"Ah, Romulans. They're so predictably treacherous."
-Weyoun, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Episode 151 (1)

Karma With Chinese Characteristics

Is there anything sweeter than karma? ...Well I guess that depends on whose karma we're talking about, and whether you're the one experiencing it, or watching someone else come face to face with it. For example, if you're a murderous dictator with a habit of carving off slices of neighboring countries, karma for you might not be so sweet after all (though that's not to say the rest of the world doesn't find it sweet to watch it happen to you).

In the Red Corner...

For years, Russian president Vladimir Voldemortovich Putana has repeated a now-somewhat-predictable playbook of arbitrarily deciding that pieces of neighboring countries are part of Russia. In 2008, he first dabbled in this practice in Georgia. He sent Russian troops into two restless regions of Georgia (Abkhazia and South Ossetia) disguised as locals, who then engaged in active warfare against the legitimate government of the region (Dickinson). In the midst of this, local proxies selected by Russia declared the region's independence, claiming to act on behalf of the people of course (while the people, who all had Russian guns pressed to their heads, offered no objections) (Reuters Staff).
Of course, these "independent republics" were about as "independent" as Warsaw Pact nations were in the Cold War (or as Belarus is now). At the time, Putin stopped short of actually having these proxies go through the song-and-dance of filing a request on behalf of these nonexistent "republics" to formally join the Russian Federation. That came later (Al-Jazeera Staff (1)).
Later, in 2014, Russia got a bit bolder. After Ukrainians from all over the country descended upon the capital city of Kyiv to throw a Russian puppet named Viktor Yanukovich out of the presidency after a hotly contested election, Russia sent troops into Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula to do the same thing (Konończuk). Their media narrative to support it was a rather nebulously defined double helix. One strand was "the government is persecuting Russian speakers here," which of course is denied by the 1.3 million Russian speakers who fled Crimea afterward (Gizicki, p. 17 - 19). The other strand was the go-to line for any event that does not go the way a nation hostile toward the US wants it to go: call it a "CIA coup" and claim victim status, despite a complete dearth of any evidence whatsoever that the CIA was involved (Al-Jazeera Staff (2)).
In fact, the CIA had their thumbs so far up the asses that they didn't even know it was happening until after the fact and they spent the next 90 days trying to adapt to it, but never mind facts. When the dust settled, Ukraine's government, which was still pulling itself together after throwing Russian puppet Yanukovich out of his ill-won presidency in the Euromaidan, known to Ukrainians as the "Revolution of Dignity," (and known to Russia and their faithful pet trolls as the so-called "CIA coup" mentioned above), had lost active control of the Crimean Peninsula.
Only this time, Russia went a step further. They ordered their proxies in the breakaway region to hold a referendum on formally joining Russia (Myers & Barry). The ballots in this referendum were carried away by Russian troops, counted in Russia, by Russian government officials behind closed doors with no oversight by the rest of the world and, surprise surprise, Russia decided the oblast crawling with Russian troops had "democratically chosen" to join Russia.
Of course, the rest of the story is recent enough to be fresh on everyone's mind. In the same year, Russian proxies operating in the Ukrainian oblasts of Lugansk and Donetsk declared themselves to be "People's Republics." In 2022, Russia recognized these two so-called "Republics" (DW Staff) and hastily signed mutual defense treaties with them that gave Russia the right to put bases on their soil, while promising Russian aid if they were ever "attacked," for example, by the nation that rightfully owns those oblasts seeking to destroy Russian proxies there and take them back. The next day, Russia launched a (ahem) "Special, Military, Operation," in Ukraine, wrapping it in a cocktail of rhetoric similar to the 2014 annexation of Ukraine ("protecting Russian speakers" while protecting Russia against some kind of nebulously defined "NATO aggression" that somehow has something to do with a nation that's never been part of NATO).
Oh, and this time he threw in Nazis. I mean, of course. A Neo-Nazi State is exactly who you'd expect to freely elect a Jewish president by more than an 80% majority while Far Right Parties claimed less than 2% of the vote, right? But again, I digress.
This laughably cynical little euphemism of "Special Military Operation" referred to a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which Russia's own political scientists rather openly admit is nothing more and nothing less than Russia's attempt to annex Ukraine by force as part of Russia's campaign to build a neocolonial Empire "new world (Apokov)." With this in mind, it should come as no surprise that as soon as Russia succeeded in more or less establishing an occupation government in the Ukrainian oblasts that form a land corridor between Russia and the occupied Crimean Peninsula, they organized in these oblasts a rather pathetically transparent set of referenda on joining Russia (OSW Staff). Of course, videos of Russian troops herding Ukrainians at gunpoint to fill out not-even-close-to-secret ballots, and of ballot counters counting completely empty ballots while claiming they are unanimously marked "yes" are all over the internet, but it's best not to dwell on such minutiae, isn't it?
In truth, no one should be surprised by this tactic. Marching Russian troops in and ordering a nation "vote to join Russia or be shot" has been one of Russia's favorite methods of imperialism for centuries. Catherine the Great used it during two of the three partitions of Poland (Rounding, p. 184), and the USSR used it in nearly every member-state that had once been part of the Russian Empire. Think of it as their signature move.

