China is a great state, and not only great in terms of the rating of “developed countries of the world”, but also in terms of area. It covers an area of nine and a half million square meters. It is the third largest country in the world, the first two of which were Russia and Canada.
As for the geographical position, China is located in East Asia and has access to the waters of the oceans.
The entire length of the land borders of the People's Republic of China is 22,117 kilometers. This border separates it from thirteen neighboring countries. Its largest neighbor is Russia, which is located in the northwestern part of China. In addition to Russia, other countries bordering China are:
- Kazakhstan;
- Kyrgyzstan;
- Tajikistan;
- Afghanistan;
- Nepal;
- India;
- Myanmar;
- Laos;
- Vietnam;
- North Korea;
- Mongolia.
Of course, the territory of the country is already so large, but there are also those territories that cannot be unambiguously attributed to the area of China, but it is also impossible to say that they do not belong to it. Such disputed territories include both the island of Taiwan and other islands: Senkaku, Paracel, Spratly, as well as other, but less significant territories.
Russia-China border
the great Wall of China
In addition to Russia, there are other states with which China shares a common border. One of these countries is Mongolia. The history of this cordon is very interesting and is of great importance for the country.
It's all about the Great Wall of China, which is known throughout the world. For thousands of years, Chinese people have built walls along the northern border of their country. This was necessary in order to prevent the attack of the nomads of Mongolia.
The Great Wall of China The very first wall was built by Emperor Shi Huang in 217-208 BC. It was called Long, as it was 2900 kilometers long. It had about twenty-five thousand towers. Such a wall could protect from enemies.
Throughout the time, two more walls were erected at this place. The one we see now is already numbered under the fourth. As for the history of the current wall, it began in 1368. Emperor Yuanzhang ordered the construction of a wall to protect their territories. Its construction lasted about 300 hundred years. And since that time, she has stood motionless in her place.
Between the walls that were erected, bricks and stones were poured, which were then tightly packed. In addition, there are many towers, fortresses and gates along the entire length of the Great Wall of China. Such a fortress is very strong and is a good defense.
Therefore, it can be safely called a historical and architectural monument that will last more than one century.
In addition to land borders, China also has a water border. It is washed by the waters of the East China Sea, the Yellow Sea, the South China Sea and the Gulf of Korea.
This is very favorable and contributes to the development of the maritime industry, provides access to other countries through water flows. In fact, such a geographical position is very beneficial for the country.
Indeed, thanks to this, the fishing industry is very well developed in China. In addition, since, in addition to this, there are still rivers in the country, the Chinese have no problems with water supply. In addition, access to such a volume of water makes it possible to organize industrial centers on land or to extract oil.
As for vegetation, sugar cane is grown in coastal areas. Another thing I would like to note is the numerical number of rice fields. Since rice is one of the main products for China, like fish, its cultivation is very important and allows you not to spend your own money on its purchase.
How is rice made? It is grown in flooded fields, caused by water borders. First, the seeds are germinated, and then the sprouts are planted in the soil. Such plantations occupy a third of the cultivated land. This is how China's main agricultural crop is grown.
In addition to rice plantations, tea plantations also play a significant role, for the care of which they also need a large amount of water. Thanks to its tea, China has become the world's leading producer.
It can be concluded that due to its proximity to such a large amount of water resources, China has reached the world level in the production of not only tea and rice, but also other crops and fish.
China border news
A lot of events and questions arise around the territory of the People's Republic of China. One of these was the annexation of thousands of square kilometers of disputed territory by Tajikistan. This area amounted to about three percent of the entire territory of Tajikistan itself.
How did it happen? - The fact is that in January 2011, China and Tajikistan distributed the disputed territories, according to which, most of them went to the second. On the one hand, this is not much, but on the other hand, this is a defeat for the diplomacy of Tajikistan.
Another interesting event related to these two countries occurred in May 2013. This year, Tajikistan gave part of its territories to China. Thus, the country paid its debt. It is worth noting that the given territories are those disputed territories that were transferred to the possession of Tajikistan, according to the agreement in 2011.
Also at the meeting in 2013, it was said that in the future, China's neighbor will have to give her their territories in the mountains, where no one lives. This land will be used by the Chinese for mining, jewelry, and research.
It is worth noting that for all its years of independence, Tajikistan has transferred to China about one and a half thousand square kilometers.
In 2014, China talked about joining its territories, the territory of the Russian Federation. This issue was discussed, but the decision regarding the accession was not made. In addition, in the same year, the PRC proposed a bill to simplify the issue of obtaining Chinese citizenship for residents of Russia. According to this bill, residence before obtaining citizenship in the country is not provided.
The most recent events were the threats to Russia from the PRC. As you know, the Russian Federation sent its troops to the territory of Ukraine in order to protect the Russians "from encroachment and violence." In response to this, they received a threat to their territory from the PRC.
But Russia is not the only country in which China has sent troops. In 2013, the PRC seized the territory of the Gorno-Badakhshan region of Tajikistan. The purpose of the capture was to expand their borders. As a result, the population had to leave this territory and migrate, as military operations did not allow civilians to live in these places.
Gift from the German Chancellor
When Chinese Representative Xi Jinping visited Germany in April 2014, the Chancellor gave him an unexpected and surprising gift. It was "the first accurate map of China", created in 1735 in Germany. It was an impressive gift that stunned the Chinese people.
The peculiarity of the map was also that it depicted the territories of Russia, which at that time belonged to China. Everyone liked this gift very much, and many said that such a gesture was “more eloquent than a hundred thousand words.”
Possible perspective of China's state borders
Given the way the representatives of the PRC are speaking, they clearly want change. To do this, in every possible way demonstrate their intentions. It might sound like this:
- "This map given to us tells us who our real enemy is";
- “This map has everything we need to have, especially the northern part”;
- “We were directly told that Russia took most of our lands.”
You can of course continue, but the meaning is clear. China wants to return the territories that previously belonged to it by any means. But China cannot do anything yet.
In December 2014, at a meeting of the council of the Shanghai Organization, China demonstrated a new program, according to which the production capacities of the non-commodity sector will be transferred to Kazakhstan. The entire cost of the agreement, which was concluded during the negotiations, amounted to fourteen billion dollars.
Based on the results of recent events, we can conclude that the PRC is rapidly trying to direct all its actions and capabilities towards the return of lands that once belonged to them. They began to declare this to the representatives of Russia.
In order to regain Siberia, the Chinese are actively fighting. They launch their troops into this territory and do their best to show that they are determined. But, nevertheless, Russia is confidently defending itself and does not want to give up its lands to the power of another country.
Thus, both parties believe that a certain part of the land belongs to them. And all why? Because these lands originally belonged to the Chinese, so they consider them theirs. But on the other hand, now this is the territory of the Russians, therefore, why would they give it to another state. So there is a struggle in which each side sees itself as a winner.
