Russian-Chinese military rapprochement, and the possibilities of a military alliance

After the events of September 11, 2001, international relations were greatly affected, which formed new trends for the United States on the one hand, and for a number of major powers such as China and Russia on the other. In the context of the recent deterioration of Russian-American Western relations after the Ukrainian crisis, and the shift of Russian interest to the East within its foreign policy interests, and in the context of emphasizing the Chinese presence in the South China Sea, which formed a number of studies that focused on developing perceptions about the idea of ​​“Rapprochement Russian-Chinese” in the face of unipolarity led by the United States. However, the analysis of this “Rapprochement” remains incomplete and has not been systematically clarified in the international relations literature, which results in the difficulty of assessing the degree of rapprochement between the Russian and Chinese neighbors, and the extent to which their strategic cooperation has increased. From this point of view, this research paper aims to assess the extent of the Russian-Chinese military rapprochement, and if there what can be described as the existence of a Russian-Chinese alliance, and are the relations between the two sides can be described as an alliance or not? This is done by measuring the degree of strategic military cooperation in the relations between the two sides. Also, this paper is interested in exploring cooperation between the two sides across the military, technical, economic, and diplomatic dimensions to develop a general assessment of the progress of bilateral relations over time.