And speaking of aggressive, expansionist dictatorships and signature moves

In the Other Red Corner...

China's "salami-slicing" tactic, whereby they redraw a map every few years to lay claims to a few new swaths of territory based on new maps they've fabricated "discovered" which claim they have always owned that territory to begin with, has been the bane of Southeast Asia for decades. Whether it's their Nine Dash Lie in the West Philippine Sea or Xi's thinly-veiled claims that any place where a Han has ever put his feet became Chinese sovereign territory the moment those feet touched it, China is known from India's Aruchnal Pradesh to The Philippines' Panatag Shoal as a land-grabbing neo-colonizer. Until now, this land-grabbing has only been along their southern borders, never their northern. But again, the key words are "until, now."
China and Russia have one of the oldest, longest, and most ill-defined borders in the world, so it's no surprise they have a long history of territorial disputes, especially considering both nations' borders were defined for centuries as "as far as my armies have the power to make it stick." Of course, in the interest of putting up a united front, the two major Communist Powers of the Cold War era have tried to settle these quickly whenever they've come up in the past century. One such instance was Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island (known to the Chinese as Heixiazi Island), an island that sits in the Amur River, which is the river separating China's Dongbei region from the Russian Far-East.
In 2008 the two powers agreed, with much fanfare, to split the island in half and let each nation control half of it (He). Then, last week, China released a new "official" map, which it declared is the quintessential end-all-be-all in geographic accuracy (Ma). And in this map, they laid claim to territory belonging to numerous neighboring states including... you guessed it: Russia.
The map listed all of the previously divided island as Chinese territory (ABC NEWS Staff). Russian media was quick to notice the claim (Novoye Izvestya Staff), though Maria Zhakarova of the Russian Foreign Ministry insisted there was no debate and that both nations respected the 2008 resolution (RT Staff), which is bold, considering she held proof to the contrary in her hand as she did so. "Maps? What maps? What are you talking about? Of course China still respects my borders. They released a map saying what? Nonsense." One can't help but be reminded of a battered wife, walking out the door with her face covered in bruises while denying that there is any turmoil between her and the abusive husband whom she stays with simply because she's so ugly that no one else will have her.

Ironically, though Russia made no objection to China claiming its territory, Indian tabloids have run with the idea that Russia is furious over the map's claim of Indian territory (Hindustan Times Staff).
In any case, Russia is really not in a position to do anything other than bend over and tell China "thank you Sir, may I have another?" I commented more than a year ago on how Russia's imperial misadventure in Ukraine has left them a broken and ruined husk depending on China for life support, and Russia's slavish, fawning attitude toward Xi this past March confirmed that. I suppose Russia should be thankful, though, that China was more subtle this time than they were the last time they annexed a disputed island from Russia. In 1969, Chinese troops invaded the USSR's Damansky Island and slaughtered everyone in sight (Farley).

In all likelihood, this will only be the beginning of this issue. A great deal of the Russian Far-East sits upon land that once belonged to China (Baptista), and I've already mentioned China's "everything that was ever mine is mine, regardless of whether I lost it, sold it, or abandoned it" mentality. China made no secret of this a few years ago when Russia committed the faux pas of broadcasting a celebration of the annexation of Vladivostok... in the country they annexed it from.

Zhang Heqing, a Chinese diplomat currently posted in the embassy in Pakistan said, “Isn’t this what in the past was our Haishenwai?”
“Today we can only endure, but the Chinese people will remember, and one generation after another will continue to remember!” and another wrote, “We must believe that this ancestral land will return home in the future!” SCMP quoted one Weibo user as saying.
-TimesNowNews

Chinese internet users, including diplomats and officials, claim that Vladivostok used to be a part of China. They claim it was Qing’s Manchurian homeland but was annexed by the Russian empire in 1860 after China was defeated by the British and the French during the Second Opium war.
-Akshay Narang, TFI Post

With China so convinced of its own unstoppability, so assured of their "Heaven-mandated" right to conquer, and Russia's Far-Eastern troops spread so thin as so many of them have been sent to Ukraine, there's little Putin can do to stop China from helping itself to still more Russian land, especially considering how weak the Russian Army has proven itself to be. But Russians needn't be alarmed. After all...