Messages about the intentions of the PRC regarding the Russian lands do not leave the news feed, every day some new facts become clear. Of course, because the two largest and most influential states compete. But how this fight will end, and who, after all, will be the winner, is unknown. We can only follow the course of events.
But now, China is directing all its actions to protect Ukraine, according to media reports. And what actually provoked their offensive attacks, we can only guess. Is China really trying to help Ukraine, or is it hiding behind this, choosing a good moment to achieve its main goal.
It should be taken into account that not only with Russia, but also with other neighboring countries, China's relations have become aggravated. These countries now include Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam.
And recently, one of the leaders of China said that China should defend the territorial sovereignty of the state, maritime interests and rights. Perhaps this was the reason for the aggravation of territorial disputes with the "neighbors".
But, in early December, measures were taken in connection with which the authorities of China and Japan will direct their activities towards rapprochement of states by reducing the tension that arose due to the difference of opinions regarding the territorial belonging of the Senkaku Islands.
Recently, you can see how often China appears in the news. This is not surprising, since in addition to territorial disputes, the authorities are also involved in the economic development of the country. So China has become one of the leading countries in the world, catching up, and in some ways even surpassing, the United States.
This is a very developed state, about which you want to learn more and more. In addition to interesting facts and historical moments, China can please with its sights and monuments of architecture, production and culture. It is worth visiting China at least once to feel all the greatness of the country and the people who live on its territory.
And in order to learn a little more about China, its cultural heritage and recent events, you can go on vacation during your vacation. You will get a sea of unforgettable emotions and be delighted.
The Chinese border has a very long history that does not end to this day.
Good articles to follow:
- - the largest center of international trade
- and its traditions
Thinking out loud
Politics
R The Russian border with China is the second longest after Kazakhstan - 4209.3 and 7512.8, respectively. And far from always this border was calm. Until recently, border disputes with China were commonplace. Sometimes it came to open clashes, as was the case, for example, on Damansky Island.
The initiator of the border disputes was Khrushchev, a corn-brained idiot of bad memory, who managed to quarrel Russia with China, as a result of which the latter moved from friendship and cooperation with the USSR to establishing close cooperation with the United States. This determined our geopolitical defeat in the early 1990s.
The 1991 Soviet-Chinese border agreements, signed during the reign of the devil-marked Gorbachev, established the border on the Amur along the main channel of the river. It was Gorbachev, an unscrupulous dealer in the interests of the motherland, who, by this agreement, surrendered many islands that were previously controlled by the USSR, including Damansky Island, to China. However, this agreement did not completely resolve mutual claims.
The border issue was finally settled in October 2004 in Beijing, when border agreements were signed, which served as a starting point in establishing close cooperation with China, which is successfully developing to this day.
The article below is about the history of creating borders with China and the ups and downs on this thorny path.
Reference
Nikolai Viktorovich Starikov is a Russian public and political figure, writer, blogger, publicist, political scientist. Commercial Director of OJSC "First Channel - St. Petersburg".
P having visited Khabarovsk, it is impossible not to discuss an issue that greatly worries many citizens of Russia, and Khabarovsk residents are especially worried. Chinese territory is visible from the beautiful waterfront of this city to the naked eye. The majestic Amur flows nearby. There are several islands in the middle of the river. In 2008, Russia transferred Tarabarov Island and part of Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island to China.
Why did this happen? The liberal community has presented and continues to present what happened as a "one-sided" and "unjustified" concession on the part of our country in relation to China.
The best way to understand the situation is to look at the facts.
This is an article by Khabarovsk resident Artem Yakovlevich Krivosheev, who tried to sort out the whole situation, as they say, “by the bones”.
“Why did Russia agree to transfer Tarabarov Island and part of Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island to China? Indeed, it is difficult to agree that the concession of 174 sq. km. Russian territory is the success of our diplomacy. However, gentlemen journalists, shouting "about the sale of the interests of Russia", however, as always, act in the interests of the moment and greatly simplify the problem. Let's try to figure out what made the Russian President do this. And the history of the issue dates back to 1858 ...
Until 1858, the modern Amur Region, the Jewish Autonomous Region, the southern part of the Khabarovsk Territory and the Primorsky Territory, according to the Nerchinsk Treaty of Russia and China in 1689, were, as it were, “neutral territory”. Then it suited both states. However, with the beginning of the confrontation between Russia and England (after the Napoleonic Wars), the situation with the significance of the modern territory of the Amur region begins to change. There was a growing danger of these territories being occupied by the British and French, and then, having a kind of “wedge” protruding into the continent, the powers of the sea could successfully launch a struggle against both mainland China and mainland Russia.
The consequences of such a development of events were well represented by the Governor-General of Eastern Siberia N. N. Muravyov: “There was a not unreasonable assumption that the British would occupy the mouth of the Amur,” reported N.N. Muravyov to Emperor Nicholas I. - What forces and means will then be required from the government so that Eastern Siberia does not become English, when an English fortress becomes at the mouth of the Amur, and English steamships go along the Amur to Nerchinsk and even to Chita? ... If instead of an English fortress there was a Russian fortress at the mouth of the Amur, as well as in the Peter and Paul port in Kamchatka, and a flotilla went between them, and for greater precaution, so that in these fortresses and on the flotilla garrisons, crew and authorities were delivered from inside Russia, - then with these small funds, for all time, the possession of Siberia and all its inexhaustible riches would be ensured for Russia.
The Crimean War and the ongoing opium wars in China have clearly demonstrated that if the Russians do not occupy the Amur region, then the British or, in extreme cases, the French, following in the wake of their policy, will do so. Being a talented politician and having authority from the emperor, Governor-General N. N. Muravyov initiated the conclusion of a new border treaty with China. According to the Aigun Treaty of May 16, 1858, the entire left bank of the Amur was withdrawn to Russia up to the mouth of the river. A direct addition to the agreement was the Beijing Treaty, concluded between Russia and China on November 2 (14), 1860, as part of a series of agreements between China and European countries in Beijing, which was burned and looted by the British and French. The border between the two countries was established along the Amur, Ussuri and Sungari, through the lake. Khanka, to the river. Tumyndzyan. Russia, thus, finally secured the Ussuri region. The western border between the two countries was also fixed. The treaty provided for the subsequent determination of the border on the ground, both in its eastern and western sections.
