US leaders say China and Russia's military ties are 'phony,' but there still isn't much they can do about them

 US leaders say China and Russia's military ties are 'phony,' but there still isn't much they can do about them......

• Russia and China's growing ties and military cooperation have worried Western leaders.
• Those ties may not be as deep and durable as they appear, but they won't be easy to undermine either.

The NATO summit last week focused on the challenges posed by Russia and China but made scant mention of those countries' increasing military cooperation, which has worried US leaders and their partners around the world.

The 14,400-word, 79-paragraph communique released at the end of the summit expressed concern about Russia's and China's military build-ups and "assertive" behavior.

Their military cooperation was mentioned once, in a sentence in the 55th paragraph: China "is also cooperating militarily with Russia, including through participation in Russian exercises in the Euro-Atlantic area."

The Chinese and Russian militaries have held joint exercises for more a decade. A 2015 exercise was their first in the Mediterranean, followed by their first in the Baltic in 2017. (China has conducted exercises with NATO members.)

"I see cooperation that is superficial at best. I think it is higher at the tactical level, soldier-to-soldier, and I think it is pretty close to phony at the strategic level," Gen. Tod Wolters, the head of US European Command, told the Senate Armed Services Committee in April.

Adm. Philip Davidson, who led US Indo-Pacific Command until his retirement in April, told the committee in March that he saw "some collaboration" between Russia and China in the "tactical and operational space."

"I think that there is less cooperation, although frequent discussion, at the strategic level. Through all of it, I view it with some alarm," Davidson said.

A senior Biden administration official told Politico this month that over the past decade the relationship has become "more concerning," operating as "almost a quasi-alliance."

Russia and China have pursued closer ties in part to counter Western countries and their partners, who see Russia's campaign against Ukraine and China's bullying in the South China Sea as troubling. While there is uncertainty about their exact level of coordination, the relationship has advanced quickly, according to Matthew Rojansky, director of the Kennan Institute at the Wilson Center think tank.

"If you compare, let's say, 10 or 15 years ago to the last five years, you definitely see Russia supplying more and more advanced technology to China. You see the Chinese being more willing to at least do exercises or have a presence out of their immediate neighborhood in East Asia," Rojansky told Insider, calling China's participation in those Euro-Atlantic exercises "very significant."