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Key Points: Sino-Russian naval cooperation is intensifying, marked by large-scale joint exercises and patrols in strategic areas like the Pacific and Arctic. While their collaboration signals a shared challenge to Western hegemony, deep mistrust and limited interoperability hinder joint combat readiness.

-Exercises showcase China’s maritime growth and Russia’s attempts to project strength despite waning naval capabilities. However, their coordination often lacks sophisticated command-and-control mechanisms or shared strategic goals.

-Analysts argue that joint aggression, particularly against Japan, is unlikely due to dissimilar objectives and logistical constraints. Instead, these drills appear more symbolic, aiming to distract adversaries rather than signaling a credible warfighting alliance.

Sino-Russian Naval Drills: A Real Threat or Strategic Theater?

Moscow and Beijing are preparing to go to war together. At least, that’s what some in Washington are taking away from their latest surge in joint naval interactions in the Pacific, Arctic, and beyond. Yet, a closer inspection of these increasingly frequent, large-scale joint exercises is necessary to discern whether they reflect genuine strategic sympathy and combined military capacities. While Russia and China are making cooperative strides, their military and political leaders remain wary of over-reliance on the other. A shared antipathy toward Western hegemony masks a lack of trust in each other’s military solvency, significantly limiting interoperability and strategic alignment. 

While Sino-Russian naval cooperation is not new, it is still relatively young. According to CSIS, the two have held over two dozen naval exercises, patrols, and multi-domain exercises with naval elements since 2003, and their tempo is only increasing. Some high-profile exercises include the Joint Sea series and Maritime Security Belt. A RAND analysis emphasizes the dozen-plus exercises in strategic theaters like the Yellow, Eastern Mediterranean, Japan, East China, South China, Okhotsk, and Baltic Seas. 

In September 2024, Russia launched its most extensive series of air and naval drills since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As part of Ocean-2024, China deployed warships and aircraft to the North Pacific. Later that month, a joint Sino-Russian fleet embarked on the China-led Northern/Interaction-2024 exercise in the Seas of Japan and Okhotsk.  In October 2024, on top of more naval patrols with anti-submarine maneuvers, Russian and Chinese Coast Guard vessels patrolled the Bering Sea for the first time, following Russian and Chinese bombers’ novel summer operation in Alaska’s Air Defense Identification Zone. Chinese warships also drew suspicion in July 2024 for loitering in the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone near the Aleutian Islands, which came a year after a Sino-Russian flotilla neared the Aleutians and two years after a handful of Chinese and Russian vessels sailed in formation by Alaska. 

It’s not just exercises; official memoranda and commercial endeavors have codified Sino-Russian civil-military maritime cooperation over the last few decades. For example, beyond newly encroaching military maneuvers, the Far North has mainly hosted dual-use maritime operations, such as Chinese shipments of Russia-destined hydrocarbon infrastructure components. Russia’s robust northern seafaring legacy helps shepherd Chinese boats through ice-riddled waters, even spurring collaborative shipbuilding ventures. With these vessels come increased prospects for hybrid and gray-zone activity, such as the confounding October 2023 critical infrastructure incident in the Baltic Sea perpetrated by China’s NewNew Polar Bear and its Russian chaperone. 

What has caused this swell of Sino-Russian maritime cooperation? Blame geopolitics and geography. 

Geostrategy

Geopolitically, China walks a fine line between supporting Russia as a strategic partner and avoiding actions that would provoke U.S. sanctions or damage its relationships with Europe and other key trading partners. Symbolic joint naval exercises conversely help China enhance its military readiness and signal strategic convergence against the U.S. and its allies’ military dominance in the Pacific. Bilateral training can help Beijing build practical experience to inform potential confrontations involving Taiwan or other actors in the South China Sea. Geographically, Beijing views busy trade routes and untapped resources in the Pacific and elsewhere as critical to its long-term national security and economic sustenance, mandating an increased emphasis on sea-based power projection. And unlike Russia’s European flank, invasion or defense of any Pacific state must be primarily approached from the sea.

What elements should analysts look at to determine whether the two intend to conduct a joint offensive in the Pacific? China and Russia would need interoperable cross-domain communications systems, integrated command-and-control (C2) architectures, doctrinal and tactical harmony, compatible logistics support systems, robust intelligence-sharing, shared sensors, cross-embedded personnel, cyber and electronic warfare coordination, elegant mission planning and simulation tools, and deep integration of weapons systems. Rhetoric from Russian and Chinese state sources suggests that these exercises focus on joint responses and fielding or advertising new weapons. However, some analysts argue that potential wartime cooperation is more likely to materialize as asymmetrical Russian support of China’s ambitions in the Pacific than a joint offensive. Many note that the two lack context-driven interoperability, preferring to deconflict their forces by keeping Russian and Chinese units in separate areas. There is scant evidence that they have developed sophisticated joint C2 mechanisms. Exercises like Joint Sea 2016 showcased some improvements in technological integration but also demonstrated that their communication systems, such as radar and sonar data links, lag behind those used by U.S. and NATO forces. This suggests that, despite the spectacle, they are inadequately prepared for joint combat operations against a well-coordinated adversary.