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According to the agreement, the eastern border between Russia and China was established, starting from the confluence of the Shilka and Argun rivers, downstream of the river. Amur to the place where the river flows into it. Ussuri. The treaty avoided the issue of ownership of the islands. However, as part of the demarcation work, the Russian side compiled and attached to the treaty a map of 25 versts per inch, attached to the text of the Beijing Treaty. An indication of the existence of such a map is found in article 1 of the text of the treaty, which reads: “Moreover, in pursuance of the ninth article of the Tientsin Treaty, a compiled map is approved, on which the boundary line, for greater clarity, is marked with a red line and its direction is shown in the letters of the Russian alphabet: A, B, C, D, D, F, G, 3, I, I, K, L, M, N, O, P, R, C, T, U. This card is signed by the authorized representatives of both states and sealed with their seals » . It was on this map that Count N.P. Ignatiev drew a border line with a red pencil along the Chinese banks of the Amur and Ussuri rivers, and in the Khabarovsk region along the Kazakevicheva channel. However, at the conclusion of the Beijing Treaty, the Chinese representative, Prince Gong, refused to sign this map, and in 1861-1886. a description of the border line was drawn up only on its section from the mouth of the river. Ussuri to the mouth of the river. Foggy, which seriously confused the demarcation of the state border along the Amur. Thus, the Beijing Treaty provided for gradual work on the demarcation of the border. This work was carried out in Primorye, Central Asia, on the Argun, but on the Amur, until the beginning of the 1990s, no work was carried out on the demarcation of the state border, only a common delimitation line was recorded.
Thus, although this is surprising, Russia and China did not mark a clear border on the Amur for various reasons for more than 100 years - from 1860 to 1990.
All this gave rise to a lot of controversy and difficulties. The Beijing Treaty did not say anything about the ownership of the islands, the Chinese representative, according to the terms of the agreement, did not sign the map. However, the emperor of China approved the decree along with the map. In addition, the agreement stated that the border runs downstream of the river. Amur to the place where the river flows into it. Ussuri. The question arose of what to consider as the confluence of the Ussuri River into the Amur. Even among Russian scientists there was no unity about what should be considered the mouth of the river. Ussuri: points located in the area of st. Kazakevicheva or in the Khabarovsk region.
However, realizing the strategic importance of these islands for the then military post of Khabarovka, Russia immediately established control over the islands of Bolshoi Ussuriysky and Tarabarov. To avoid border conflicts, all activity on the islands was limited to haymaking. To fix the line of the state border on the ground, the Russian-Chinese demarcation commission in 1861 on the Chinese coast opposite the village of Kazakevicheva installed a wooden pole with the letter “E”, which had the coordinates 48º16’20” N.L. and 152º37′ E In 1886, the wooden pole was replaced by a stone one installed in the same place. On the “Map of China and the Amur River Coast” (1859) and the “Map of Manchuria” (1897) published in Russia, the archipelago was designated as the territory of Russia. Despite this, the Chinese side has repeatedly made claims to the archipelago, accusing the other side of deception and unauthorized transfer of the demarcation pillar. .
However, before the start of the First World War, the demarcation of the state border along the Amur was never carried out. For example, according to the instructions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia, in 1911 the coastal population was asked to “use those islands that they recognize as belonging to them, ignoring the protests of the Chinese” until the end of the delimitation. In addition, the determination of the boundary along the main fairway (by the maximum depth of the channel) on the Amur and Ussuri was very difficult. The point is in the peculiarities of their course. These rivers carry a lot of silt, which constantly settles at the bottom - and, of course, exactly where the main river flow goes, that is, along the fairway. As a result, the fairway of the rivers shifts every now and then. There are quite a few islands in the rivers. As a rule, silt settles on one side of the island, and on the other side, at the same time, bottom sediments are washed away by the current. Therefore, the fairway now and then goes from one side of the island to the other. Thus, the island, which until recently was considered to belong to one of the parties, according to the fairway rule, turns out to belong to the other. Based on this principle, it is not at all possible to determine the belonging of the islands of Bolshoi Ussuriysky and Tarabarov. Since there was no clear understanding of what should be considered the main fairway. This feature of the Amur and Ussuri rivers was used by the Chinese side in conducting "irrigation wars" in the region of Bolshoi Ussuriysky and Tarabarov, with a serious aggravation of relations with the USSR under Khrushchev, and later under Brezhnev. The meaning was simple: the Chinese sank barges with sand in the Kazakevichev channel, increasing its siltation, which subsequently caused the fairway to go north and automatically annex the disputed islands to Chinese territory. Accordingly, we carried out dredging works. It came to oddities: the Chinese filled up the channel at night, and we deepened it during the day.
With such a baggage of contradictions, the state border existed all the years of the First World War, the revolution and the civil war in Russia. In 1929, using the conflict on the CER as a pretext, our troops occupied Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island. Being in close proximity to Khabarovsk and not previously controlled by our troops, the island could be used to shell the city, where industry began to be built. In 1931, Manchuria was occupied by the Japanese. In the light of these events, a military presence on the islands was simply necessary. In addition, the USSR took control of almost all the islands on the Amur and Ussuri. Actually, the border remained in this position until the creation of the People's Republic of China in 1949. The young state owed much to the USSR, in addition, the general ideology, competent policy towards China of the Stalinist USSR did not give rise to the border problem. The PRC and the USSR acted as a united front against a common enemy - the Anglo-Saxon powers. February 14, 1950 in Moscow, a Soviet-Chinese Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance was signed for a period of 30 years, called, according to I.V. Stalin "to serve the cause of ensuring peace in the Far East against all and sundry aggressors and warmongers." In accordance with the Treaty of Friendship, Union, Mutual Assistance (1950), the Soviet-Chinese border, before the revision of bilateral relations, was a border of good neighborliness, where active ties were maintained between the population of the border regions, lively trade was conducted, and cultural exchange was established. Agreements on cooperation were concluded in a number of border areas, including the “Agreement on the procedure for navigation on the border rivers Amur, Ussuri, Argun, Sungach, and Lake. Khanka and on the establishment of a navigable situation on these waterways ”(1951), on forestry, on the joint fight against forest fires in the border areas, etc. Within the framework of these agreements, the de facto guarded border line was not questioned. The transfer of topographic maps to the PRC with the designation of the entire border line confirms the absence of claims from the Chinese comrades. There were no comments from the Chinese side regarding the line of the border.
Problems began with Stalin's death and Khrushchev's rise to power. By this example, one can clearly see the consequences of the country's leader's misunderstanding of the canons of geopolitics. This "projector" managed in a few years to surrender a number of positions to the Anglo-Saxon powers and greatly spoil relations with allied China. However, until 1960, China did not put forward territorial claims. It is this year that the long-standing and unresolved territorial issue begins to rise, as a reflection of the general sharp deterioration in relations between countries. In whose interests? In the interests of the United States, of course. In 1960, the USSR unexpectedly recalled Soviet specialists from China and almost simultaneously the first episode occurred on the border, which showed the existence of disagreements between the USSR and China on the issue of the border line and the ownership of certain sections. We are talking about an incident in 1960, when Chinese pastoralists were grazing cattle in the territory under Soviet jurisdiction (near the Buz-Aigyr pass in Kyrgyzstan). When the Soviet border guards arrived, the shepherds declared that they were on the territory of the People's Republic of China. Later it turned out that they acted on the directive of the authorities of their province. On this occasion, the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of China and the USSR sent several notes to each other and made oral statements in which for the first time since the formation of the PRC, at the official, diplomatic level, a different understanding of the line of the border with the Soviet Union has been revealed.
