Ukraine

Yeah, it might.

https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/chinas-balancing-act-between-us-and-russia

The United States’ efforts to limit China’s shipments of dual-use goods to Russia seem to be having an impact. Russia is finding it harder to obtain the semiconductors and machine tools needed to sustain its war effort. Additionally, Putin’s plan to boost his failing gas revenues by building a second pipeline to China remains stalled.

Yet China is a winner in a situation created by Russia’s brutal war against Ukraine. China has expanded its market presence in Russia and secured affordable Russian hydrocarbons, but only to a degree that maintains its diversified portfolio of energy sources.

Aborted Trade Growth

Chinese-Russian trade has seen explosive growth since the launch of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. With bilateral trade surging from $145 billion in 2021 to $240 billion in 2023, China has solidified its position as Russia’s main trading partner.

The primary areas of cooperation include energy, agriculture, technology, infrastructure construction, and transportation, Putin pointed out during his visit to Beijing. What this really means is that China is Russia’s top source for the types of goods that the United States identifies as “high-priority” items. These goods—including semiconductors, telecommunications equipment, and machine tools—can be used in both civilian and military sectors.

In December 2023, monthly exports of these dual-use products from China to Russia reached over $600 million but have since fallen to over $300 million per month. Despite this decrease, China’s support for Russia’s war effort through these supplies has been substantial. Russia’s dependence on China for these products has surged from 32 percent in 2021 to 89 percent in 2023.

But China also has no reason to do that, and some good reason not to. I bet that they won't.

China may not have a direct interest in the outcome of the war itself.

However, it does gain from Russia being dependent on China.

The reason that Putin has been willing to have that dependence is because China isn't actively aiming to oppose the invasion. All China has to do to gain here is, well, nothing.

For China, that's a pretty low-cost way to gain a bunch of influence in Asia. My guess is that China's goals probably look something like this:

• Make sure that this doesn't turn nuclear (which would potentially affect China).

• Don't have China become involved in the conflict.

• Make use of the period of time where Russia is cut off from the West to extend short-run Russian dependence (like, obtaining substitute parts from China) to long-run dependence (tying Russia to Chinese systems and services) insofar as possible.

If China decides to act in concert with the West, then it gains nothing -- China probably doesn't care much what happens in Ukraine -- and loses this new influence in Russia, which Beijing probably does very much want.