Surprising facts: China, Iran, NK, & Russia share almost nothing military - Putin's simple trick to seem inflexible when he changes - India & China vote to eliminate nukes every year

Surprising out of the box facts that the mainstream media almost never share that undermine a lot of the click bait scary stories

The idea here is to give you a new look at things that seem scary in the news. I will share something unexpected in each case that is almost never said that undermines a lot of the click bait claims.

By the nature of them the things I say here are likely to surprise you. They are all carefully fact checked.

Putin seems inflexible just because he keeps telling us he never changed his views - but in reality changes views all the time - each time saying his new view is the view he has always had - his simple trick to intimidate by seeming inflexible

Putin SEEMS inflexible. But he constantly changes his position. What makes it seem that he never changes his views is that when he changes his views he TELLS us that he never changed his view.

For instance as we saw yesterday if you follow my 1960s -level-of-detail Ukraine war updates or follow the Ukraine war news closely:

• Putin now says he is willing to meet with Zelensky

• Putin now says he always was willing to meet with Zelensky

See my:

Probably not 1960s-level-of-detail news - interesting details: Putin more flexible than before - accepts need for Ukrainian security guarantees of some sort - first version of guarantees ready soon

This makes it seem he is very inflexible and never changes his mind because he tells us he never changed his mind

However

• In reality he never said he is willing to meet with Zelensky until very recently.

So that is his simple technique to seem like he has to get his way.

Putin DOES change but always claims he isn't changing his views to intimidate people so they don't try to get him to change.

But in reality he constantly changes, all the time telling us that he has never changed his views and that this is what he always said.

China, Russia, North Korea and Iran are so far from allies that they don’t even share any of their best technology with each other - or military secrets - or do any intelligence sharing - and have no mutual defense agreements

China, Russia, NK and Iran are NOT MILITARY ALLIES AND THEIR STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS ARE VERY LIMITED

The SCO is an Asian grouping and they have some shared economic and political interests.

But there is almost no sharing of military technology. They don't share military secrets with each other. They don't have intelligence sharing like the 5 eyes. They have no formal mutual defense treaties except the one between China and NK which it signed a fair while ago and China is not expected to honour it.

China and Russia do sea based military exercises together sometimes. But China does that with other countries too. That's about it.

Lots of smiles and flowery talk but this is not like NATO

Very little in common - some shared goals but even economically and politically a lot of rivalry and trying to get the better of each other

• No intelligence sharing between Russia, China, North Korea or Iran

• Nobody helped Iran when Israel took over its skies

• China got its Russian technology from Ukraine not Russia.

• China will NOT supply Russia in this war with anything except gray area chips, drones and machine tools

Ignore hype about a new “axis”
These are NOT allies or even particularly friendly
They do NOT trust each other and do NOT share intelligence or military secrets or advanced technology with each other except NK and Russia in a VERY LIMITED WAY.

China does NOT share this equipment with Russia or North Korea

China used to supply Iran but NOT since 2005
China DOES supply Pakistan

Background graphic from: https://www.twincities.com/2025/09/03/china-parade-weapons/

Three leaders photo from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c5yl1e5gvznt?post=asset%3A0f45792e-69e7-4e5d-8808-018961c4d078#post

Example, Russia can't use ANY of the vast military force China displayed in the parade. Nor can North Korea.

Or Iran.

I know this graphic is a bit surprising. But it is true. Here for instance is a summary from the Carnegie Foundation

QUOTE STARTS

Nevertheless, these states [Russia, China, North Korea and Iran] still pose threats largely independent of one another. They are far from a coherent bloc against which the United States could or should orient an effective strategy.

They share nothing like the military ties, diplomatic structure, and economic cooperation that existed among the Warsaw Pact countries during the Cold War, for example.

They are very far from enjoying the level of political, economic, diplomatic, and technological cooperation that exists between the United States and its allies and partners.

Meaningful cooperation between these four states, moreover, has so far been largely restricted to support for Russia’s war effort.

U.S. policymakers therefore need to monitor the signs of deepening cooperation between them, but they should also be careful not to overstate the group’s coherence and thereby encourage them to solidify into a real bloc.

To the contrary, the aim of U.S. policy should be to divide them. Just as the United States managed to split China and the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and thus destroy the myth of “monolithic communism,” today it should aim to split this group and thereby defuse the threat that it could pose.

https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2024/10/cooperation-between-china-iran-north-korea-and-russia-current-and-potential-future-threats-to-america?lang=en

Here more recently a short summary by Admiral Radakin who has just retired from his role as chief of the Defence Staff for the UK armed forces.

QUOTE STARTS

"It's a military parade. But for nations to come together and to be prepared to fight together and to support each other, it's much more substantial than a big parade.

