What to watch for in the Xi-Putin meeting

Beijing on May 19-20

Greetings from the China-Russia Report’s (very) temporary headquarters at the charming Rutland Arms in Fulham, London. I’m off to Oslo tomorrow for Statkraft’s energy geopolitics conference, where I’ll speak Tuesday on The Chinese electrostate and Europe: Managing Complex Risks. There’ll be a lot to talk about. Other speakers will include Jake Sullivan, Ulf Sverdrup, and more. It’s very last minute, but if you’re in Oslo and would like to meet up tomorrow or Tuesday, then give me a shout. – Joe

Image: ChatGPT image generation

The Xi-Putin meeting

It’s confirmed: Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin will meet in Beijing on May 19^th and 20^th, just days after the Trump-Xi summit. Here’s what to watch for.

1. The meeting itself is a message.

Xi is using Putin to counterprogram Western head-of-state convenings. After the summit, President Trump called Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi after his visit to Beijing, and said he would call “the leader of Taiwan” – presumably Republic of China President Lai Ching-te.

A U.S. president calling the leader of Japan, America’s most important ally in the region, after a meeting with Beijing is unremarkable. On the other hand, holding direct communications with the leader of the Republic of China would mark a sharp departure from recent practice: a U.S. President has not talked directly with Taiwan’s leader since 1979. Trump’s December 2016 post-election call with then-President Tsai Ing-wen was conducted before he assumed the U.S. presidency in January 2017. Trump, who said he would consider calling Lai in an off-the-cuff press conference, may be unaware of the unprecedented and highly sensitive nature of direct calls with the ROC leader.

2. Taiwan may be the subtext of the Xi-Putin meeting.

As Amanda Hsiao and Bonnie Glaser write, Beijing is playing a long game on Taiwan as it believes time is on its side. The PRC may indeed secure its favored outcome in Taiwan’s January 2028 election, which would vindicate Beijing’s patient approach. On the other hand, there is a significant risk that Beijing may judge that it has a closing window of opportunity if certain political trends in Taiwan materialize, the U.S. experiences intense political discord, and AI/AGI timelines compress. The summer of 2028 – the time of year when Taiwan’s grid is strained, even in peacetime, and the island can most easily be blockaded – may be a moment of peak danger.

Xi may regard the current period as a moment of opportunity to press Washington over Taipei. Moreover, given his propensity for hedging against all eventualities – a feature seen in Putin-Xi ties – Xi may be positioning himself to move quickly against Taiwan, if needed, including if the U.S. continues to outpace Chinese AI capabilities.

3. Given that Taiwan may be top-of-mind for Xi during his meeting with Putin, keep a close eye on China-Russia energy deals, especially overland oil pipeline volumes.

The most consequential vector for further Sino-Russian oil cooperation involves the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline. ESPO has a capacity of approximately 1.6 Million Barrels per Day (MMBPD) and primarily draws volumes from eastern Russia. A little under half of ESPO’s oil exports are sent overland to the PRC via pipeline; the rest are shipped to Russia’s Kozmino export terminal, where they enjoy greater optionality (but typically find their way to China anyway, especially in the post-full scale invasion period). ESPO’s overland China leg could be expanded very easily, and quickly, and would significantly enhance Beijing’s oil security in a Taiwan contingency.

While it will likely be logistically difficult or politically impractical for a U.S./Japan-led coalition to interdict Russia-to-China maritime oil shipments, even in a contingency, the PRC’s oil security would be enhanced if it can access greater overland oil volumes from Russia, especially along ESPO. The only way for the coalition to physically interdict overland oil shipments would be to escalate to kinetic or cyber attacks.

Xi and Putin may also agree to new volumes along the Kazakhstan–China Crude Oil Pipeline, on the Atasu-Alashankou axis. This pipeline is not fully subscribed, and Beijing and Moscow have agreed to expand bilateral shipments in February 2022 and (reportedly) again in September 2025. U.S. sanctions on Rosneft, if enforced, could complicate a new deal.

There is also the potential for Beijing and Moscow to agree to the Power of Siberia-2 (PoS-2) natural gas pipeline. There are many, many reasons to be skeptical that the pipeline will ever be built, due to financing, cost, political challenges routing it through Mongolia, its risk of becoming a stranded asset, and more. The project faces steep challenges and is very likely not commercially viable – even if Qatari LNG faces long-term outages.

