Russia and China’s 'multipolar world' raises nightmare scenario for Europe
Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) and Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Tianjin, China, on Sept. 1, 2025. (Kyodo News via Getty Images)
Despite being a global pariah as recently as last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin has had a pretty good few weeks, making high-level visits East and West.
After his face-to-face meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump last month, he capped his return to the international stage on Sept. 2 by standing shoulder-to-shoulder with his Chinese counterpart as a vision for a new world order was laid out.
"We should continue to unequivocally oppose hegemonism and power politics, practice true multilateralism, and stand as a pillar in promoting a multipolar world and greater democracy in international relations," Chinese President Xi Jinping told a crowd of more than 50,000 people at Tiananmen Square.
"Today, mankind is faced with the choice of peace or war, dialogue or confrontation, win-win or zero-sum," adding that the Chinese people "stand on the right side of history."The event was hugely significant — in a rapidly changing world where U.S.-driven democracy as the powering force of global affairs is uncertain, China and Russia made the case for a return to a world where superpowers control their own spheres of influence.
"It looks like China having a sphere of influence in the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia, the U.S. dominating the Western hemisphere, and Russia dominating at least large parts of Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and its periphery."
"A return to spheres of influence would be extraordinarily bad for democracies," retired Australian Army Major-General Mick Ryan told the Kyiv Independent.
"It would be extraordinarily bad for any country on the periphery of Russia and China. And it's something that we should all push back on as hard as possible."
How did we get here?
In reaction to Xi's speech and China's military parade, Trump accused Xi, Putin, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un of "conspir(ing) against the United States of America," but it is in large part due to his actions that such a shift in the global order is happening.
Trump's "America First" policies and his turn away from Europe have emboldened China and Russia to take a much more assertive stand on the global stage, Rafael Loss, policy fellow for defense, security, and technology at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) told the Kyiv Independent.
"The Trump administration in the United States is making it easier for them through its own actions," he added.
What does a ‘multipolar world’ mean?
Following World War 2, the global system experienced a bipolar world order, when it was largely split between the spheres of influence of the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the U.S. remained the sole dominant global superpower — politically, economically, and militarily.
Over the past decade, the U.S. leadership over global affairs began to crack, with other major powers filling the gaps, returning to the "spheres of influence" more associated with the 19th century.
According to Ryan, China eyes a sphere of influence in the Western Pacific and Southeast Asia, while Russia attempts to dominate in "Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and its periphery."
"That's what Putin and Xi have in mind, and I think they believe they now have a historic opportunity to pursue that goal."
For Russia and China this isn't a new idea — a letter to the United Nations co-signed by both countries laid out their multipolar vision way back in 1997.
"Russia seems to think that it would thrive in a world where there's very little order and where uninhibited violence."
And while the language used then — just like Xi's speech on Sept. 2 — spoke of the "peaceful coexistence" of states and greater international cooperation, nothing points to peace in the way these states have managed.
Xi's speech took place at a parade featuring over 10,000 troops, more than 100 aircraft and vehicles, and the country's most advanced weaponry, like the nuclear-capable DF-61 intercontinental ballistic missiles, hypersonic missiles, drones, and laser weapons.
"Xi says one thing and does another," Ryan said, adding, "He's benefited humanity by tripling the size of his nuclear arsenal? Those two things just are not in the same universe."
Russia's method of exerting influence is already evidenced in its invasion of Ukraine, and a multipolar world would allow it to carry on doing so unabated.
"Russia seems to think that it would thrive in a world where there's very little order and where uninhibited violence, as we see in Ukraine, allows the strongest and most brutal to dominate at least their region, if not larger parts of the world," Loss said.
Europe in a multipolar world
All of this poses immense challenges for Europe.
Already having to learn how to survive in a world without the U.S. military support it has relied on for decades, democratic Europe will be fighting for survival in a region in which Russia has already demonstrated it has no qualms about deploying massive amounts of violence to assert its influence.
Without the U.S. nuclear umbrella, Europe would be severely outgunned on that front — France and the U.K. possess around 515 nuclear weapons, but Russia has around ten times as many.
But Ryan stresses that collectively, Europe is "far richer and militarily powerful than Russia can ever be anymore," but adds that Europe currently lacks one thing that is essential in pushing back against a militaristic and imperialist Russia — will.
Europe is only sluggishly revamping its defense industry, and its current efforts to confront the Kremlin and bring the war in Ukraine to an end involve ongoing discussions about security guarantees that Russia will never agree to, and Europe couldn't enforce even if it did.
"At the end of the day, you need a polity where the political leaders and the citizens are engaged in an open and honest conversation about the threats they faced and how they might respond to them," he said.
"(The West) has been pretty supine and happy to lay back and let the Americans do the heavy lifting, and I think that era is at an end."
In short, there's only one way to push back against an emboldened Russia as it is rehabilitated on the global stage.
"The most forceful rejection of that kind of model is at this time presented by Ukraine's struggle for independence," Loss said.
"Depending on how Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine concludes, will have a major impact on whether such wars are more or less likely in the future."
