After U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken acknowledged China and Russia’s increasingly strong relationship in front of the Senate Wednesday, one foreign policy expert has raised red flags that the adversaries are trying to shape a new world order.
"It's really a return of the Russia-China axis," Atlas Organization founder and author Jonathan D.T. Ward said on "Mornings with Maria" Thursday. "So they're back in a sense. Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are both products of the Russian and Chinese revolutions, respectively."
"I think the best argument for Cold War II is, it's the same characters. Russia and China never really finished the job. They're back," he continued. "They're working together one more time. Russia's the junior partner now. I think that's going to go very badly for them in the long run."
Chinese President Xi Jinping kicked off his three-day state visit to Russia Monday by shaking hands and meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, with both leaders calling the other "dear friend."
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The meeting in Moscow marked Xi’s first international trip this year and comes just days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin, citing his alleged involvement in the abduction of Ukrainian children.
Towards the end of their meeting, both leaders reportedly signed a declaration of their political and economic commitment to each other, Blinken mentioned on Wednesday. Ward predicted Russia will become a "resource satrapy" for communist China.
"In the meantime, they're going to consolidate this economic relationship that's going to present very big challenges for the United States. So it means that we have to go forward with economic containment of China," the expert explained. "It makes no sense at all at this point to have a global economy that's dependent on a totally hostile state that's breaking bread with Vladimir Putin, economically backing his invasion of Ukraine and preparing for war with the United States in the Pacific."
Minimizing national security concerns related to China begins with containing their economy’s capacity, Ward ultimately argued, noting the U.S. should stop them from growing "more powerful and capable."
"It has to be restrained, constrained and contained," he reiterated. "This is how we beat totalitarian states in the past without having to go to war, and it's the best path forward in the future. And I think the Putin-Xi visit just proves the nature of this regime, the tightness of these two and their shared strategic coordination."
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An additional Chinese security concern is currently being addressed on Capitol Hill: TikTok. Its CEO Shou Zi Chew is set to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Thursday as the massive social media platform faces a potential ban over national security concerns that stem from its China-based parent company, ByteDance.
"The problem with TikTok is Bytedance, which is absolutely beholden to the Chinese Communist Party. This is one of China's tech giants, it's got relationships with the Chinese state," Ward weighed in. "That kind of reach in here, that's what our lawmakers are going to be talking about, the dangers of having that kind of reach into our society, 150 million Americans on this platform."
FOX Business’ Eric Revell contributed to this report.