Nevertheless, PoS-2 may move forward for political and energy security rationale. Reuters reported on March 5^th that China’s 5-year plan would advance “early work” on the Power of Siberia-2 natural gas pipeline. If you look at page 26 of the NDRC’s “Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development of the People’s Republic of China,” you will indeed find the following language: “建设中俄远东天然气管道、川气东送二线天然气管道，推进中俄中线天然气管道前期工作。” (Or, roughly translated, “Build the China-Russia Far East natural gas pipeline and the second line of the Sichuan-Gas-to-East-China pipeline; advance preparatory work on the central-route China-Russia natural gas pipeline.”) This “advance preparatory work” statement doesn’t signal major interest from Beijing, in my view, although other analysts believe it’s a significant step. Still, it’s possible that Xi and Putin may agree to the PoS-2 natural gas pipeline this week, even if it imposes economic costs for both sides.

4. Be careful about dismissing smaller deals as unimportant.

Inking many smaller arrangements can matter cumulatively; hyping larger potential deals can also enable Beijing and Moscow to manage Western psychological reactions to the smaller deals that do move forward.

Lately, there’s been some odd chatter around an “oil leg” of the Power of Siberia-2 pipeline, which has traditionally included only a natural gas component. To be clear, oil and natural gas cannot share the same pipelines, due to various technical factors, including contamination, operating pressure, different pumping infrastructure, and more. Accordingly, it would be very surprising to see oil and gas PoS-2 megaprojects – especially when neither is commercially viable.

Smaller projects are worth watching carefully: they can sum up to impressive totals and can often be deployed faster and at less risk for both sides. Take China’s incremental natural gas commitments and purchases of Russian natural gas since January 2022. Beijing has agreed to the Far Eastern Route (10 billion cubic meters per year, or bcm/yr); importing greater volumes along PoS-1 and expanding the Far Eastern Route (FER), for an additional total of 8 bcm/yr; and purchased more LNG volumes (about 7 bcm/yr). Taken together, these arrangements total about 25 billion cubic meters per year, or about half of the planned PoS-2 volumes, yet receive a fraction of the policymaker and media attention. That’s a mistake.

Finally, Russia has also expanded exports to Uzbekistan and other CIS countries. While hard to trace, some fraction of these Russian exports to Central Asia indirectly support greater pipeline export volumes to China along the Central Asia-to-China (CACP) natural gas pipeline. Beware the smaller deals. They add up quickly.

Sources: China-Russia Report, BP Statistical Yearbook, TASS, Author’s Calculations

Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center and the Indo-Pacific Security Initiative; he also edits the independent China-Russia Report. This article reflects his own personal opinion.

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.

Will Russia, PRC provide naval targeting data to the IRGC?

U.S. ships to transit Strait tomorrow morning

U.S. naval ships will reportedly begin escorting merchant vessels exiting the Strait of Hormuz tomorrow morning, Middle East time, according to a social media post by President Trump. The move comes as evidence mounts that the blockade tactic was counterproductive. While evidence is limited as of this writing, it seems that one or more U.S. Navy ships may attempt to enter the Strait and “guide” merchant vessels out. Why are U.S. Navy ships and sailors being placed in harm’s way in a very challenging environment, especially since the mission objectives are unclear and Russia and/or the PRC may provide targeting data to Islamic Republic forces?

There are several immediate problems with the “guiding” tactic: first, why would a merchant vessel undertake potentially catastrophic risks from naval mines, drones, or even cruise missiles? Will these vessels need insurance or other guarantees? In addition, even if 50 vessels leave the Strait it only buys a limited amount of time, as typically, about 150 vessels transit the Strait in peacetime every day. So while the administration is – to its credit – finally backing off the blockade tactic, the new approach also doesn’t seem sustainable.

