limited scope. Massive direct help would be greatly appreciated.

Surmising Xi’s reply is harder, although many commentators did try. They were more or less evenly divided between favouring either a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ answer, and only I, the clairvoyant, stated uncompromisingly that either was possible.

Unable to read anything on Xi’s inscrutable face, commentators agreed to wait and see what the two limitless friends would do next. Depending on what it was, they could then figure out Xi’s response retrospectively.

Alas, Putin’s next move didn’t clarify matters. He announced that Russia would deploy tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus, which went against both the letter and the spirit of his public agreement with Xi. Rather than answering the old question, this action raised new ones.

Either this development was discussed and agreed by the two chaps in private or it wasn’t. If it was, Xi must be happy. If it wasn’t, he must be incandescent. Which is it?

Enter the ambassador with a precariously pronounceable name, Fu Cong. Asked about that boundless friendship, he said that some people “deliberately misinterpret this because there’s no so-called ‘no limit’ friendship or relationship. ‘No limit’ is nothing but rhetoric.”

For all my clairvoyance, I can’t be sure I understand every implication. There are too many. First, speaking through his dummy (you don’t think Fu was stating his own opinion, do you?), the ventriloquist Xi tells the West to disregard the empty words he and Putin put into that agreement.

Friendship, what friendship? No limit? You bet every part of your body limits exist, in everything but rhetoric.

Two scenarios are possible here, and the first one is obvious. Xi refused to provide direct military help to Putin, and the latter retaliated by blatantly breaking their agreement not to proliferate nukes.

That enraged Xi, and Fu’s statement is a public rebuke of Putin. It’s also a plea to the West that it shouldn’t treat China as Russia’s ally in that bandit raid on the Ukraine.

Alliance with Russia may make China a target for massive sanctions, and her economy isn’t doing well as it is. So far Xi has been doing all he could not to fly too close to the sun of sanctions, and Fu’s disclaimer seems to confirm China’s intention to keep her nose, well, cleanish.

It may also mean that China is withdrawing her friendship and, more important, support from Putin. If that’s the case, he won’t last long.

His nearest and dearest may decide that the end is nigh, and their only chance of their own survival is to blame it all on Putin, deliver him to the Hague and make it easy for the West to pretend it believes that Russia has found God.

But that’s only one possibility. The other one is subterfuge, something of which both China and Russia are eminently capable. Using rhetoric to repudiate rhetoric, China is planning to step up her secret supplies to Russia, while trying to stay just this side of Western sanctions. There, the results would be unpredictable.

Giving up that silly tomfoolery about my clairvoyance, I must admit I don’t know which of the two scenarios is real. Neither does John Kirby, US National Security Council coordinator.

“Look,” he said. “For us it’s actions, not words… It’s certainly encouraging to hear that they are publicly making that pronouncement. But we’re going to obviously continue to monitor.”

Mr Kirby’s grammar is questionable, but his words are wise. Nothing emanating from manifestly evil powers must be taken at face value. Remember the Russian proverb Reagan once quoted, “trust but verify”? The first part is strictly optional; the second, vital.

Meanwhile, the Russians disavow Fu’s statement, suggesting he didn’t mean it the way it sounded. Just go by the official documents signed by Putin and Xi, says Putin’s spokesman Peskov: “The whole context of their mutual understanding is stated in the two documents… They clarify completely the whole gamut of questions currently on the mutual agenda.”

Yes, except that Putin broke that agreement both in deed (planning to deploy nuclear weapons in Belarus) and in word (continuing to make nuclear threats). And Xi tells the world that the agreement is just hot air to be ignored.

Which of the two scenarios is true to life? Let’s hope for the first and prepare for the second. That’s the best we can do, and never mind the Chinese whispers.