Oh. When I said “the west” I was squarely pointing the finger at France. China is playing the longer game there because Russia has stationed Wagner down there already. It benefits both Russia and China if the population is focused on removing French influence. China gets a long term investment hedge against France and Russia gets more cheap mercs for Ukraine.

Now, I don’t really want to spend much time doing a full research project on what is basically a game of thrones’ish style side bet. It’s insanely complicated, I would imagine. After a few African countries went full-on coup d’état a few months ago, I realized there was much more going on.

Edit: I wasn’t downvoting you. I suspect that some people might be trying to launch some instability of their own. Lulz.