Since the autumn of 1960, the systematic exits of Chinese citizens to the islands on the border rivers of the Far East, which are under our control, began. They told the Soviet border guards that they were on Chinese territory. The reaction of the Soviet border guards to the incidents has also changed. If earlier they simply ignored the crafts of Chinese peasants in a number of territories under Soviet jurisdiction, then, starting in 1960, they tried to suppress them .
In this situation, the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU decided to create an interdepartmental commission of specialists from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the KGB and the Ministry of Defense, whose task was to select and study treaty acts on the border with the PRC. The commission identified 13 sites where there were discrepancies on the maps of the parties and 12 where the distribution of the islands was not carried out. The border line itself did not have a clear designation on the ground, because. Of the 141 border markers, 40 were preserved in their original form, 77 were in a destroyed state, and 24 were absent altogether. It was also noted that the description of the border in treaty acts is often of a general nature, and many treaty maps were drawn up on a small scale at a primitive level. In general, according to the conclusion of the commission, it was noted that the entire border line with the PRC, except for the section in the Pamirs south of the Uz-Bel pass, was determined by agreements. In the case of border negotiations, the commission proposed to draw the border not along the banks of the rivers, but along the line of the middle of the main fairway on navigable rivers and along the line of the middle of the river on non-navigable rivers, and not as it was indicated by the red line on the map attached to the Beijing Treaty, according to which the border went along the Chinese coast. That is, the border was determined very approximately, its new demarcation was necessary. The uncertainty of the border on the ground gave an excellent reason for creating conflict situations.
And China actively used the border problem as a pretext for conflicts. The statistics of violations showed that from 1960 to 1964 their number grew rapidly, and in the second half of the 60s the incidents became more acute. In 1960, the number of violations was about 100, in 1962 there were already about 5,000. In 1963, more than 100,000 Chinese civilians and soldiers took part in the illegal crossing of the Soviet-Chinese border. Thus, Khrushchev's quarrel with China marked the beginning of a very difficult and painful process of demarcation of the entire state border. Under Khrushchev, in February 1964, consultations began with the PRC on border issues. Moreover, the Chinese put forward obviously unrealistic demands. So China demanded that the Beijing and Aigun treaties be recognized as “unequal”. Here it is necessary to understand that the task of China at that time was not to resolve territorial disputes, but to aggravate them and provoke a conflict, demonstrating to the United States its determination to resist the USSR.
In April 1964, the parties exchanged topographic maps indicating their understanding of the border line and created a working group, after which they proceeded directly to the consideration of the border line. As a result of studying Chinese maps and comparing them with Soviet ones, it was found that there are discrepancies in drawing the border line on these maps in 22 sections, of which 17 are located on the western part of the Soviet-Chinese border (now the Central Asian republics of the former USSR) and 5 sections - on eastern part of the border. These sections approximately coincided with the sections indicated in their note by the interdepartmental commission of 1960. On the Chinese maps, 3 more sections were indicated that did not appear in the materials of the commission, including a rather large section in the area of the Bedel Pass (Kyrgyzstan), as well as islands near Khabarovsk.
Based on the results of the examination of the maps in Moscow, it was concluded that it was possible to conduct negotiations not on individual sections, as previously assumed, but on the entire border, as the Chinese delegation insisted. This approach became possible because for the most part of the border line there were no vital divergences. On the longest line, which required clarification - the river border in the Far East, the parties had the same understanding that the border should have passed along the main fairway. In this regard, the delegation was given an additional instruction - to confirm the line of the border in areas where the parties understand it in the same way.
So, let's remember - Khrushchev initiated the border problem, who poured mud on Stalin, who was an indisputable authority for Mao Zedong, and committed a number of unfriendly actions against China. The result of Khrushchev's short-sighted policy was the fighting on Damansky Island, as well as in Kazakhstan, and, most importantly, China's turn from friendship and cooperation with the USSR to the United States. Which largely determined our geopolitical defeat in the early 1990s. The border issue was a consequence of this policy.
Further events developed as follows. During Gorbachev's timeDuring the negotiations in 1987 - 1991, which culminated in the signing of the Agreement on the Soviet-Chinese border of 1991, it was established that the border on the Amur should pass along the main fairway of the river . Under this agreement, many islands that were previously controlled by the USSR, including Damansky Island, turned out to be Chinese territory.
Now a question. Does anyone remember the angry articles of the liberals that Gorbachev was selling his homeland and gave China several dozens of “originally Russian islands” at once? Nevertheless, here Mikhail Sergeevich, with his passion for unilateral concessions, nevertheless helped to resolve the long-term border problem, largely initiated by Khrushchev's policy.
However, this agreement bypassed the solution of the border problem near the islands in the Khabarovsk region. And you can see the reason on the map below. The southernmost channel between China and the islands of Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky is the Kazakevich channel. If we consider it as the confluence of the Ussuri into the Amur, then all the islands are Russian territory. And if we consider the place to the north of the Big Ussuri Island as the confluence of the Ussuri into the Amur, then the islands are completely Chinese territory. And this option is unacceptable for Russia, since then the border will pass directly in the immediate vicinity of Khabarovsk (the left bank will be Chinese, and Khabarovsk is on the right).
In fact, this was the last unresolved territorial dispute with China (together with the island of Abagaytuy on the Argun) at the time President Putin took office. Now it is necessary to understand the geopolitical context in which Putin operated in the early 2000s. From 2003 to 2004, Vladimir Putin initiates an object lesson for those who want to give Russian subsoil under the control of US monopolies and, by order of the Americans, buy up the State Duma (the Yukos case and the landing of Khodorkovsky), cancels the colonial, in fact, the PSA law (Partition Agreement products), introduces the NDPI (“Tax on Minerals” that fills the current state budget). Putin then takes the next step. In October, Russian-Chinese negotiations open in Beijing, at which, along with a number of unpublished agreements, additional agreements are signed that regulate all existing territorial disputes between Russia and China.
Since in the case of the Khabarovsk Islands it was impossible to apply the principle of delimitation along the fairway, the parties agreed to divide Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island into the southern Chinese and Northern (most developed) Russian parts. In addition, in exchange for the northern part of the Greater Ussuri, we ceded half of the island of Abagaytuy to the Argun. A new principle was applied - territories were divided according to landmarks on the ground.
