In a controversial move that has strained its relationships with the EU and the US, South Africa will host naval exercises off its eastern coast with Chinese and Russian ships. The exercises coincide with the first anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The South Africa National Defence Force (Sandf) confirmed on 19 January that South Africa will host the navies of China and Russia during a "multilateral maritime exercise" over the period 17 to 27 February.
The exercise, codenamed "Mosi" ("Smoke" in Swahili), will take place around the Durban and Richards Bay areas of South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal province, according to the statement.
According to Russia's Tass news agency, the Admiral Gorshkov, a ship "carrying Tsirkon hypersonic missiles" will take part in the exercises as well after taking in supplies in Russia's navy base in Tartus, Syria.
It will be only the second time that the naval forces of the three countries have held joint operations. The first took place in November 2019 in Cape Town, just before the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The SA National Defence Force || Media Statement || Thursday, 19 January 2023 || SA to host the People’s Liberation Army Navy from China and Russian Federal Navy during the Multilateral Maritime Exercises over period 17 to 27 February 2023.#SANDF#DCCMediaLiaison#SANavy pic.twitter.com/QiDU2rBalF
— SA National Defence Force (@SANDF_ZA) January 19, 2023
Criticism at home and abroad
The latest exercise ("Mosi II") has come under fire from South Africa's main opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, which claims that with hosting the exercises, Pretoria has "chosen sides".
"While our government has claimed to be neutral, this is just another of many incidents where the [ruling party] ANC has clearly exposed their favoritism towards Russia and has in fact done nothing but to showcase and prove [the] government’s lack of neutrality in this case," according to the party's shadow minister of defence and military affairs, Kobus Marais.
In a statement, he called the war games "nothing more than an expensive publicity stunt".
Meanwhile, David Feldman, a spokesperson for the US Embassy in South Africa, was quoted by CBS News as saying that the US is "concerned about South Africa's plan to hold joint naval exercises with Russia and the [People's Republic of China] in February, even as Moscow continues its brutal and unlawful war of aggression against Ukraine".
Pauline Bax of the International Crisis Group pointed out that the exercises coincide with the anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which she remarks is "diplomatically quite awkward, and something that South Africa could have pushed to another date".
But South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor, who met with her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov when he visited Pretoria earlier in January, said that the drills were to be "merely an exercise with friends".
Defence and Military Veterans Minister Thandi Modise was quoted by South Africa's Independent Online portal as saying the exercises are "highly beneficial for the three navies", adding that "nobody protested" when the US held its own military exercises with the Sandf in July last year.
Russia 'not as isolated' as West wants
By hosting the war games, "South Africa sends a clear signal that it is not going to join the anti-Russian front", Marcin Kaczmarski, a secuity expert with the University of Glasgow, told RFI.
The exercises show that "Russia is not as isolated as the West would like", he said.
His remarks are backed up by the Democracy Index 2022 published last month by the Economist Intelligence Unit, which states that "two-thirds of the world's population live in countries that are either neutral or Russia-leaning when it comes to the war in Ukraine".
China remains its most powerful ally.
Russia's Tass news agency described a visit to Moscow by Chinese President Xi Jinping, planned in the coming months, as "the main event in the bilateral agenda for 2023". The trip is a follow-up to Putin's visit to Beijing in February last year – just before Russia invaded Ukraine – when the two countries pledged a "friendship without limits".
It is unclear to what extent their military cooperation will expand. But China may have its reservations too.
Combined power
The upcoming exercises hosted by South Africa demonstrate "the potential for Russia-China cooperation in the Indian Ocean, and how the two present a much greater threat to a continued US role and influence in the region than either would individually", according to Oriana Skylar Mastro, a fellow at Stanford University's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the American Enterprise Institute.
"Both China and Russia have gradually been increasing their presence in the Indian Ocean. Russia recently announced it would establish a naval facility in Port Sudan on the Red Sea," she told RFI, pointing out that China opened its first overseas base in Djibouti in 2017.
China and Russia hold a series of these multilateral exercises less for military purposes and more for political purposes.
PODCAST Oriana Skylar Mastro, Fellow at Stanford University and the AEI
"China and Russia hold a series of these multilateral exercises less for military purposes and more for political purposes," Mastro says, adding that they are "not particularly threatening in any way on the military side of things".
According to the analyst, "Russia is willing to take some political risks to support Chinese military activities with the upcoming war games", which represent the latest challenge to the United States and its allies.
China is already stepping up its military presence in "controversial locations such as the South China Sea" by constructing bases on atolls and reefs, Mastro points out.
The Taiwan question
But overall, Mastro thinks that China isn’t too happy with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine "largely because they don't believe in [that] kind of foreign military intervention as an effective foreign policy tool".
Another reason, she says, is that Beijing doesn’t want to show too much support for Russia because "they don't like the parallels between Ukraine and Taiwan. From the Chinese perspective, they have a very strong, legitimate claim on Taiwan. And Russia does not have the same strong, legitimate claim on Ukraine".
While Beijing has always recognised Ukraine’s sovereignty and extended "heartfelt" congratulations on the 30th anniversary of the country’s independence, it regards self-ruling Taiwan as one of its provinces that, eventually, must return to the "motherland".