"These are not countries that have a history together, that have a mutual trust, that will support each other when it comes to war fighting,"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3rvdgn0538ohttps://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3rvdgn0538o

So let’s look in more detail. Though the graphic only covers China, Russia and North Korea we need to include Iran as well.

Nobody helps Iran

First about Iran: China helped Iran in a major way early on but stopped signing new arms contracts in 2005 and then stopped selling arms altogether once those contracts were fulfilled by 2015.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93Iran_trade_relations#Post-2005_Shift

Iran supplied the Shahed drones to Russia which made a huge difference to the war - but Russia has done little to help them back. It kept promising new fighter jets and new air defenses. There were even some stories claiming that the fighter jets had already been delivered to Iran but when Israel took over the Iranian skies it became clear to the world that Iran had no new fighter jets. None of its fighter jets are capable enough to even take to the skies safely while F-16s are around.

Russia and China did nothing to help it when Israel took over its skies.

Also this is NOT about giving equipment. Many countries gave equipment to Ukraine outright. But NK and Iran only sold equipment to Russia - it was a commercial thing for them. They earned money from it and that was their main motivation.

So, here I'm talking here about selling equipment not giving it. Even though Iran would pay good money for fighter jets or air defenses, Russia and Chian wouldn’t sell this equipment to Iran.

China will NOT sell its most advanced technology to Russia - or North Korea - even after the war is over

Indeed China won’t even sell its advanced technology to Russia or North Korea either.

China DOES sell some of its equipment to Pakistan. So it sells equipment to Pakistan that it won't sell to Iran or NK or Russia.

You can get an idea of which countries China sells advanced technology to from its air defense systems and fighter jets.

First air defenses

TEXT ON GRAPHIC:

Russia is very short of air defenses in the Ukraine war and can't stop Ukrainian drone attacks

China's HQ-9 would be highly desirable for Russia because of its proven ability to stop missiles in the Pakistan / India border conflict

Iran and North Korea would find it a very major advance

But China only exports it to:
Morocco, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Egypt

HQ-9 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HQ-9#Operators

Graphic: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chinese_HQ-9_air_defence_operator_2025.png

For fighter jets - Russia has enough 4th generation fighter jets for now similar to the J-10C, but China for sure wouldn’t sell them any. North Korea and Iran would find Chinese fighter jets highly desirable.

China now has the J-35. This is a fifth generation fighter jet and would be very desirable to Russia but there is no chance of China selling it to Russia.

TEXT ON GRAPHIC

China's J-10C fighter jet
Would be of great interest to
North Korea or Iran.

China does NOT supply
it to anyone except Pakistan

Its fifth generation J-35 would be of
great interest to Russia too - instead it
may sell it to Pakistan (as usual) and possibly Egypt

China would NEVER sell such advanced technology to
Russia even without the war, never mind North Korea or Iran

• there is no technology sharing alliance here like NATO

J-10C operators from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:J10C_operators.jpg

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chengdu_J-10#Operators

It has orders from Pakistan (as usual) and Egypt is also considering it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenyang_J-35#Operators

China won’t sell ANY military systems to Russia during the war even lower tech things like shells or artillery systems.. It won’t send it anything that is directly military in nature. Its air defense systems would likely be Putin’s most desirable equipment he saw in China - but it’s not for him.

So this is very different from NATO where the countries share military hardware with each other freely and share intelligence too. There's no shared intelligence agreement between China, Russia, NK and Iran either as far as I know.

And no mutual defense agreement whatsoever except the one between China and NK which China is not expected to honour in reality.

Why won’t China sell its technology to Russia? They are not best pals in reality - Russia refused to help China at all when it was a developing military power and it’s not surprising China won’t help Russia back.

Further back China had a major conflict with the Soviet Union over their common border which was only finally resolved in 1991.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Soviet_border_conflict#Border_negotiations:_1990s%E2%80%932000s

They are on reasonably friendly terms now. But to call them best pals or allies over states things and is a major misunderstanding many of the people I help have.

It’s because of

• flowery language and declarations of eternal friendship that nobody involved takes seriously - it’s politics.

• tendency for the West especially the US to portray them as an axis or alliance when they are not

This partly goes back to a widely criticized flawed report by a US commission all of whose members had strong connections with companies that would benefit financially from the increased finance for the US defense industry that this report would be likely to promote.

This report hit the headlines usually with no explanation of the bias of the commission members.

BLOG: Report is NOT PLAUSIBLE that Iran, China and Russia combine to attack the USA
— ALL the commission members have strong connections with companies that benefit financially from the US defence industry
You can read it here: https://doomsdaydebunked.miraheze.org/wiki/Report_is_NOT_PLAUSIBLE_that_Iran,_China_and_Russia_combine_to_attack_the_USA_-_ALL_the_commission_members_have_strong_connections_with_companies_that_benefit_financially_from_the_US_defence_industry

So do watch out for that. That particular report was obviously mistaken when Israel took over the Iranian skies with no military support of Iran from Russia or China whatsoever.