Through the cries of the liberals “about trade with the Motherland”, the fact was “missed” that for the first time in the history of Russia and China, all claims and disputes were removed from the entire length of 4300 km of the Russian-Chinese border. Of course, the transfer of part of the islands cannot be unambiguously called a success, and I am far from thinking of justifying our President, however, for some reason, dishonest journalists do not say that the situation with the state border that developed in the early 2000s was inherited by Putin from Khrushchev and Gorbachev. Where the first quarreled with our main geopolitical ally, as a result of which the territorial issue was initiated, and the second successfully solved this problem, finally ruining the country he led. As a result, the Russian Federation, in terms of strength and influence in the world, and most importantly, the presence of trump cards in the negotiations in 2004, was far from the Stalinist USSR of the 1952 model. In 1952, an agreement on borders could be concluded on favorable terms for us, since the space for diplomatic bargaining was incomparably wider.
Was it possible to resolve the territorial issue in the conditions of our time in some other way? This is a big question. The transfer of part of the island near Khabarovsk was the result of almost 150 years of history of our victories and defeats, the strengthening and weakening of Russia, and was not a "one-time concession from Russia." So why are liberal journalists and overly emotional patriots scolding Putin so much? Let's get to the facts. In October 2004, border agreements were signed in Beijing, and the border issue was finally settled. Immediately after that, on December 31, 2004, the Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 1737-r was issued on the design and construction of the Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean (ESPO) oil pipeline with branches to China. (The legal registration of the border was completed only in July 2008, when Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi signed an additional protocol describing the line of the Russian-Chinese border in its eastern part [ ).
The leadership of Russia and China has set a course for cooperation and good-neighborly relations with each other, eliminating the last territorial disputes that could seriously spoil relations between the two countries and lead to a Russian-Chinese war, which the United States needs so much. This is what liberal bloggers and journalists, or rather their overseas sponsors, don't like.
They need a confrontation, or better yet, a war between the two most powerful continental countries.
And the more reasons for conflict, the better.
1 In fact, last year I already climbed the roof of one of the 25-storey buildings "Crown" on Volochaevskaya Street and even posted it on my blog. However, much has changed since then, especially on the other side of the border with China. The neighbors began to actively develop the territories they inherited as a result of concessions to Russia - primarily the western part of the Big Ussuri Island. Our task is with a big fan of this topic Sasha aleonkin (by the way, he writes a lot about border China in his blog) saw the photography of new objects right on the other side of the border. We didn’t go far, because we still don’t have permission to visit the border zone. We made it easier - we took pictures from the 15th and 25th floors of a building located in the central part of Khabarovsk. This height was quite enough for us, since the center of the Far Eastern capital of Russia is separated from the border with the Middle Kingdom by some three dozen kilometers. In fact, we originally planned to get on the roof, but, unfortunately, we did not succeed. We were not very lucky with the weather either - a cloudy morning was not very conducive to the effective use of a not particularly fast telephoto lens, which gives more than 20x magnification. However, what happened, happened. Some of the footage, in my opinion, is quite interesting. Well, as a kind of bonus, I added to them a few photos of the central part of Khabarovsk.
Claims to these lands and the small islands adjacent to them were presented by the PRC as early as 1964 after a sharp cooling in more than friendly relations with the USSR. Since the 1990s, hydrotechnical work has been actively carried out to strengthen the coast on the Chinese side, which also contributes to the erosion of the Russian coast and the displacement of the main channel of the Amur. The matter largely comes down to the not quite clear geographical marking of the border back in the 1860s, when the Russian Empire seized these lands from China (the latter, however, to a large extent belonged only nominally). The USSR subsequently even renamed the main passage of the Ussuri on the maps as the Amur channel, but this did not help the new Russia, which was weak in military and economic terms. In order to normalize relations with a powerful and tirelessly growing neighbor and close the issue of the border near Khabarovsk, which could become a real time bomb in the future, in October 2004 the PRC's territorial claims were satisfied. Four years later, the western part of Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island, Tarabarov and smaller islands on the Amur were transferred to China. The border moved close to the capital of the Far East (here it should be noted that officially the village of Ussuriysky (Chumka), which lies on the eastern tip of the Big Ussuriysky Island, is part of Khabarovsk).
A high white elevator in the background and a mass of private sector houses is already the village of Krasnaya Rechka in the southern part of Khabarovsk. Here in the picture, due to the relatively small height of the shooting point, the Amur channel crossing the frame is completely invisible.
Behind the pontoon bridge is a high-voltage power line pylon leading to the Jewish Autonomous Region (JAO).
In the center of the frame, you can see a stele, which actually stands not on Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island, but on the other side of the canal from it. It crowns the Square of the Sun, which the Chinese also call the East Pole of China. It is believed that this is the most distant continental point of the Middle Kingdom to the east. Strictly speaking, this is not so: sixty kilometers to the south, the border runs a little further east, but here, at the confluence of the Amur and Ussuri, the place looks much more symbolic. The erected monument symbolizes the sun rising in the east (the yellow ball is crowned with the hieroglyph Dong, meaning east), and vividly resembles two small steles donated to Khabarovsk by the Chinese side, the cities of Suifenhe and Jiamusi (the first of them stands at the intersection of Lenin and Volochaevskaya streets - close to the house , from where I was filming, and the second one is near the intersection of Leningradskaya and Sinelnikova). About 35 kilometers separated me from the Sun Square.
Even more to the right, you can see the gilded dome of the chapel of St. Victor, installed on the Big Ussuriysky Island in 1999 in memory of Russian and Soviet soldiers and officers who died defending the country's Far Eastern borders. It is worth noting here that in the 20th century at least two military operations died down in these places: in 1929 during the conflict with China on the CER, and in 1945 the attack on the Japanese Kwantung Army began from here. After the border was moved, the chapel ended up in the border zone near the most neutral zone.
The white building on the right is the tower of the Chinese border outpost on Bolshoi Ussuriysky Island, which, of course, occupies most of the picture here. In the distance behind the tower is the mast of the mobile operator China Mobile - indeed the easternmost in China.
It is planned to build a land border crossing on the island, but the Russian side does not seem to be in a hurry with this, knowing full well that the treasury of the Celestial Empire will benefit to a greater extent from an additional round of development of border trade, because goods and services in China are several times cheaper. Also on the mainland, the Chinese have started building an airport that will connect Fuyuan with at least Harbin and Beijing, from where it will be possible to get to any corner of the world. Such a project will inevitably create competition for Khabarovsk International Airport, if, of course, China develops a simplified visa procedure similar to the one that operates for Russians in relation to organized tours to border cities. It's no secret that direct flights from Khabarovsk to international hubs like Seoul and Beijing are very expensive.
One way or another, with the development of the western part of the island, the emphasis is not only on Russian tourists, but also on domestic tourism. Even now, cruise ships with Chinese on board are still scurrying along the river channels, sometimes passing opposite the center of Khabarovsk.
By the way, on the right, it looks like you can see part of the future majestic bridge from the Chinese coast to the island.
To the left, the Russian frontier outpost turns white.
Much closer to the city you can see the Chinese border outpost on Tarabarov Island.
Here are the high-rise buildings of Accessible Lane, on the other side of which Pionerskaya Street begins, running parallel to the river bank.