Modern Russian Navy Submarine. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

One exception to any joint aggression may be Japan, which some say is a more feasible and worrisome contingency than collaborative operations in Taiwan. Reasons range from Japan’s reliance on and proximity to critical shipping chokepoints to Russia’s and China’s territorial disputes with Japan—China contests the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, whereas Russia contests the Kuril Islands. Concerned onlookers also point to the myriad Sino-Russian exercises and patrols that have violated Japanese airspace and waters, as well as tactics like amphibious assaults, as evidence that the two aspire to operational and regional strategic integration. So the argument goes, a sudden flareup cannot be ruled out even under the shadow of U.S. allyship, as “opportunistic aggression” could emerge out of geopolitical tumult elsewhere. While not impossible, a contemporaneous Sino-Russian invasion of Japan or any other state still seems far-fetched because their shared end is unclear. Proponents of Sino-Russian Pacific warfighting should reference evidence of such intimate planning and strive to be specific about which contingencies they worry will come to fruition.

Tensions

Though rapidly expanding, the People’s Liberation Army’s Navy (PLAN) remains less mature than its Russian counterpart, a counterpoint to the common appeal to China’s seniority. These drills have showcased China’s growing confidence in maritime capabilities, but insufficient interoperability and dissimilar strategic attitudes hinder joint combat readiness. Both navies seem focused on individually asserting dominance in their immediate backyards, their joint focus predictably in areas of strategic overlap. It’s easier to define what they stand against—Western gestures toward Sino-Russian containment––than for. Where does deepening coordination end and an “unholy” alliance begin? Are they fighting to the same ends? What happens after a joint “victory”?

Scholars should also consider the extent to which these exercises attempt to innovate to address forward-looking threats. For instance, the two have engaged with unmanned surface vessels and other emerging technologies. Still, this might be a tactical veneer that covers broader doctrinal stagnation and even incompatibility, at least on Russia’s part. For instance, exercises like Ocean-2024, which resurrect Soviet-era large-scale naval maneuvers characterized by comprehensive, multi-fleet coordination to overwhelm adversarial forces, highlight Russia’s reliance on compartmentalized flotillas, smaller ships, and ever-more obsolete platforms. In striving to signal strength after high-profile attrition in the Black Sea, the discrepancy between a promised prolific naval presence and the meager reality underscores Moscow’s strained capabilities in multi-theater blue-water operations. Innovation in the Sino-Russian relationship is further hampered by deep-seated and institutionalized wariness of technology theft, insecurities around corruption and espionage, and lack of confidence in each other’s equipment quality. It is unlikely that the two intend and are prepared to prosecute a joint offensive against the collective “West.”

Members of the People's Liberation Army navy are seen on board China's aircraft carrier Liaoning as it sails into Hong Kong, China July 7, 2017. REUTERS/Bobby Yip

Members of the People’s Liberation Army navy are seen on board China’s aircraft carrier Liaoning as it sails into Hong Kong, China July 7, 2017. REUTERS/Bobby Yip

Conclusion

As Sino-Russian military cooperation increasingly tests the waters, so does intrigue grow around its goals. Occasional joint drills have evolved into an emergent pattern of warships, bombers, and other assets prowling strategically sensitive theaters. Is this a sign of deeper military alignment and credible interoperability aimed at joint aggression or superficial maneuvers designed to keep rivals guessing and distracted? This maritime century may be shaped by the sincerity and substance of the Sino-Russian military relationship.

About the Author: Laurel Baker

Laurel Baker is the 2024 Rising Expert on Geostrategy in the Rising Experts Program at Young Professionals in Foreign Policy. Currently working for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory as a National Nuclear Security Administration Graduate Fellow, she previously conducted research at a variety of think tanks and nongovernmental organizations, including the Hoover Institution, the Institute for the Study of War, The Arctic Institute, the Wilson Center, and the National Academy of Sciences. Her work has appeared in the Wilson Center’s Polar Perspectives journal, Charged Affairs, and The Arctic Institute’s newsletter, The Arctic This Week. Baker holds an MA in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies from Stanford University, where she researched Chinese and Russian unconventional warfare. Her views are her own and do not represent those of Pacific Northwest National Laboratory or the US government.