Russia Needs China More Than China Needs Russia: Who Knew?

​Catherine Putz in The Diplomat:

"Two years after the Kremlin's rift with the West, Moscow's hopes that a new business relationship with Asia would make up for Russia's losses have not materialized," Alexander Gabuev of the Carnegie Moscow Center begins his analysis of Russia's pivot to "nowhere."

Thomas S. Eder and Mikko Huotari began their recent Foreign Affairs article by remarking, "Ever since Europe imposed sanctions on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, Moscow has held high hopes of countering them by strengthening its alliance with China on energy, defense, and agricultural trade and investments."

What's at the core of this failure? One place to look is at the motivation for increasing cooperation in both Moscow and Beijing. Russia's deteriorating relations (and trade) with Europe precipitated a search elsewhere for partners. For this reason, the $400 billion gas deal signed in May 2014 drew headlines. But the devil, as always, was in the details: Russia would be getting less money per cubic meter of gas than when it sold to western Europe and in the past two years the construction dates have been pushed further into the future.

Russia needs China, but China has options.

http://thediplomat.com/2016/04/why-did-russias-pivot-to-asia-fail/