Furthermore, has the Trump administration thought through its response if Moscow and/or Beijing provides military and/or intelligence assistance to IRGC forces that results in the sinking of an American ship and the deaths of dozens or even hundreds of sailors? Russian intelligence has provided Iran with the locations and movements of American troops, ships and aircraft, according to CNN. Russia also traditionally holds the world’s largest arsenal of naval mines. Beijing, meanwhile, has provided shoulder-fired rockets and satellite imagery data to Iranian forces, per the Economist. Has the Trump administration conveyed any warnings to Vladimir Putin and Chinese Communist Party General Secretary Xi Jinping about their forces providing semi-overt or clandestine support to IRGC forces?

At best, the operation will seemingly provide limited energy market relief at substantial risk. Additional transits will be needed on a frequent basis, compounding risks. It is difficult to envision the operation leading to a transformation in the status of the Strait but it is easy to see how this business can get out of control.

If the Trump administration has not yet done so already, they should warn Beijing and Moscow not to assist the targeting of U.S. and coalitional forces in the Strait.

Oil storage and Iran

The below elaborates on some comments I made to the Jerusalem Post article, Iran may run out of oil storage within weeks under US blockade pressure.

“Israeli intelligence remains far too optimistic about the U.S.-Israel-Iran war. Most energy market analysts estimate Iran has 45-80 days of runway from onshore and floating storage before it must shut-in oil production - not 15-60 days. Those estimates also assume no production tapering or blockade leakage, which would stretch out shut-in timelines by perhaps another month or two. Finally, NIOC has had recent experience shutting in production, and will very likely be able to limit long-term damage to Iranian wells. Some sharp market analysts I’ve talked with already see evidence of Iran cutting production, which will extend timelines.

With Israeli intelligence almost certainly underestimating Iran’s ability to withstand a long-duration outage, the current policy of blockading Iran will degrade the Islamic Republic’s capacity, but at high cost and insufficient speed. Kinetically escalating, including by putting boots-on-the-ground, would prove even more disastrous. Instead of doubling down on a failed blockade policy or escalating recklessly, Washington should look at other ways to end the conflict on acceptable terms.”

Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center and the Indo-Pacific Security Initiative; he also edits the independent China-Russia Report. This article reflects his own personal opinion.

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.

Xi-Putin relations are shifting, post-Prigozhin mutiny

The CCP's top ideologist met with Russian nationalists

There is circumstantial but strong evidence that the Prigozhin mutiny has altered Xi’s perceptions of Putin and led him to diversify and institutionalize ties with the Russian political elite. Almost immediately after the Prigozhin mutiny, Xi recharacterized bilateral relations, emphasizing the broad-based “interests of our two countries and peoples,” subtly but clearly suggesting a desire to de-personalize bilateral relations. In addition, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has begun deepening engagement with other actors in the Russian political system, including the so-called “systemic opposition.”

Wang Huning — fourth-ranking PBSC member, the CCP’s chief ideologist, and head of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and United Front apparatus that coordinates work with non-CCP political actors — met recently in Beijing with Leonid Slutsky, head of the (woefully misnamed) Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR). The Wang-Slutsky dialogue appears to be the highest-level publicly reported interaction between the two political parties, while the two parties inked a memorandum institutionalizing cooperation. The CCP’s newfound engagement with the LDPR, an ultra-nationalist party with deep skepticism of China, is further evidence that Beijing is pragmatically hedging against a wide variety of outcomes in Russia’s domestic politics in the post-war era.

Xi regards Putin’s hold on power as much less certain than before

Xi is a student of the Soviet collapse and Russian politics. His father, Xi Zhongxun, studied the Soviet Union and managed Soviet experts; Xi is a committed Marxist-Leninist; and the Soviet Union’s disintegration profoundly influenced Xi’s worldview. Since rising to the pinnacle of leadership in the Chinese Communist Party, Xi has conducted more state visits to Russia than any other country, has met with Putin more than any other leader, and characterized his personal relationship with Putin as one of “best and bosom friends.” Given his deep engagement with Russia, Xi is watching Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and drawing key lessons.

Xi’s most immediate lesson from the war is that Putin’s hold on power is less secure than he previously anticipated. Xi and the CCP appeared stunned that Putin and his domestic security services were caught flat-footed by the Prigozhin Mutiny in June 2023. The CCP’s authoritative organs – Xi himself, the MFA, and the People’s Daily – were all slow to comment publicly on the crisis, while the PRC’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson said that “the Wagner Group incident is Russia’s internal affair.” While this is standard diplomatic language, Putin likely expected more support from Beijing. The CCP’s reluctance to immediately and publicly back Putin at a moment of maximal danger suggests that Beijing was genuinely surprised by the mutiny and unsure of the outcome.

