Would China invading Taiwan spark Russian attack on NATO? Experts say it's 'plausible'
Such a scenario would for all intents and purposes amount to a global war between nuclear superpowers, yet many experts agree that this scenario is not too far from reality.
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, attend a wreath laying ceremony to the Unknown Soldiers' Tomb, marking the 80th anniversary of the victory over Nazi's Germany, May 9, 2025 in Moscow, Russia. (Contributor/Getty Images)
Russian-Chinese relations
If Beijing moves against Taiwan, NATO might soon find itself in a two-front war with China and Russia — or so the alliance's secretary general believes.
"If Xi Jinping would attack Taiwan, he would first make sure that he makes a call to his very junior partner in all of this, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin… and telling him, 'Hey, I’m going to do this, and I need you to to keep them busy in Europe by attacking NATO territory,'" Secretary General Mark Rutte said in a July 5 interview with the New York Times.
Such a scenario would for all intents and purposes amount to a global war between nuclear superpowers, yet many experts agree that this scenario is not too far from reality.
Beijing and Moscow have tightened their alliance aimed at dethroning the U.S. as the global superpower, a cooperation nowhere else more visible than in Chinese support for Russia's war against Ukraine.
In the meantime, NATO continues to grapple with the war in Ukraine and internal divisions wrought by the Trump presidency. It would benefit China to fuel this turmoil, making sure the alliance's attention remains split while Beijing pursues its own territorial ambitions.
"If China were to decide that incorporating Taiwan into China by force was their only option, they will do all they can to ensure both Europe and America have as many dispersed challenges to deal with as possible," retired Australian Army Major General Mick Ryan told the Kyiv Independent.
China and Russia eye a two-front war on the West
According to the South China Morning Post, China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi recently told the EU's top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, that his country cannot afford Russia to lose its war against Ukraine, as it would allow the U.S. to shift its focus on Beijing.
This admission underscored "China's strategic interest in depleting Western resources on the European continent," Nataliya Butyrska, an expert on East Asia at the New Europe Center in Kyiv, told the Kyiv Independent.
This goal has also been evident in China's support of Russia's aggression against Ukraine.
The Asian power has been the leading source of dual-use goods feeding the Russian defense industry and has helped Moscow cushion the impact of Western sanctions.
Kyiv has even accused China of directly providing arms to Russia – an allegation Beijing denied. Several Chinese nationals have also been captured fighting in Ukraine within Russian ranks.
Experts have long warned that China is closely watching Russia's invasion of Ukraine to learn lessons for a potential invasion of Taiwan. But the interest is not limited to the military sphere.
"China is closely observing the West’s response to Russia’s actions and sees opportunities for itself amid a potential fracture of transatlantic unity," Butyrska said.
Underscoring the symbiotic nature of the Russian-Chinese relationship, a Chinese invasion of Taiwan could also present a boon to Moscow.
"Russia wouldn’t need a request from China to keep NATO occupied; it is more likely to take advantage of a Taiwan invasion by undertaking some kind of further aggression in Europe," Dan Hamilton, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, told the Kyiv Independent.
Ukrainian and Western officials have been raising alarms that a Russian attack against NATO territory — for example, in the Baltics — is an increasingly plausible scenario.
Camille Grand, a security and NATO expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, concurred that in "the event of a major crisis in Asia, the Russian Federation might indeed try to take advantage of the U.S. focused on a Taiwanese contingency to test NATO and further challenge European security."
Even the more cautious voices do not rule out a possible coordination between China and Russia in the case of an attack on Taiwan.
Jan Svec, a China researcher at the Prague-based Institute of International Relations, notes that an ideal scenario for Beijing is seizing the island by non-military means without sparking a broader conflict with the West.
However "if the situation escalates and the Chinese government decides on a military invasion (which is a less likely but also possible option), then it would make some sense to coordinate with Russia," he told the Kyiv Independent.
NATO caught with 'pants down'
Putin and Xi have not been shy about the ultimate goal of their "no-limits partnership" — challenging the U.S. and Western dominance on the global stage.
Such clarity seems to be lacking in the NATO camp. U.S. President Donald Trump's strategy to drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing by making overtures to Russia has been met with skepticism from experts.
The new U.S. president has also signaled plans to reduce the U.S. military presence in Europe while urging European partners to take up greater responsibility for their own security, allowing Washington to shift focus to the Indo-Pacific region.
But as Hamilton notes, the "North Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific (regions) are strategically linked by the China-Russia entente."
"NATO's best contribution to this challenge is for Europeans to do more to defend Europe so that Americans can devote more resources to the Indo-Pacific," he adds.
Allied leaders have rushed to allay Trump's concerns, agreeing to ramp up the defense spending target from 2% to 5% of GDP during a recent summit in The Hague. However, some experts say this is far from enough to counter a united Russian-Chinese threat.
Edward Lucas, a non-resident Senior Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, agrees that a coordinated Chinese assault on Taiwan and a Russian assault on NATO is "all too plausible."
"What is baffling to me is that NATO, having been on edge after Trump‘s election victory… is slumping back into a posture of complacency," he told the Kyiv Independent.
Calling the new defense spending target an "aspiration" rather than a reality, Lucas says that "NATO still has its pants down when it comes to defense and deterrence."
The Russia, China, North Korea axis
Grand points to another piece of evidence of the intrinsic links between North Atlantic and Indo-Pacific security: North Korea's involvement in the Russia-Ukraine war.
Pyongyang, traditionally a close partner of China, has shaped up as arguably the most active supporter of Russian aggression in Ukraine and a direct participant in the war.
While China's support has been mostly economic and material, North Korea has deployed thousands of soldiers to help Russia fight against Ukraine, as well as ballistic missiles and millions of artillery shells.
"European countries and the United States are underestimating the threat posed by North Korea," Butyrska says, adding that Pyongyang's support for Russian military ventures is "happening with China’s tacit approval."
"Beijing is interested in leveraging this potential to escalate tensions on the Korean Peninsula. This could tie down U.S. forces there at the moment of a possible invasion of Taiwan and draw North Korea into direct confrontation with the United States," she says.
This united challenge, also linked to the Middle East via the Russian-Iranian partnership, shows that NATO faces the most dire security challenges since the Cold War. Rutte's warnings should, therefore, not be taken lightly, the experts say.
Note from the author:
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