Lukashenko suddenly flew to Beijing, where Xi Jinping publicly emphasized Belarusian sovereignty,
What's telling is that Lukashenko did it directly after a meeting with Putin, but not as an agent for Putin, but as an agent for Belarus!
This is a very interesting turn of events. Lukashenko softening the relations to Ukraine dramatically, and now turning to China for support.
But of Course China is the real interesting player to watch here. As I see it, they are turning away from Russia with this move, and by turning towards Belarus instead, and supporting their turning towards Ukraine could be sign of a political strategy. Where they make friends with Belarus, possibly even strong friends, and then with Belarus long term making friends with EU and Ukraine, China will gain influence into Europe. China is playing the long game, it doesn't matter if it may take 10 years or even more, Belarus is almost inevitably going to get closer to EU, and China making friends with Belarus and Ukraine is now more likely to become beneficial than alienating them because they side with Russia.
China will most likely pick up the scraps in Russia after they lose the war, so China will achieve control with the rare earth resources Russia currently control. They may remain Russian on paper, but China will own the rights to those resources, bought a an insane discount because Russia is near bankrupt.
I am absolutely all for that, because their motivation is to get closer to EU is more important than Russia. Which of course makes sense IMO, as EU is the way better friend to have than Russia.
I think we may be seeing the formation of the new world order after Russia becomes irrelevant after losing the war to Ukraine, and USA is losing enormous influence too, by alienating allies and losing the hold they had on the golf region, because USA and Israel lost so badly to Iran.
The new balance will be more cooperation between EU and China, with USA standing on the sidelines screaming about how they are the world strongest power, but without actual influence, because economically they are globally inferior to if EU and China working together on maintaining international law. And militarily they are extremely vulnerable to asymmetrical warfare.
USA is losing both military and economic dominance of the world, and the world (EU China and Canada) is looking to a future with less dependence on USA.
Ironically EU would traditionally have preferred to work with USA, but USA has simply made the prospect impossible.
The winner in this is of course China, and the biggest loser is Russia because they are losing almost everything. If the Russian federation falls, they are literally losing everything Putin thought he fought for.
USA will lose enormous political influence, and their military power is already not as respected as it was before the Iran war.
They may lose the petro dollar, and the dollar as the worlds reserve currency, and if they fall, USA will be an enormously diminished global economic power. Possibly dropping from most significant to number 3!!
While that is still significant for a population of only 300 million, it is nothing compared to the long period after WW2 where USA has been extremely dominating on the world stage.