Xi’s perception of Putin has changed. While the two figures continue to backslap in public, Xi and the CCP have quietly hedged bets and diversified ties with the rest of the Russian elite, beginning with speaker of the Russian Federation Council Valentina Matvienko’s visit to Beijing in July 2023. The meeting was out-of-cycle, as bilateral inter-parliamentary commission meetings are typically conducted in September, both prior to and after COVID. The July 2023 meeting’s content was even more instructive than the timing, however.

At the Matvienko meeting, Xi stressed that Sino-Russian relations were a “strategic choice made by the two countries based on the fundamental interests of their respective countries and peoples.” In other words, Beijing maintained that the “strategic choice” enjoyed broad support larger than any one individual. While this formulation, ”发展中俄关系是两国基于各自国家和人民根本利益作出的战略选择,” echoed prior rhetoric, including the two sides’ March 2023 joint communique, Xi’s new formulation was richer and stronger than the joint statement.

A few items are worth noting. First, the July 2023 readout elevated the phrase “fundamental interests of the two countries and their peoples,” to a standalone sentence. In addition, the May 2024 statement placed this phrase first, which is significant, given word order’s importance in Chinese. Finally, the May 2024 joint statement’s claim that bilateral ties “will not be affected by any temporary matter or single event,” appears to be a reference to the Prigozhin mutiny. Although Beijing and Moscow have used this framing in 2017 and a similar formulation in April 2023, the timing is still notable.

Xi’s comments reflect a subtle but evident shift in framing from March 2023 to July 2023, after the Prigozhin mutiny. The March 2023 joint statement emphasized “respective national conditions (各自国情).” Beijing appears to use this phrase (各自) when delineating differences between its own interests and Moscow’s. This pattern was also seen in the run-up to the Iran war, when Wang Yi emphasized the “two countries’ respective and common interests” (两国各自和共同利益), seemingly highlighting contrasting approaches in Russia, a major energy exporter, and China, the world’s largest importer of energy.

Xi’s July 2023 comments took a markedly different tone, as he called bilateral relations a “strategic choice made by the two countries based on the fundamental interests of their respective countries and peoples.” The content, timing, context, and personnel of the July 2023 meeting all suggest that Xi sought to institutionalize the relationship and safeguard bilateral ties in the event of Russian domestic political turmoil.

Beijing is diversifying ties across the Russian political spectrum, beyond Putin

One of Beijing’s most important and long-standing outreach vectors has been via the United Russia Party. Not only is United Russia the ruling party (and therefore subject to the CCP’s ruling party dialogue), but it could plausibly form the nucleus of any post-Putin Russia. The CCP has deep ties with United Russia: the two parties held their 11th dialogue mechanism in November 2025 between the International Department of the CPC Central Committee (IDCPC) and the Chairman of United Russia’s Supreme Council, while then Vice-President Xi Jinping personally attended party-to-party talks in 2010.

Beijing has also recently stepped-up ties with a wide cross-section of Russian elites, including members of Russia’s “systemic opposition” parties. Russia’s “systemic opposition” parties enjoy limited autonomy from the Putin regime and do not actively oppose its rule. Nevertheless, the CCP recognizes that the shells of systemic opposition parties – the LDPR, A Just Russia, even the Russian Communist Party – may be important actors shaping a regime transition, or a post-Putin government.

High-level meetings between CCP leaders and “systemic opposition” figures include a December 2025 discussion with Sergey Mironov, the head of A Just Russia party. The Chinese Communist Party and Xi himself have long held meetings with the leaders of the Russian Communist Party, a relationship it values for ideological and symbolic reasons.