The red roof deserves special attention, just visible in the green leaves to the left of the nine-story panel building. This is one of the houses of the military department, or rather the artillery team. Dating back to the 1880s, it is one of the oldest surviving buildings in Khabarovsk. I am slowly preparing a story about this remarkable corner of the city at the beginning of Komsomolskaya Street, but so far something is too slowly ...
The picture shows the eastern part of the city center. Actually, houses got into the frame, even standing on the one bearing the name of Lenin. The green massif to the right of them belongs to the Dynamo park.
To the right in the foreground, the walls of the air defense headquarters turn yellow, and to the left, in a small square named after the friendship of Khabarovsk and Suifenhe, there is the stele I mentioned above, donated by China. She is not visible in the picture.
The history of Russian-Chinese contradictions in terms of the islands of Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky has about fifty years; prehistory goes back to the 17th century.
The history of Russian-Chinese contradictions in terms of the islands of Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky has about fifty years; prehistory goes back to the 17th century. I think it makes sense to dwell on it in more detail - after all, you need to know what exactly China does not like in the previous treaties and on what it bases its claims to the islands belonging to Russia.
Initially, Russia and China were separated by vast territories, sparsely populated or completely deserted. The northern border of China was the Great Wall of China, located at a distance of more than a thousand kilometers from the current border. Of course, in those days, the Chinese could not even think that the border would ever move so far to the north. Between the Amur and the Ussuri and the Great Wall lived warlike Manchus, ethnically distant from the indigenous Chinese - the Han.
The first Russians appeared in the Amur region in the 17th century. Then, south of the Amur and Ussuri, there was a separate Manchurian state, whose rulers did not particularly like the activity of unknown aliens, and in the same century the Manchus made several campaigns against Russian settlers on the northern shores and even occupied this territory for some time. However, not for long: there was no point in holding the taiga banks of the rivers, besides, the war with China soon began, which the Manchus won by taking Beijing in 1644 and placing a new dynasty, the Qing, on the throne. Manchuria organically joined the Celestial Empire with the rights, as we would say now, of an autonomous region: the Chinese, for example, were forbidden to settle and engage in agriculture on the territory of Manchuria. Thus, by the middle of the 17th century, the border of China expanded in a rather original way to the Amur and Ussuri rivers; but there the Chinese encountered new Russian settlers. It was from this moment that the “border epic” between Russia and China began, which continues to this day. Over the course of a long history of demarcation, more than forty documents regulating the status of the border have been adopted, but only five of them have had serious consequences.
Nerchinsk Treaty(August 27, 1689) - the first treaty between Russia and China, approximately establishing the borders of states. This treaty included clauses that established the basic principles of trade and determined the order of diplomatic relations. In accordance with this treaty, Russia ceded the Amur Region to China. Not from a good life, of course - a small Russian embassy and a guard detachment of several hundred people were surrounded by an army of many thousands. This treaty, however, is a landmark moment in our history - it was from this moment that Russia began active trade with China, exchanging money and its exports for tea, silk and porcelain.
Burin Treaty(August 20, 1727) - defined the border from the Shabin-Dabat pass (Western Sayans) to the river. Argun. The articles of this treaty, without changes, were included in the following treaty -
Kyakhta Treaty(October 21, 1727). He fixed the agreement on trade and borders. He clarified the border, established the procedure for contacts between the authorities of the border regions. In this treaty, points were defined for trade at the frontier. Also, according to this agreement, once every three years, a Russian caravan could come to Beijing. The Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Beijing received the status of an unofficial permanent representation.
Aigun Treaty(May 16, 1858) - under this agreement, Russia received back the Amur Region. Territories on the left bank of the Amur, from the river. Argun and to the Sea of Okhotsk. The Ussuri region, according to this agreement, was a joint possession of Russia and China. Amur, Sungari and Ussuri were open for free navigation of Russian and Chinese ships. The agreement was concluded after a negotiation between the Governor-General of Eastern Siberia N.N. Muravyov and Hua Shan, representative of the Emperor of China. The situation was somewhat reminiscent of the one that developed during the signing of the Nerchinsk Treaty: of course, no one threatened Hua Shan, but at that moment the Taiping uprising was raging inside China, besides, China was waging the most difficult Second Opium War; four days after the signing of the treaty, the British and French captured the fortress of Dagu and the port of Tianjin. In such conditions - suffering continuous defeat - China risked another military conflict - in the north. The Chinese chose to pay off.
Beijing Treaty(November 2, 1860) finally determined the Russian-Chinese border, thus supplementing the Aigun Treaty. The eastern border between the two countries was established along the rivers Amur, Ussuri, Sungache. The agreement stated that the Amur and Ussuri regions are the possession of Russia. From the Russian side, the mission was headed by Count N.P. Ignatiev, from Chinese - "Prince Gong named Yi Xing." At first, the Chinese behaved rather defiantly - the British and French were driven back, it seemed that China had recovered from the blow; but soon Dagu and Tianjin were again taken, Dalian and Yantai were captured, and near Peking the Anglo-French army defeated the sixty thousand Manchurian cavalry. In October, Beijing was taken, and the Chinese hurried with the treaty. The agreement was accompanied by a protocol with a map signed by Russians and Chinese - P. Kozakevich, K. Bugodossky, Chen Qi and Jing Chun. On this map, the border (the so-called "red line") is drawn along the Chinese coast of the Amur and Ussuri and along the Kazakevich channel, that is, the rivers completely belonged to the Russian Empire.
A "time bomb" in relations between Russia and China was planted in the process of signing the Beijing Treaty. In world practice, there are extremely rare cases when the river surface entirely belongs to one of the parties, while the other side is content with the coastal line. The border mainly runs along the fairway of navigable rivers and in the middle of non-navigable ones. At the same time, it should be noted that the fairway of the river and its middle are often not coinciding concepts. However, this principle was not officially documented anywhere, so it was rather a kind of rule tacitly recognized by the majority of states in the world. The Far Eastern rivers are generally unique in this regard - the fairway of the river can shift depending on both natural and human-caused reasons. In particular, islands sometimes disappear on the Amur and Ussuri - a sand spit is washed in, and the island turns into a peninsula. The Chinese used this opportunity with might and main - they often tried to fill up the channel between the islands and the coast, so that the Russian island would automatically turn into a Chinese peninsula, they built artificial dams so that the river changed its course and, accordingly, the fairway shifted. At the moment, these works have taken on a truly titanic scope, which is why Russia annually loses a fairly solid piece of territory, and China, accordingly, gains it, artificially shifting the channel.
Recently, a number of Russian diplomats and journalists have defended with surprising fervor the idea that the status of the islands on the Amur and Ussuri has never been regulated, these islands do not belong to anyone and, therefore, giving the islands to the Chinese is not a cession of Russian territory. In fairness, it should be noted that the authorship of this theory does not belong to them, but to the propagandists of the CCP. And why our pen workers constantly just repeat the Chinese version - the Lord knows. Maybe they like her. Or maybe they paid.
