STRATEGIC TRENDS 2022 - Key Developments in Global Affairs

They also declared their opposition to the further expansion of NATO, the China now faces urgent questions formation of competing blocs in the about its strategic orientation, espe- Asia-Pacific region, the pursuit of the cially the extent to which it should US Indo-Pacific Strategy, and the es- continue to support Russia.6 It could tablishment of the Australia-US-UK distance itself from Russia, w. [...] Both on North Korean nuclear and ballistic countries support the denucleariza- missile tests and a suspension of US- tion of the peninsula in principle, but South Korea military exercises, with they prefer the preservation of a nu- Russia’s plan for a phased resolution of clear-armed North Korea to the col- the crisis based on reciprocal conces- lapse of the regime and the establish- sions. [...] Throughout the pathetic to China’s views.34 The joint Cold War, Japan’s defense strategy naval exercises that the two countries was based on ensuring the country’s conducted in the East China Sea in ability to respond to a threat from the 2014, along with others held in near- Soviet Union to the north. [...] 31 S T R A T E G I C T R E N D S 2 0 2 2 In the years following the breakup of the Quad and the implementa- of the Soviet Union, Russia became tion of the US Indo-Pacific Strategy increasingly attracted to the idea of in 2017. [...] For an English translation of the full ability to deter Russia in Europe while document, see “Joint Statement of the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China allowing the United States to devote on the International Relations Entering a New sufficient attention to the vital task of Era and the Global Sustainable Development,” China Aerospace Studies Institute, 04.02.2022.