The Olympics: a step towards the creation of Greater Eurasia from Kaliningrad to Hong Kong

President of Russia Vladimir Putin will attend the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing. This can be considered a return visit, since Chinese President Xi Jinping attended the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi in 2014. What signal does such a rapprochement of leaders send to the world?

More than a partnership

Relations between countries, of course, depend on a large number of factors, but our countries have been fortunate at this historical stage.

The leaders' diplomacy, direct partnership and already clearly human and friendly contact between the Chinese President and the Russian president have become a bright and unique feature of bilateral relations. This is a very valuable resource that allows not only to advance cooperation in strategic areas, but also to solve complex issues literally as they come. This is a collaboration of strong personalities who deeply respect and understand each other perfectly.

Numerous meetings and regular video communication between President Xi and President Putin are also an example of the interaction of major powers that have become neighbours and strategic partners by the will of history.

It is important to consider the visit of the Russian President to China for the opening of the Winter Olympics in Beijing precisely in this context. Of course, we remember how President Xi Jinping visited the Winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014. We also remember the situation in which this was done: a number of leaders of Western countries, including US President Barack Obama and the Prime Minister of Great Britain David Cameron, did not come to Russia.

It is obvious that this demonstrative absence has become a continuation of the politicisation line of world sport, the fruits of which the world is reaping today, when various, often far-fetched pretexts explain a violation of the Olympic Charter, which clearly enshrines the principle that sport is outside politics.

The presence of the Chinese leader in Sochi in 2014 was all the more important because it confirmed that our countries support each other at strategic moments when there are attempts to dictate to them certain rules. We also remember how President Xi explained his visit back then: "According to Chinese tradition, when neighbours or friends celebrate a joyful event, we should definitely come and congratulate them. That's what we came to you with”.

I can't predict exactly the words that President Vladimir Putin will say in Beijing, but he has already formulated the essence of his position during a videoconference with President Xi Jinping on December 15, 2021. Namely, that Russia and China support each other on issues of international sports cooperation, "including rejection of any attempts to politicise sports and the Olympic movement”. As it's known, President Xi responded to this: "I am ready to move forward with you, to open a new page of Sino-Russian relations together in the post-pandemic period”.

What to expect from the Beijing Olympics

During a December videoconference with President Xi, President Putin noted: "I have no doubt that the upcoming winter Olympic Games will be held at the highest level. They know how to do it in China."

The preparation for the games demonstrated the highest level of the sports industry development in China. A unique case - Beijing became the first city in the world to be honoured to host both the winter and summer Olympics.

The Olympic Games are one of the greatest achievements of mankind, aimed at affirming the dignity of the individual, cultivating high spiritual qualities, preventing wars and the transition to a peaceful course of competition between individuals and entire states. In ancient Greece, during the Olympics, military conflicts between Greek city-states stopped.

This feature of the Olympic tradition was highly appreciated by the great enthusiast Pierre de Coubertin, who revived Olympic traditions at the end of the 19th century.

In 1980, the United States organised a boycott of the Summer Olympics in Moscow, although Soviet athletes had come to the Winter Olympic Games in Lake Placid (USA) six months earlier.

On August 8, 2008, the opening day of the Summer Olympics in Beijing, the troops of the then pro-American President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili attacked Russian peacekeepers in South Ossetia and the peaceful city of Tskhinvali. In 2014, the closure of the Olympic Games in Sochi was overshadowed by a coup in Ukraine and the beginning of the genocide of the Russian-speaking population.

It's the same approach that we also see today, observing how the countries of the Anglo-Saxon bloc - the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Australia - tried to ignite a diplomatic scandal around the Olympics under the pretext of "human rights violations" in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

Speculation on a sensitive issue in the field of interethnic relations completely ignores the fact that China has a policy at the state level aimed at developing interethnic friendship. It is no coincidence that the Chinese yuan denomination is signed not only in Chinese characters, but also in Arabic, Latin, traditional Tibetan and Mongolian scripts, that is, in the languages of the titular ethnic groups of the autonomous regions of China.

Bringing unity amongst the peoples around common values is an obvious similarity between China and the Russian Federation, which have proven their ability to unite people of different nationalities around achieving great goals. In this context, the victories at the Olympic Games and the results achieved in the sport of the highest level are also important for interethnic consolidation in our countries.

It is symbolic that most people in the world, from the spectators to the athletes themselves, expect the Olympics to be a celebration of sports, and not a showdown.

Attempts to determine with the help of political preferences, political correctness and other frankly "unsportsmanlike" criteria the geography of competitions and the rules of admission to them are the murder of the international sports movement as a universal heritage.

