CIA chief says he is “sure” China is considering providing lethal weapons to Russia
CIA director William Burns has confirmed that the US is “sure” that China is considering providing Russia with lethal equipment for its war against Ukraine. Washington is not aware that any delivery of material has already taken place and even considers that the decision to arm Russia has not yet been taken, but that it is being debated in the leadership of Chinese power.
“We are sure that the Chinese leadership is considering the provision of lethal equipment,” Burns said in an interview with CBS collected by The Hill. Washington’s fear was first expressed last weekend, when Secretary of State Antony Blinken made the US suspicions public at the Munich Security Conference. There he was able to share them directly with the highest representative of Chinese diplomacy, Wang Yi, whom he warned of the negative consequences that such a shipment would have.
This Saturday, the CNN television network quoted US sources assuring that Beijing was considering the supply of suicide drones through a technology company. The UK believes that Russia has exhausted its stocks of Iranian suicide drones.
Biden has also expressed the same suspicions as Burns, in an interview with CBS News, recalling that in his last meeting with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, he warned him about the consequences of sending lethal weapons to Russia. “I had a long conservation with Xi about this in the summer. I said, ‘Look, this is not a threat, it’s just a statement.’ When, in fact, the Europeans saw what was happening and the Americans saw what was happening in Russia, in Europe, guess what? Six hundred companies pulled out and left,” Biden said.
Burns, in addition, has indicated that the next six months will be “key” in the war in Ukraine given the decreasing Western interest and the “political fatigue” existing among the countries that support the Ukrainian government, according to what he has told CBS. “Putin, I think, is gambling right now that he can make time work for him (…) The key is going to be on the battlefield in the next six months, it seems to us,” Burns stressed, arguing that fatigue and time could give Russian troops a new opportunity to make advances on the battlefield. (EP)