Meetings with the ultranationalist LDPR, which has traditionally expressed Sino-skepticism, are especially noteworthy and sensitive. The LDPR previously warned about Chinese investment, especially in the Russian Far East, where its geographic support has traditionally tilted (although Russian Far East voters have shifted towards the Communists since the 2020 arrest of former LDPR Khabarovsk Governor Sergei Furgal). Moreover, the LDPR’s former party leader, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, previously called for all Chinese migrants to be deported from the Russian Far East. The CCP traditionally eyed the LDPR warily and eschewed engagement.

That is changing. While CCP-LDPR ties were moribund for over a decade, they began deepening in November 2023, in the aftermath of the Prigozhin mutiny. Leonid Slutsky met with Liu Jianchao, Minister of the International Department of the CPC Central Committee, after the last major leadership meeting was held in 2019. Slutsky’s February 2026 meeting with Wang Huning appears to be the highest-level meeting between CCP and LDPR leaders in Beijing, and probably ever. Significantly, the two sides inked a cooperation memorandum.

The CCP’s decision to begin strengthening ties with the LDPR after the June 2023 Prigozhin mutiny reflects several factors. After Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the firebrand former head of LDPR, died in April 2022, the LDPR became less Sino-phobic overnight. The LDPR has also become more deeply intertwined with the Kremlin, which is now reportedly re-branding the ultranationalist organization as Russia’s “party of diplomacy,” to external far-right parties. While the LDPR rather awkwardly invited Prigozhin to the party’s convention in late 2022 (a request he heatedly declined, in characteristic poor judgment), the party backed Putin immediately amid the mutiny and remains in the Kremlin’s good books. Finally, the LDPR’s low recorded support levels – only 3.2 percent in Russia’s Presidential electoral-like event from 2024 – do not capture widespread nationalist sentiment. For instance, roughly 38 percent of Russians agreed that “ethnic Russians in Russia should have certain advantages over everyone else,” according to a March 2022 opinion poll by the independent Levada institute. Despite the LDPR’s somewhat precarious and disorganized position, Russian nationalism is alive and well. Beijing understands that nationalists in the political, military, and intelligence wings will likely play a major role in determining political order in post-Putin Moscow, and the LDPR serves an important institutional shell for the nationalist element in the Russian political system.

Skeptics will say that these moves from International Department of the CPC Central Committee (IDCPC) are just standard CCP United Front work and standard engagement with uncontroversial opposition parties. That critique would miss the step change in Beijing’s engagement with the LDPR, which called for deporting Chinese migrants, was frozen out by Beijing for over a decade, and has now received a meeting with Wang Huning, along with a signed inter-party cooperation memorandum, all within two years of the Prigozhin mutiny.

What the CCP’s actions vis-à-vis Moscow mean for the West

Beijing does not necessarily expect a regime transition in Moscow any time soon, but Xi’s institutionalization of ties with United Russia and systemic opposition political parties, especially the ultranationalist LDPR, suggests that Xi is pragmatically hedging against a variety of outcomes in post-war Russia. Western countries should be doing the same, including by paying closer attention to the competing individuals and factions in Russian domestic politics that will jostle for influence in a post-Putin Russia.

Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center and the Indo-Pacific Security Initiative; he also edits the independent China-Russia Report. This article reflects his own personal opinion.

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.

Beijing wants the Strait of Hormuz open, for now

Latest Chinese trade data re: the Middle East; Saudi Crown Prince calls Xi Jinping

The next few days could be highly consequential for the Middle East. With the ceasefire set to expire on Tuesday, and seemingly little progress made on U.S. – Iran negotiations, fighting appears likely to resume this week, as of this writing.

Xi Jinping talked via telephone with MBS on the afternoon of the 20^th, according to the authoritative People’s Daily. During the call, Xi stated the following:

China advocates an immediate and comprehensive ceasefire and supports all efforts conducive to restoring peace, while adhering to resolving disputes through political and diplomatic means. The Strait of Hormuz should remain open to normal navigation.”

Xi’s phone call with MBS – and pointed reference to opening the Strait of Hormuz, contrary to Iranian wishes – comes on the heels of an April 12^th visit to Beijing by Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the son of MBZ, the UAE’s President. While in Beijing, the crown prince of Abu Dhabi met with Xi Jinping. Taken in tandem, the visit and the call with Arab leaders suggest that Beijing may be considering a sort of “pro-Arab neutrality” amid the U.S.–Israel–Iran war. This doesn’t mean that Beijing will desist from supplying intelligence, defense industrial base support, or even weapons to Tehran. Instead, it suggests limited enthusiasm in Beijing for a region-wide war that would damage key oil suppliers and export markets. Beijing’s apparent opposition to a regional war holds true in 2026 but may change over time as the PRC decouples from the region’s oil markets.

