The Lawfare Podcast: What the War in Ukraine Means for China’s Global Strategy

Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine is putting one of its closest partners, China, in a difficult position. Just weeks before the conflict began, China and Russia announced a new partnership without limits that was seen as a shared bulwark against pressure by the United States and its allies. But Russia's choice to attack its neighbor Ukraine is an awkward tension with China's long-standing position against the use of force between states, and some cracks may be showing in the new relationship as China has so far not proven willing to come as wholeheartedly to Russia’s support as its pre-war declaration might have suggested.

To better understand how the war in Ukraine is impacting China's strategy toward the rest of the world, Scott R. Anderson sat down with two legal experts: Dr. Patricia Kim, a David M. Rubenstein Fellow at the Brookings Institution who specializes in China policy, and Professor Julian Ku, a professor at Hofstra University School of Law who has studied China's approach to the international system. They discussed the new relationship between China and Russia, China's role in the Ukraine conflict and what lessons it is taking away from the Western response, including for its own interests in Taiwan.