With Western sanctions escalating, Russia is increasingly relying on continuous life support from China on the battlefield between Russia and Ukraine. Despite China’s claims of neutrality in the Russia-Ukraine conflict and denial of providing lethal weapons assistance to Russia, in reality, China is covertly supplying Russia with a significant amount of dual-use military and civilian components and materials, effectively keeping Russia’s military machine running.
According to a recent analysis by The Economist, on May 19th, Russian President Putin arrived in Beijing, in what many see as a plea for help from China. Russia’s production of precision-guided missiles and drones used to bomb Ukrainian cities relies on microelectronics and semiconductors from China. China also supplies most of the commercial First-Person View (FPV) drones and associated technologies to Russia.
The article points out that while China also provides FPV drone components to Ukraine, such as cameras, motors, and gears, almost all assembly work is completed in Ukraine. Ukraine is well aware that in China’s eyes, Russia holds the utmost importance.
Russia’s weapons and ammunition factories are nearly entirely dependent on China’s CNC machine tools. The Jamestown Foundation estimates that around 90% of Russia’s machine tool imports come from China.
Furthermore, critical materials needed for shells, tank ammunition, and missile propellants like nitrocellulose are also heavily reliant on imports from China by Russia. While Russia has a few explosive factories producing nitrocellulose, the output is far from enough to meet wartime demands. Recently, many intermediary companies in Turkey have also provided half of Russia’s nitrocellulose imports, but these companies are currently facing severe sanctions.
Western officials have accused China North Industries Group Corporation (Norinco), a direct subsidiary of the China North Industries Corporation (Norinco, with two sub-companies), of increasing exports of nitrocellulose to Russia.
China insists that nitrocellulose is a dual-use product needed for paint and varnish production. It has been reported that to conceal the truth, Russia’s four major explosive factories all have related civilian subsidiaries. Western officials accuse Norinco of trying to mask its export activities to Russia through shell companies and foreign intermediaries.
The article also highlights China’s increase in exports of raw materials needed for nitrocellulose production in Russia: cotton pulp and cotton cellulose. Previously, almost all of Russia’s cotton pulp came from Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, but this import source has been affected following a new round of sanctions from the European Union on related enterprises in the two countries last year and this year.
Analysts believe that China is unlikely to reduce its support for Russia’s war machine, as China not only profits greatly from the conflict but also secures cheap oil and natural gas from Russia in return. China’s use of the term “dual-use” is seen as a deceptive tactic in this situation.