But back to the history of the issue. What happened to Russian-Chinese relations after October 1917?
Immediately after the October Revolution, the Soviet government annulled all the secret and unequal treaties concluded by its predecessors. On July 25, 1919, the leadership of the RSFSR explained to the Chinese people and their leaders what kind of treaties were meant by unequal treaties. These included all treaties on spheres of influence, on the rights of extraterritoriality, on concessions and indemnities. The border treaties, however, remained in force: both sides considered them to be quite equal in rights.
In the late 1920s in China, after the defeat of the bourgeois-democratic revolution and the occupation of the northeast of China by the Japanese, the situation was difficult. The question of the Soviet-Chinese border smoothly flowed into the question of the Soviet-Japanese border. The Japanese, it should be noted, were more ambitious in this matter than the current Chinese and regularly made efforts to correct the border line in accordance with their own ideas about where the border should have passed. The Japanese were regularly beaten - at Khasan and Khalkhin Gol - after which they calmed down until the next provocation. However, at the local level, the Japanese recognized the border and did not exchange it for trifles. In particular, in 1932 Su Bingwen's Chinese army crossed the border and surrendered to the Soviet border guards. The Japanese did not pursue the Chinese - they turned around at the border and went back.
After the victory of the Communists in China, relations between the USSR and China were cloudless for some time. In 1952, the USSR handed over to China sets of topographic maps of the area, for which the Chinese were extremely grateful to us. And only in the mid-1950s did the first clouds appear on the previously cloudless firmament of Soviet-Chinese friendship. This was due to several reasons. Stalin died, the only person Mao Tse-tung truly feared. Khrushchev, on the other hand, caused Mao nothing but contempt. We will not dwell on internal Chinese reasons - this is too big and confusing topic. In general, Mao decided to try the "big brother" for strength.
Since 1954, articles began to appear in Chinese newspapers stating that border relations with the USSR were not fully settled. In 1954, a government publishing house published a book, A Brief History of Modern China, which included on a map "Chinese territories captured by the imperialists from 1840 to 1919." China, according to this map, included South and Southeast Asia as a whole, the Andaman Islands, the Sulu Archipelago, the Mongolian People's Republic, part of the Kirghiz and Kazakh SSRs, the entire Korean Peninsula, the Amur Region and the Ussuri Territory. This practice continues to this day: now, when, it would seem, all issues have been resolved and all problems have been removed, Chinese children see “lost territories” on school maps. Some publishing houses indulge in the fact that they directly paint over the Ussuri Territory and the Amur Region in the color of China. In 1960, the first provocations began on the border with the USSR, and in 1964 Mao delivers his famous speech, where the following words are heard: “About a hundred years ago, the area east of Lake Baikal became the territory of Russia, and since then Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Kamchatka and other points are the territory of the Soviet Union. We have not submitted an invoice to this registry yet.” The bills were presented at lightning speed: according to them, China should have owned one and a half million square kilometers of Soviet territory, including all the above-named settlements. Soon the appetites of the Chinese played out, and they started talking about three million.
In 1964, border negotiations were held between the leadership of China and the USSR. An agreement was reached according to which the border was to pass along the main fairway. The talks ran into the problem of the islands near Khabarovsk - Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky - the very ones that Putin so unobtrusively presented to China. It is very difficult to determine where the border should go - along the river bed or along the Kazakevich channel - at this point, and the islands, from the point of view of both the Chinese and Soviet representatives, had and still have great strategic importance. That is, Putin did not give China the gardens of Khabarovsk residents - he presented an important strategic point for which the Soviet delegation in 1964, having ceded most of the islands to China with ease, almost held on with its teeth. Be that as it may, the new treaty, even on the agreed sections of the border, was never signed: the Chinese demanded that a clause be added to it stating that all previous treaties were illegal and unequal, and the current treaty, although the PRC recognizes it, is also unfair. Of course, there could not be such an article in the treaty, and therefore the new treaty never saw the light of day.
This was followed by five years of continuous provocations and, as a result, a bloody conflict on Damansky. Here is how the methodology for conducting such provocations was described by V.D. Bubenin, later the first commander of the Alpha group, and then the head of the frontier post, who took an active part in the events on Damansky:
“The situation is this: a fisherman comes, sticks a portrait of Mao on a stick in the snow, starts to peck a hole. We explain: the border cannot be violated. We see off. The next day, 20 fishermen come. There are three grids, and each has quotes. Swinging to catch better. We see off. Five hundred people are brought to the border. Women, children, arrange a rally, beat the drums. Loaded on cars and to the Soviet coast. Our guys are in line. Cars are driven at them, they expect to scare them. It didn't work, they left. They come with banners: quotes are attached on clubs, iron pipes are on top of sticks. Ours is a wall again. Those quotes in your pocket, clubs in a move. Nothing, forced out ... "
This happened regularly at the border. Small groups of Chinese were often dealt with peacefully, with large groups there were fights. They used poles, butts of machine guns, sometimes - hoses. There were no casualties. So, in December 1967, the Chinese, in the amount of more than a thousand people, tried defiantly to cross the border at the Sopka Kulebyakina frontier post of the Imansky frontier detachment, using cars, tractors, carts. The Chinese brandished hooks, clubs, studded with nails, crowbars, hooks. Head of the school for sergeants G.A. Skladanyuk was forced to give the order to displace the crowd with the help of two armored personnel carriers, since the chain of cadets could not hold back the Chinese, and individual fighters or small groups of them were surrounded by a crowd trying to capture them. As a result, the Chinese were pushed back, five people, according to the Chinese, died, falling under the wheels of armored personnel carriers. There were no casualties on the Soviet side, although many cadets were injured until armored personnel carriers arrived to help them. Tellingly, the Chinese were followed by dozens of correspondents, including foreign ones, who filmed everything that happened. When the Chinese retreated to their shore, loudspeakers began to work from there.
Such provocations happened at the border almost daily. And then there was Damansky. But this is a topic that deserves separate consideration, and therefore we will simply briefly describe the consequences of the conflict. After the death of 58 Soviet and 800 to 3000 Chinese soldiers and border guards, the Soviet leadership acted tough and decisively. On July 20, 1969, a few months after the fighting on Damansky, the Chinese tried to capture Kirkinsky Island by crossing there on boats and rafts. On the Chinese concentrated on the island, massive fire from mortars and heavy machine guns was opened from the Soviet coast. The Chinese tried to take cover in the freshly dug trenches, but the mortars quickly drove them out. Then the Chinese rushed to their shore, to which they had to swim - all boats and rafts were destroyed by mines. Chinese losses, according to visual estimates of the Soviet border guards, are several dozen dead. It is very likely that there were more of them - it is not known how many drowned during the crossing back.