China got its Russian military technology from Ukraine when Russia refused to sell - and China then refuses to sell its technology back to Russia

This may be another surprise that few will know. China actually got its military technology from Ukraine which sold it Russian gear after the breakup of the Soviet Union when Russia refused to sell anything to China.

This is a summary from 2013:

QUOTE STARTS

Beijing bought a half-finished Soviet aircraft carrier, the Varyag, from Ukraine for $20 million in the 1990s, and refurbished it into China’s first carrier — the Liaoning. The Chinese frequently have reverse-engineered Russian technology, but they encountered difficulties in imitating weapons systems such as high-performance turbofan jet engines.

Ukraine has served as a back channel for China to circumvent Russia’s intellectual property rights protections. In recent years, debt-ridden Kiev sold to Beijing hundreds of Russian-made aircraft engines to equip China’s JL-trainers and J-10 and J-11 combat aircraft — themselves knockoffs of Russia’s Sukoi fighter jets.

In addition, Ukraine’s Antonov aircraft design and manufacturing company has provided Beijing with key services, helping produce China’s Y series of military transport and surveillance planes.

Ukraine also built for China the Zubr-class amphibious hovercraft, the world’s largest. The Chinese navy has used the vessel in amphibious assault exercises in the South China Sea to intimidate challengers to Beijing’s expansive claims in the region.

https://www.uatom.org/en/2013/12/19/inside-china-ukraine-gets-nuclear-umbrella.html#

Russia doesn’t have a single aircraft carrier any more - vital for force projection in a modern world - while China and India both sail aircraft carriers built by Ukraine for the Soviet Union

Ukraine built the Varyag for the Soviet Union but it was only half finished at the break-up of the Soviet Union. Ukraine sold it to China and it became China’s first aircraft carrier, the Liaoning

• Liaoning - built originally for the Soviet Union but not completed in time - and the half-finished aircraft carrier was sold to China as a more or less empty hull after removing a lot of its contents to become its first aircraft carrier

This is a very striking situation. Russia has no foreign ports outside the former Soviet Union now it lost the Tartus port in the Mediterranean. Without an aircraft carrier, it has no way to send its fighter jets to anywhere in the world , they are limited to flying from Russia and they can’t fly far. In the modern world you can’t do much by way of force projection without an airforce.

India and China both have refurbished Soviet Union aircraft carriers - the Indian one bought from the Soviet Union and the Chinese one bought from Ukraine - but Russia hasn’t got a single aircraft carrier left.

Also, there is no way China or India would build an aircraft carrier for Russia. It’s just given up on the technology.

So both China and India got their first aircraft carriers from the Soviet Union directly or indirectly. But Russia has lost the capability to make them, as it was Ukraine that built them and it cant get it back from either of them or Ukraine.

Details here:

• Russia doesn’t have any aircraft carriers while the USA typically has 4 in service at any time and has 7 more in repairs or getting ready to deploy - UK has 2 and France has 1

And now it's the other way around. Russia wants the Chinese hardware and China refuses to sell. Except some dual use civilian / military equipment like drones and chips and dual use machine tools that Russia can use to make missiles.

The SCO is only one of many such alliances globally - as we head towards a more multi-polar world

Many organizations in the world similar to the SCO for just about every country in the world

There are many such organizations for other regions of the world.

African Union https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Union

South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Asian_Association_for_Regional_Cooperation

And of course SCO

Shanghai Cooperation Organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Cooperation_Organisation

Caribbean community https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caribbean_Community

Mercosaur https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercosur

Organization of American states https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organization_of_American_States

Union for the Mediterranean https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_for_the_Mediterranean

Pacific Islands Forum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Islands_Forum

And many others. This is just a selection.

I got Perplexity AI to help me find these. It’s the sort of thing a chatbot can do quite well. https://www.perplexity.ai/search/similar-organizations-to-the-s-cHnFJa5.SxiKKrbDgjeP.w

We are headed towards a multi-polar world which does NOT mean China dominates. It means that there will be world powers from every continent likely eventually - probably eventually even sub-Saharan Africa (currently geopolitically the weakest of all though abundantly rich in resources)

Only Israel votes against the resolution to establish a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East, and three minor abstentions

Iran would like to establish a Middle East nuclear weapon free zone on this map.

This is voted for regularly in the UN General Assembly.

ONLY ISRAEL VOTES AGAINST.

Three abstain: Argentina, Cameroon and the USA.

Several others don’t vote, small island states.