China’s commercially-motivated, pro-Arab neutrality

Of course, China’s Middle East imports are concentrated in commodities, especially oil. These imports faced only limited disruptions in March, per GACC data, although things have shifted somewhat in April and could change starkly in the coming days.

For context, China’s total imports stood at about 11.43 Million barrels per day in 2025, from well-diversified supply sources. Russia was the single-largest supplier, at about 18 percent, but if the GCC countries are treated as a single entity, then they comprise a much larger share.

As any Middle Eastern expert is sure to point out, the GCC countries are not a monolithic or even coherent bloc: Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Bahrain blockaded Qatar in 2017. And mere weeks before the U.S. – Iran war, Saudi Arabia and the UAE “were locked in a broader strategic contest,” as my colleague Jonathan Panikoff wrote at the time. Still, grouping the GCC makes sense in the context of the U.S. – Iran war.

But major disruptions in the Middle East will not only impact China’s energy and commodity imports, but also its exports. The GCC market accounts for a non-trivial portion of Chinese exports and GDP. GCC countries accounted for about 6 percent of the PRC’s total merchandise exports in 2025, per my calculations. Since exports comprised about 19.3 percent of Chinese GDP in 2025, exports to the GCC totaled 1.1 percent of total Chinese GDP. These exports unsurprisingly tumbled in March, the latest month for which data is available, due to the U.S. – Iran war.

Beijing sees more risks than opportunities from a Middle East war, for now

Beijing has consistently expressed skepticism of a Middle Eastern war, although it has done little to oppose the conflict. It has largely stayed out of the way, skipping trilateral naval exercises with Iran and Russia just ahead of the conflict. That muted stance is because while the PRC will be damaged by the economic fallout of a war, it has stockpiled oil for years and is relatively well-prepared for the crisis, at least when compared to regional rivals.

A future crisis could see Beijing take a starkly different approach. Beijing is rapidly mitigating its Malacca Dilemma, or its vulnerability to the U.S. Navy interdicting oil volumes from the Middle East. While fleet turnover takes several years, electric vehicles are slowly diminishing Chinese transportation fuel demand. Chinese gasoline consumption has already peaked; Chinese diesel demand is also increasingly facing structural pressure, as sales of battery electric heavy-duty vehicles nearly tripled in 2025. While some of these sales were pulled forward from 2026 due to tax incentives, the trend is clear and will accelerate when more energy-dense batteries, such as solid-state batteries, are commercialized.

Again, the vehicle fleet will take time to turn over, but the direction of travel is toward lower gasoline and diesel use, which makes the PRC less reliant on interdictable maritime imports, including from the Middle East.

As PRC dependence on interdictable Middle East crude declines, so does the coercive value of a U.S. naval blockade along the Malacca Strait in a Taiwan contingency. Washington and Taipei need to think now about what deterrent instruments can replace the Malacca dilemma.

Meanwhile, the GCC countries should consider not only Beijing’s present response to the crisis, where it has hedged against both sides of the conflict, but also the next one. In the medium term, and given its relative energy self-sufficiency, Beijing may have an interest in instigating a future Middle East energy crisis through an Iranian proxy. As Beijing’s energy self-sufficiency grows, its structural alignment with the GCC weakens, raising the possibility that Beijing’s calculus on regional instability could eventually invert. In the future, both Moscow and Beijing may have an interest in ensuring an unstable Middle East.

Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Indo-Pacific Security Initiative, and editor of the independent China-Russia Report.

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.

Taiwan’s energy system must be protected against Guns and Knives

North oil, south electricity (北油，南電)

Given recent developments, including Taiwan’s planned counter-blockade drills, I’m including some comments I made at an Atlantic Council event, Enhancing Taiwan’s energy resilience: A cross-strait and beyond seminar.

