Revving up parallel optics, Russia and China recently extended the Treaty of Good-neighbourliness and Friendly Cooperation, which the Chinese CPC mouthpiece Global Times, noted presciently ‘sets an example for a new type of international relations’ and one which enables them to ‘safeguard global strategic stability’.
The zero-sum game of the alternative ‘authoritarian bloc’ coalescing against the ‘free world bloc’ of QUAD, just got reiterated. As the master of unpredictability, Putin does not shy away from occasionally and knowingly spicing up regional undercurrents by hosting joint military exercises with Pakistan i.e. ‘Friendship-2020’, that understandably gets decoded across the Line of Control (LOC), in another way.
To an extent, these cat and mouse games of geopolitical manipulations and counterintuitive posturing is par for course, as they are invariably accompanied by sending subtle messages to reinstate the status quo ante – the brewing warmth on…