Eeryone else votes in favour including all the Middle East states except Israel

Coloured with: https://www.geograf.in/en/map-color.php

This is the record of votes for 2024:

https://reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/1com/1com24/votes-ga/404.pdf

121 countries including China joined India to call for a convention to prohibit all nukes in 2024 - majority vote for this every year - 49 against - 12 abstain

India has nukes but wants to very rapidly eliminate all nukes. Every year it brings a resolution to the UN to quickly eliminate all nukes globally as soon as is practically possible and a majority of countries vote for it every time.

https://reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/1com/1com24/votes-ga/404.pdf

This shows most of those countries on a map (there are a few small ones the interface didn’t include):

Countries that voted in 2024 to hold a convention on the prohibition of nukes

It claims it’s countries I visited, but I haven’t visted these countries, I just did it in order to make a map with those countries coloured blue. https://map1.maploco.com/visited-countries/mine.php?c1=p152qsqrjv-kvwt9h8o45-eomktlq5gq-k1apl6nv7r-2skpgzm8ri

The complete list is a bit longer. See: https://reachingcriticalwill.org/images/documents/Disarmament-fora/1com/1com24/votes-ga/404.pdf

Almost the entire global south is a nuclear free zone

The ones shown as blue are in nuclear weapon free zones. Nobody can even bring a nuke into those zones. The ones shown in yellow are Non Proliferation Treaty states. They pledge not to make nukes themselves and have regular atomic inspectors to make sure they don’t produce them. But some of them are in nuclear umbrellas of other states, especially the yellow ones in NATO such as Canada, Norway, Spain etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear-weapon-free_zone

Mongolia is the only single country nuclear weapon free zone. The other big blue area in the northern hemisphere is the central Asian nuclear weapon free zone.

The Central Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (CANWFZ) treaty is a legally binding commitment by Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan not to manufacture, acquire, test, or possess nuclear weapons. The treaty was signed on 8 September 2006 at Semipalatinsk Test Site, Kazakhstan, and is also known as Treaty of Semipalatinsk, Treaty of Semei, or Treaty of Semey.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Asian_Nuclear_Weapon_Free_Zone

It’s easy to remember, all the “stan”s except Pakistan and Afghanistan are in it. Stan is a Persian term meaning place.

Many countries including Mexico, Indonesia, South Africa etc have ratified the Treaty on prohibition of nukes

Then there’s the treaty on the prohibition of nukes. Many but not all countries in nuclear free zones are in this treaty.

It also adds a few other countries not in those zones such as Ireland.

Some other countries in Europe such as Ireland also prohibit nukes but aren’t in a nuclear weapon free zone.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_on_the_Prohibition_of_Nuclear_Weapons

Hans Blix says Ukraine and Gaza Strip are blips - in the larger picture the world is moving in the direction of less conflict - and foresees an end to all wars

Hans Blix is a former nuclear weapons inspector, former head of the IAEA and chair of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission.

He says that despite blips like Gaza Strip and the Ukraine war that

• the world is moving in the direction of less conflict.

• He foresees an end to all wars

As a species we are surely only fully civilized once war ends, replaced by non lethal competition such as the Olympics. We will find promising signs that this may even happen this century.

This century may end with us eventually:

• scrapping not just most nukes but nearly all missiles.

I cover that here:

SEE ALSO

Also

Why Putin will never use nukes

It NEVER makes sense for Russia to use nukes EVER.

And this explains why we do NOT risk a world war at all from any of these news stories.

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See Latest short debunks for new short debunks

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TIPS FOR DEALING WITH DOOMSDAY FEARS

If suicidal or helping someone suicidal see my:

BLOG: Supporting someone who is suicidal

If you have got scared by any of this, health professionals can help. Many of those affected do get help and find it makes a big difference.

They can’t do fact checking, don’t expect that of them. But they can do a huge amount to help with the panic, anxiety, maladaptive responses to fear and so on.

Also do remember that therapy is not like physical medicine. The only way a therapist can diagnose or indeed treat you is by talking to you and listening to you. If this dialogue isn’t working for whatever reason do remember you can always ask to change to another therapist and it doesn’t reflect badly on your current therapist to do this.

Also check out my Seven tips for dealing with doomsday fears based on things that help those scared, including a section about ways that health professionals can help you.

I know that sadly many of the people we help can’t access therapy for one reason or another - usually long waiting lists or the costs.

There is much you can do to help yourself. As well as those seven tips, see my:

BLOG: Doing what matters at times of stress
— new WHO booklet to help with mental health during COVID19 pandemic

BLOG: Breathe in and out slowly and deeply and other ways to calm a panic attack

BLOG: Tips from CBT
— might help some of you to deal with doomsday anxieties

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