China broadcast its might on Wednesday. Tens of thousands of spectators in Beijing looked on as the People’s Republic unveiled laser weapons, nuclear ballistic missiles, and giant underwater drones alongside armored vehicles, tanks, and parading soldiers whose marching prowess put the rest of the world to shame. Some 26 world leaders, including Russia’s Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, joined Xi Jinping as onlookers.
The highly choreographed spectacle comes two days after Xi convened the 25th Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Tianjin, joined not only by leaders ill-favored in the West but also India’s Narendra Modi and traditional U.S. allies.
The SCO has come a long way. A quarter of a century ago, around when Putin took power and long before Xi and Modi entered the world stage, the SCO was a quiet backstage where China and a few Central Asian countries tried to demonstrate a modicum of relevance. But today the SCO is the world’s largest regional bloc, and accounts for 30% of global GDP.
The countries that make up the SCO resist set alignments. But if one issue links them it is grievances against the U.S.-led international order. China is in the second round of a trade war started six years ago by President Donald Trump during his first term. Russia is still reeling from longrunning U.S. support for Ukraine in the wake of the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion. India is now grappling with 50% tariffs for not toeing the Trump trade line.
That Kim attended the parade, a first for a North Korean leader since 1959, underscores that this is a collection of disaffected powers—and China is happy to marshal them. After all, Pyongyang has been the most consistent, long-term antagonist to Washington. China and even Russia have had far longer and deeper periods of alignment with the U.S.
But there are still profound differences among these nations. They are not joined by trust, common values, and a common vision. The main attendees at the SCO and the military parade may dislike a world order still dominated by the U.S. But there are major and in some cases mutually incompatible differences on what they want from the future.
The stakes are highest for China. For all the warm words and photos, Xi does not regard any of the other SCO members as being economically or geopolitically in the same league. China’s economy is eight times the size of Russia’s, and three times India’s. Beijing is still exploring the possibility of a favorable trade deal with Trump, and unlike other nations may get one.
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What Russia and India feel about China’s rise is clear from their recent histories. Modi is as nationalistic as Xi, and is no doubt irritated at the confidence and pushiness of its great eastern neighbor. New Delhi has never bought into the Belt and Road Initiative, and notably banned TikTok and other China-related apps. India has a competing vision of itself as a great power and nurtures the hope it will one day stand as an equal to China and the U.S. Tellingly, it is China not other P5 members that resists India’s bid to permanently join the U.N. Security Council.
For Russia, the issue is one of dealing with a power that it depends on, but still harbors major differences with. Any one visiting Russia in the past will know when the subject of China comes up, there are perpetual suspicions toward its territorial intentions in the far east of the country. Putin is also a strong nationalist. It is interesting to speculate what he might really feel about looking increasingly, these days, like the junior partner of Beijing.
If there is any message from the SCO, it is how many of these very different powers are finding it necessary to work together because of the inconsistency and challenges thrown at them by the Trump Administration. But Wednesday’s military parade, the largest ever held by China, also shows that whatever the emerging world order is, it is governed by harsh realism, self-interest, and opportunism.
China may well find that leading a rival bloc is far more difficult than being part of the old system that now seems to be eroding.
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