In this sense, it is very important that the 24th winter Olympic Games remind humanity of real sports victories. And the main thing is that this common historical heritage cannot be abandoned in any way. The world, after two years of a pandemic and six years of near-sports fuss, as a result of which those who would have lost in fair competitions often began to win, wants honest records from the Olympics. And also a celebration.

The system of measures against the pandemic became a separate challenge.

It is clear that they will be tough, including the so-called closed cycle (athletes and members of delegations are forbidden to leave the enclosed Olympic space during the Games), enhanced PCR testing and regular measures for the prevention and control of all participants. Without such tough anti-pandemic measures, the Olympic Games would hardly have been possible in the current situation.

Physical culture is one of the ancient Chinese traditions. It is clear that the role of sport in the modern world is difficult to overestimate. But in this case, it is important to emphasise: physical culture is also part of the Chinese way of life. It is impressive when you see mass physical exercises of people of all ages in Chinese cities.

Such traditions are also beginning to be instilled in Russia, but there is, as the saying goes, something else to work on. The interpenetration of cultural and sporting traditions will fill the relations between our countries with new content. After all, even if the leaders set the tone for these relations, their level largely depends on how close and understand each other the peoples themselves are.

In a situation when the Olympic movement is going through a crisis, a vivid manifestation of which are the "doping wars" and dishonest and unfair harassment of athletes, cooperation between Russia and China in the sports field is of particular importance. Russia and China are two great sports powers and two huge sports industries.

Perhaps our countries should think about creating new competitive formats in the future that would help preserve the ideals of the Olympic movement and pass them on to future generations.

Russia and China — intercivilisational symbiosis

Sports cooperation is just one of the many areas where Russia and China have each other's back. The reality is that the modern collective West operates on the principle of "divide and rule", seeks to split countries and peoples as much as possible, to make mischief between them, and, when it succeeds, to set them against each other.

The ruling class of the West uses every opportunity to complicate the process of Russian-Chinese cooperation. We see how the brain trusts and media structures of the West are making great efforts to sow distrust between our nations, to introduce negative stereotypes of perception of each other into the public consciousness. Russians are constantly being portrayed on social networks and blogs as uncouth, aggressive and rude barbarians in the eyes of the Chinese, and the Chinese in the eyes of the Russians as mercantile schemers full of guile.

It is obvious that the American elites dream of repeating the scenario realised in the 1970s, when the United States, weakened by the defeat in Vietnam, practically regained their lost positions, using the difficult relations between the two largest socialist countries at that time.

However, the historical experience accumulated by our peoples will hardly give an opportunity to repeat such a scenario. Cooperation between the Russian Federation and China is not directed against any third country, but we must understand that by covering each other's backs, we increase the level of our security, resistance and stability by an order of magnitude.

Based on this, we are making our geopolitical choice today, which is based on a close partnership, which is "more than a union". This is an inter-civilisational symbiosis that determines the future of Greater Eurasia and the whole world today.

"Greater Eurasia" instead of "Greater Europe"

In the 1990s, hopes for long-term strategic cooperation with the leading countries of Western Europe - Germany, France, Italy - were widespread in the Russian Federation. It was planned that a broad humanitarian dialogue, partnership in the energy sector, and technology exchange would serve to establish a "Greater Europe from Dublin to Vladivostok."

It was also assumed that such an alliance should be beneficial to the Europeans themselves from a geopolitical point of view, and would help them become more independent in the face of American hegemonic ambitions.

A significant part of the Russian political and business elites were set up to implement this scenario, and many European politicians shared these hopes.

In 2003, when the leaders of Russia, Germany and France jointly opposed the American invasion of Iraq, it seemed to many that cooperation between Russia and continental Europe had a future in terms of geopolitics. However, by the beginning of the 2010s, it became obvious that this scenario was not destined to come to life.

On the one hand, European politicians focused on dialogue with Russia were removed from power under obvious pressure from the United States. But this is the reason that lies on the surface. There were also deeper factors of a civilisational nature.

Russia and Europe have many external similarities, behind which, however, deep differences in mentality, values, and life priorities are often not being seen. Individualism, egoism, the cult of profit and the cult of superiority are deeply rooted in Western consciousness, especially in the modern historical period.

It also could not but affect relations between Russia and Europe.

By the way, a similar situation seems to have developed as a result in Sino-American relations. The United States failed to conduct dialogue with China as an equal partner on a mutually beneficial basis and began to demand unilateral concessions for itself, slipping into a mentoring tone, up to direct insults.