Taiwan’s energy system must be protected against Guns and Knives

Image: U.S. Navy, Aerial view of the Pearl Harbor submarine base and adjacent fuel tank farms on October 13, 1941

Most people watching this event recognize energy’s strategic importance, but it’s worth sharing a vignette from history. Before we dive in, I want to be clear that both Japan and the U.S. of today are vastly different than in 1941. But at Pearl Harbor, both Imperial Japanese and US forces suffered from profound military intelligence failures. It’s well known that the U.S. misinterpreted signals that would have predicted the attack, while the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) failed to target U.S. aircraft carriers. But the biggest blunder of all was the failure of the IJN to target U.S. logistics, especially exposed oil tanks. Had the IJN taken out the oil tanks they would have immobilized the entire U.S. Pacific Fleet.

In the words of Admiral Nimitz, “we had four and a half million barrels of oil out there and all of it was vulnerable to 50 caliber bullets. Had the Japanese destroyed the oil, it would have prolonged the war another two years.”

Admiral Nimitz arguably underestimated the effects of an energy outage. In an alternate universe, what if instead of committing an act of overt military aggression, the Imperial Japanese intelligence services had instead deniably destroyed all the oil tanks via sabotage? History might look vastly different.

Even though logistics and energy may seem boring, wars are won and lost by both guns and knives.

Source: Atlantic Council

Moving to the present day, there are many reasons for concern. As you can see, East Asia’s democracies are vastly more reliant on maritime energy imports than the PRC. Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea import virtually all of their hydrocarbons via interdictable maritime routes.

While the PRC has some energy advantages, it’s not 10 feet tall, of course. It’s not in the CCP’s interest to act coercively, given its many vulnerabilities that could be proportionately and reciprocally addressed, if needed.

Since Taiwan’s electricity supply will be critical in any contingency, we need to better understand its nuances. Northern Taiwan is strategically important because it’s the capital region and because it’s home to more than 40 percent of Taiwan’s population. As Resilience Media notes, north Taiwan also isn’t self-sufficient in electricity.

Source: Taipower

Accordingly, resiliency planners need to focus efforts on northern Taiwan. We’re going to need more generation in and around Taipei.

While renewables are useful and we should build them everywhere, we can’t solely rely on them in northern Taiwan. Since Taipei and Seattle are roughly as sunny, northern Taiwan may need to rely on oil in a near-term crisis, as Taiwan has over 100 days of inventory. Over the medium and long-terms, northern Taiwan may need to rely on nuclear energy.

Image: World Bank Solar Atlas

Note: Red and orange colors indicate strong solar potential; green and blue indicate weak sunlight potential

Given Taiwan’s regional nuances, the ROC should consider organizing into energy districts, just as the U.S. does, in part, via Petroleum Administration for Defense Districts, or PADDs.

Here’s what a PADD might look like in Taiwan, with northern, eastern, southern, and central districts. Dividing the island into different blocks will help optimize planning.

Images: Energy Information Administration and the ROC government’s TCCIP

Finally, in my own personal opinion, the U.S. and Taiwan should increase energy resilience cooperation. That will entail working across humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, as well as cyber and sabotage risks.

Cooperation should arguably involve rotating U.S. personnel from across the DOE, NRC, national laboratories, and more as part of a U.S.-Taiwan Energy Resilience Task Force.

Such cooperation need not be public: the U.S. should prefer substantive support for Taiwan over showy displays and emphasize the One China policy. But the U.S. and others should also not shy away from upsetting Beijing.

Taiwan is already strengthening itself, including by increasing military spending to 5% of GDP by 2030 and purchasing billions of dollars of U.S. defense equipment. These efforts by Taipei are commendable and constructive, especially because coalitional military capabilities will be of paramount importance in any contingency.

At the same time, we should learn from history and appreciate the importance of energy resiliency.

We must secure our free societies from the threat of coercion from guns and our energy systems from sabotage by knives. Thank you.

Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center and the Indo-Pacific Security Initiative; he also edits the independent China-Russia Report. This analysis reflects his own personal opinion.

The China-Russia Report is an independent, nonpartisan newsletter covering political, economic, and security affairs within and between China and Russia. All articles, comments, op-eds, etc represent only the personal opinion of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the position(s) of The China-Russia Report.