China Likely Supplying Drone Technologies and Cruise Missile Parts to Russia

The following article first appeared on Warrior Maven, a Military Content Group website.

China and Russia have launched what is being called their largest joint military maneuvers in three decades, a massive exercise that stretches from the Arctic Ocean to the Mediterranean. Russian President Vladimir Putin made it clear that the primary point is to send a message to the US.

According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the drills involve more than 90,000 troops, more than 400 warships and submarines and over 120 planes and helicopters. The two navies will also cruise together in the Pacific, the fifth time that has happened.

“We pay special attention to strengthening military cooperation with friendly states,” Putin said. “Today, in the context of growing geopolitical tensions in the world, this is especially important.

“Under the pretext of countering the allegedly existing Russian threat and containing the People’s Republic of China, the United States and its satellites are increasing their military presence near Russia’s western borders, in the Arctic and in the Asia-Pacific region…Russia must be prepared for any development of the situation.”

In July, the Russian and Chinese navies conducted six days of live-fire exercises off China’s Guangdong province. At that time, unnamed experts quoted in the Global Times, the English-language newspaper controlled by China’s Communist party, said that “unlike the US that aims to maintain its global military hegemony, the China-Russia military cooperation provides stabilizing factors to the deteriorating global and regional security.”

There is something in these drills for both countries. Russia needs Chinese help if it is ever going to achieve its goal of becoming a power in the Pacific. Meanwhile, Russia supports China’s claim over 90 percent of the South China Sea.

The US has taken notice. Earlier this week, the Biden administration urged European allies to line up alongside the US in expressing displeasure over Russia’s growing military collaboration with China.

China is not believed to have supplied weapons directly to Russia. But earlier this year, senior administration officials told CNN that Russia is now engaging in its largest military manufacturing expansion since the Cold War – and that China is proving the Russians with machine tools, technology for cruise missiles and drone and turbojet engines.

Last year, 90 percent of Russia’s micro-electronics imports reportedly came from China. Those are used to produce missiles, tanks and aircraft.

And the head of the US European Command, Gen, Chris Cavoli, has told Congress that Russia has been able to reconstitute its military capacity to what it was before the invasion of Ukraine.