On August 13, 1969, near Lake Zhalanashkol in the Kazakh SSR, border guards clashed with a special detachment of the PLA. They did not stand on ceremony with them: the Chinese detachment was surrounded and completely destroyed, only one person survived (two more died in the hospital). The Chinese tried to help out their detachment by throwing reserves into the attack, but, having stumbled upon heavy fire, the Chinese withdrew to their territory with heavy losses. The losses of the Soviet side in this incident are two people.
This battle sobered the Chinese. Zhou Enlai agreed to meet with Kosygin, and during this meeting on September 11, an agreement was reached to stop hostile actions on the border and stop troops on the lines occupied by them at that moment. It so happened that the Damansky and Kirkinsky Islands turned out to be occupied by the Chinese at that time, since on September 10, the Soviet border guards received an order to cease fire. That is, de facto, both of these islands, which did not have any strategic importance, but, nevertheless, became symbols of confrontation on the border, remained with the Chinese, although the Soviet side until 1991 regularly demanded that the Chinese leave the islands. It is difficult to say why the islands were then actually given to the Chinese: perhaps the Soviet leadership wanted to settle the conflict as soon as possible, realizing that since both of these islands are on the Chinese side of the fairway, sooner or later they will have to be given away. It is possible, however, that in this way the Soviet government tried to play the role of the victim, since before that only the Chinese demanded the return of territories, and now the diplomacy of the USSR received a good trump card up its sleeve, which allowed any Chinese initiative to put forward its own counter.
On May 16, 1991, the "Agreement between the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and the People's Republic of China on the Soviet-Chinese state border in its Eastern part" was signed in Moscow. The text finally approved that the border was drawn along the fairway of navigable rivers and the middle of non-navigable ones, plus a demarcation commission was created. The agreement was ratified by the Russian Supreme Council in February 1992, and on March 16 the Agreement entered into force. Damansky and Kirkinsky went to China officially.
The border dispute was not, however, settled. In addition to a number of secondary issues, two main ones remained in force: the problem of the Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky Islands and the Bolshoi Island on the Argun River. The Argun bifurcates around the Bolshoy, and therefore it is difficult to draw a border along the fairway. In principle, Bolshoy just did not have and does not have much value, therefore it was used as a kind of bargaining chip in disputes about the fate of the other two islands. What is so special about these islands - Tarabarov and Bolshoi Ussuriysky - if in 1964 the USSR refused to give them to China, despite the aggravation of the border situation?
On the map, this area looks like a kind of triangle (the Chinese call it the Fuyuan Triangle). The sides of the triangle are the Amur River, the top is Khabarovsk, the base is the Kazakevich channel. Until recently, the border was about 30 kilometers away from Khabarovsk (Boli in Chinese). Now she came close to him, while, however, passing all the same not along the channel.
The islands, in addition to actually covering Khabarovsk from a sudden attack and controlling the channel of the Amur and Ussuri, are distinguished by an amazing natural diversity: linden, Mongolian oak, Amur velvet, Amur grapes, water chestnut, Komarov's lotus grow on them. The white-tailed eagle, osprey, soft-skinned turtle, Far Eastern stork, mandarin duck live on the islands - all of them are listed in the Red Book. About 60 species of fish are found in the waters of the islands, which is rare even in the Far East.
So, Putin gave the islands to the Chinese. At the same time, not only did Russian diplomacy suffer a crushing defeat - China generously ceded the Russian island of Bolshoi to Russia, eventually getting what it wanted; but also the border still does not run along the riverbed, that is, the Chinese at any moment have the opportunity to unleash a new border conflict, motivating this with more general documents, according to which the border should run along the riverbed. Moreover, the Chinese have repeatedly tried to fill up the Kazakevich channel in order to change the water regime in the "triangle". Against this background, statements similar to the statements of mysterious "experts" that the islands will go to China sooner or later due to the shallowing of the Kazakevich channel, and that there are no vegetable gardens and rest houses on the islands given to China (of course, no; they remained on Russian territory, and a border zone will now pass in their place), seem to be a desire to pass poverty off as a virtue. In addition, we had nowhere to hurry: the next aggravation of the situation on the border was expected no earlier than China would solve the Taiwan problem.
When you look at all these ingenious Chinese machinations, the question involuntarily arises: why so much work for the sake of some patches of land? After all, no one has settled on Damansky and Kirkinsky since then, so was it worth breaking so many copies?
To answer this question, you need to know Chinese psychology. The Chinese are not Europeans, they think by completely different criteria. All these small tweaks on the border are a test of the northern neighbor's readiness to use force. Since 1954, Chinese society has been living in constant expectation of a war with its northern neighbor, and all border disputes maintain this tension in it. The period of total friendship with China that has begun in our country is by no means accompanied by similar phenomena on the other side. Anyone who comes to the museum in Beijing can admire the tank No. 545 captured by the Chinese during the battles on Damansky. A museum has been created on the island itself that tells about the “valor” and “heroism” of the PLA fighters during the battles for Damansky. Foreigners are not allowed there, so one can only guess what they tell Chinese schoolchildren, who see "lost Chinese territories" in their textbooks every day.
Once Napoleon predicted great troubles for the world if "China wakes up." He woke up. And if earlier our Far Eastern border was locked, now the Russian authorities are opening this lock with some maniacal persistence, selling to China not only weapons, but also military technologies. For the first time we drank this bitter cup on Damansky, when it turned out that out of many types of weapons seized from the Chinese, several machine guns and carbines were made in the USSR. The Soviet authorities learned the lesson. The Russians seem to have completely forgotten him. The fact is that it is not enough just to get any, even the latest weapon: without the lack of special technologies, without knowing how engineering came to create this model, it is impossible to create your own weapon. The fragile balance on the border was maintained, on the one hand, by large masses of weakly armed Chinese, and on the other, by the powerful weapons of the Soviet divisions. The balance has collapsed - the supply of technology to China means that from now on, Chinese science is at the forefront in the study and creation of the latest weapons.
The Chinese are still waiting. They have such an opportunity, and there is such a tradition too - the Chinese leadership thinks in terms of not years and decades, but half a century and a century. If there is an opportunity to get a result at lightning speed, but at the same time take a risk, or wait, but it is guaranteed to achieve your goal, the Chinese will choose the second path. Don't rush anywhere. Wait until Russia weakens. Until the expanses of Siberia are populated by the Chinese. And only then to present new demands, from which Russia will no longer be able to refuse.
It must be understood that the Chinese still consider themselves the pillars of the universe, and Europeans who know Chinese are looked upon as talking monkeys. China is now going through an era similar to the "Meiji Revolution" in Japan - to take the best and most modern from Europeans, then adapting it to their own standards. The Chinese can declare as much as they like about their peacefulness; as soon as they do not need this peacefulness, they will discard it without regret.
China understands only strength, it perceives any concession as weakness. And under these conditions, the return of the islands to China is an unforgivable mistake that could lead to serious consequences.
Vladimir Alekseev