Proclaiming through the mouth of Brzezinski, on the one hand, the creation of the G2, and on the other, the United States made a different choice: a bet on the consolidation of the collective West, and with China they tried to behave like a world hegemon with a dependent periphery. But in relation to China, as well as in relation to Russia, such approaches, as is well known from many historical examples, do not work.

Europe's rejection of traditional spiritual and moral guidelines has led to the fact that our dialogue with Europeans at the value level has been seriously hampered. The situation is fundamentally different in the sphere of Russian-Chinese relations.

A superficial glance captures a lot of differences between Russian and Chinese culture, it would seem that we absolutely don't resemble each other. However, at a deep level, at the level of mentality and values, Russia and China are much closer to each other than Russia and the West.

Adherence to traditional morality, respect for the traditional family, for history, for ancestors and their cultural heritage brings Russians and Chinese closer, creates a field of value attraction between us. And this, obviously, opens up strategic prerequisites for successful long-term cooperation.

Moscow actually offered Beijing the format of partnership that was previously planned with Western Europe and did not take place for the reasons described above. We are talking about long-term energy cooperation, cooperation in strengthening the defence and security of our countries, and mutual support in the international arena.

Today, this scenario is being successfully implemented. And we can say with confidence that our movement towards each other is for the benefit not only of our countries, but also of all mankind. The Russian-Chinese symbiosis is becoming one of the key factors ensuring global stability in an era of turmoil and upheaval.

Now we see that "Greater Eurasia from Kaliningrad to Hong Kong" has a much better chance of success than "Greater Europe from Dublin to Vladivostok" had even in the best years of the Russian partnership with Berlin and Paris.

The task for the future is to ensure humanitarian sovereignty

In the modern world, it is difficult to overestimate the importance of stable and meaningful interaction, especially in strategic and mutually beneficial areas. This is the basis of stability not only in bilateral relations, but also in a much more global context.

The West and its leader, the United States, have already refused and continue to refuse fundamental agreements that ensured global stability. Please note that many of these agreements were concluded more than 30 years ago - during the former Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. However, the current state increasingly resembles the most disturbing years of that Cold War.

What can oppose this? Russia, as it's known, has made its proposals on security guarantees. China supported this initiative. In essence, we are talking about the fact that our countries insist on the priority of the international order established after the Second World War under the UN leading role. Moreover, they are ready to provide it - to guarantee, as they say in diplomacy.

In today's world, this is not just an allied position - it is a principled interaction based on the coincidence of strategic priorities. Not to mention the fact that the cooperation of two such powerful powers has a sobering effect. China, like Russia, is self-sufficient, and by combining economic opportunities, our countries complement each other almost completely.

Let me remind you that by the end of 2021, the Russian-Chinese trade turnover reached a new high of $140 billion. This creates a solid foundation on the way to achieving $200 billion in trade turnover, as agreed by the leaders of our countries.

China's strength is that, based on the experience of the USSR, it managed to combine a market economy with strategic planning. This provides the Chinese side with objective advantages and increases the effectiveness of the socio-economic policy as a whole.

All this, as well as the fact that we are also neighbours with a long border, allows us to move steadily along the chosen path without the intervention of external factors.

At the same time, it is obvious that in the development of our relations there are still many undeveloped areas, voids and gaps that need to be filled. Unfortunately, our peoples still know little about each other, there are great reserves for the development of public diplomacy, contacts through expert communities. Today, bilateral expert discussions are either narrow and non-public, or emphatically academic in nature.

A new type of expert cooperation is needed, on the basis of which a joint model of advanced design - geopolitical, economic and socio-cultural - can arise.

Among the topics for discussion, it is worth highlighting such semantic blocks as the problems of civilisational identity and traditional values in the 21st century, issues of equal partnership in a polycentric world, issues of sustainable development and environmental security, problems of transhumanism and the boundaries of human identity.

It is obvious that we must make more efforts to further bring our peoples closer together on the basis of creating a common humanitarian, value, semantic space and expanding the completeness of knowledge and ideas about traditions and cultural heritage.

Today, our countries are strong enough to defend their sovereignty in the defence sphere, in the sphere of economy, and in high technologies. However, in the current conditions, this is not enough. It is also important to ensure humanitarian sovereignty, the right to determine one's own image of the future, the image of the new reality that the rapid 21st century brings with it.

The West does not have a monopoly on progress, a monopoly on the future, on determining the parameters of progress and the boundaries of human identity. We must and will define these boundaries only for ourselves.

Russia and China are not only two world powers, they are two self-sufficient civilisations, they are unique civilisational worlds whose experience embodies the greatest achievements of the human spirit. Therefore, our dialogue is of unprecedented importance not only from the point of view of today's agenda, but also in the context of the further development of world history, from the point of view of possible prospects for the common fate of all mankind.