...I'm sure China won't annex anything without holding a democratic referendum first.

(1) Okay, so on the charge of really, really needing to lay off the DS9 quotes, I can enter no plea other than guilty, and I throw myself upon the mercy of the court.

Works Cited

ABC News Staff. "China's new national map has set off a wave of protests. Why?" ABC News. 1 Sep, 2023. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/chinas-new-national-map-set-off-wave-protests-102855103

Al-Jazeera Staff (1). "Georgia’s South Ossetia cancels referendum on joining Russia." Al-Jazeera. 31 May, 2022. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/5/31/georgias-south-ossetia-cancels-referendum-on-joining-russia

Al-Jazeera Staff (2). "Putin accuses US of orchestrating 2014 ‘coup’ in Ukraine." Al-Jazeera. 22 Jun, 2021. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/6/22/russias-putin-accuses-us-of-orchestrating-2014-coup-in-ukraine

Apokov, Petr. "The offensive of Russia and the new world." RIA.org. 26 Feb, 2022. Accessed from The Wayback Machine. 5 Sep, 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20220226051154/https:/ria.ru/20220226/rossiya-1775162336.html

Baptista, Eduardo. "Why Russia’s Vladivostok celebration prompted a nationalist backlash in China." South China Morning Post. 2 Jul, 2020. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3091611/why-russias-vladivostok-celebration-prompted-nationalist

Dickinson, Peter. "The 2008 Russo-Georgian War: Putin’s green light." Atlanticcouncil.org. 7 Aug, 2021. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/the-2008-russo-georgian-war-putins-green-light/

DW Staff. "Russia recognizes independence of Ukraine separatist regions." DW. 21 Feb, 2022. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.dw.com/en/russia-recognizes-independence-of-ukraine-separatist-regions/a-60861963

Gizicki, Wojciech; Sheremata, Pavlo & Kovalchuk, Olena. Polish-Ukrainian Cross-Border Cooperation.
Farley, Robert. "How the Soviet Union and China Almost Started World War III." National Interest. 9 Feb, 2016. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://nationalinterest.org/feature/how-the-soviet-union-china-almost-started-world-war-iii-15152

He Na. "Big future for returned Heixiazi island." China Daily. 31 Oct, 2008. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2008-10/31/content_7160516.htm

Hindustan Times Staff. "Russia 'Ridicules' China For India; Says New Map 'Won't Change Ground Reality' | Watch." Hindustan Times. 2 Sep, 2023. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.hindustantimes.com/videos/news/russia-ridicules-china-for-india-says-new-map-wont-change-ground-reality-watch-101693598779391.html

Konończuk, Wojciech. "Russia’s Real Aims in Crimea." Carnegie Center. 13 Mar, 2014. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://carnegieendowment.org/2014/03/13/russia-s-real-aims-in-crimea-pub-54914

Ma Zhenhuan. "2023 edition of national map released." China Daily. 28 Aug, 2023. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202308/28/WS64ec91c2a31035260b81ea5b.html

Myers, Steven & Barry, Ellen. "Putin Reclaims Crimea for Russia and Bitterly Denounces the West." New York Times. 18 Mar, 2014. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. "https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/19/world/europe/ukraine.html

Narang, Akshay. "‘This is our land,’ China now claims Russia’s Vladivostok as part of its territory." TFI Post. 4 Jul, 2020. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://tfipost.com/2020/07/this-is-our-land-china-now-claims-russias-vladivostok-as-part-of-its-territory/

Novoye Izvestya Staff. "China has «annexed» the Russian half of the Great Ussuri Island on new maps." Newizv.ru. 30 Aug, 2023. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://en.newizv.ru/news/2023-08-30/china-has-annexed-the-russian-half-of-the-great-ussuri-island-on-new-maps-418045

TimesNow Staff. "Russia's Vladivostok celebration irks Chinese diplomat, says 'in the past it was our Haishenwai'." TimesNowNews. 3 Jul, 2020. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.timesnownews.com/international/article/after-galwan-valley-china-lays-claim-on-russia-s-vladivostok-calling-it-haishenwai/615563

Reuters Staff. "FACTBOX-Russia recognises South Ossetia and Abkhazia." Reuters. 25 Aug, 2008. Web. 5 September, 2023. https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-georgia-ossetia-regions/factbox-russia-recognises-south-ossetia-and-abkhazia-idUKLP53983920080826

Rounding, Virginia. Catherine the Great - Love, Sex and Power. 2006, London. St. Martins Publishing.
ISBN 978-0-312-37863-9

RT Staff. "Russia and China have no border dispute – Moscow." RT. 31 Aug, 2023. Web. 5 Sep, 2023. https://www.rt.com/russia/582175-china-border-island-map/