MOSCOW: Russia and China say their friendship has “no limits.” But behind the performative pageantry of summit diplomacy, intelligence operatives in Moscow are on high alert. A secret counterintelligence memo from Russia’s FSB—verified by six Western intelligence agencies and recently obtained by The New York Times—reveals that Moscow’s spy chiefs consider Beijing less a partner than a predator.
This confidential document, written by the FSB’s 7th Service (responsible for countering espionage from China and Asia), outlines deep concern that Chinese operatives are targeting Russian scientists, military officers, and strategic assets. It paints a picture not of alliance, but of a cold-eyed marriage of convenience, where mutual suspicion thrives beneath warm words.
According to the memo, Chinese intelligence is aggressively attempting to recruit Russian insiders—scientists facing financial hardship, specialists with access to aviation or drone warfare, and even Russians married to Chinese nationals. Their goal: to acquire sensitive Russian military technology and battlefield knowledge, particularly from the war in Ukraine, which Chinese strategists see as a laboratory for modern warfare against Western-equipped forces.
This isn’t an isolated assessment. U.S. officials have long suspected that China is exploiting the Ukraine war to refine its own military strategy. CIA Director William Burns has warned that China is “learning in real time” from Russia’s mistakes and successes. British intelligence officials told The Telegraph last year that Beijing is “heavily invested” in acquiring frontline data—especially concerning NATO-supplied weaponry.
The FSB document also raises alarms about Chinese academics subtly laying groundwork for territorial claims in Russia’s Far East. This dovetails with a broader pattern. In 2023, China published an official map labeling parts of Russian territory with historical Chinese names—part of a trend that some Russian nationalists have called “cartographic revanchism.”
Meanwhile, Chinese mining companies and research institutes are allegedly being used as cover for espionage in the Arctic, where warming seas have opened up a new geopolitical front. With Russia’s Arctic infrastructure faltering under sanctions, China sees opportunity. According to the FSB, Chinese agents are probing Russia’s vulnerabilities in this region through front operations masquerading as scientific research.
If true, these revelations upend the image of Sino-Russian harmony. “There is no such thing as friendly intelligence services,” as Paul Kolbe, a 25-year CIA veteran, aptly put it. Even in alliances, intelligence work is often adversarial. But the scope and brazenness of China’s espionage in Russia—as described by the FSB—suggest something more profound: a lack of genuine trust between these authoritarian giants.
This isn’t the first indication. In 2020, a report by the Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service noted that “China’s interests in Russia are growing rapidly” and that “Russia is increasingly being perceived in China not as a partner, but as a resource.” In 2021, a Taiwanese intelligence white paper cited Chinese efforts to infiltrate Russian defense industries. The pattern is clear: Beijing wants access to Russian know-how but isn’t waiting for permission.
The FSB memo confirms that Moscow is fully aware of this threat—but also trapped by its dependence on China. Since invading Ukraine in 2022, Russia’s economy has been isolated from the West. China stepped in, becoming its top oil buyer, supplier of essential components, and de facto tech provider. According to the document, the FSB explicitly warns agents not to take any sensitive countermeasures against Chinese operatives without high-level approval, for fear of damaging bilateral ties.
This dilemma has profound strategic implications. If the West hopes to cleave Russia from China—as some Trump-era officials argue—the FSB document is both promising and sobering. On one hand, it proves there is genuine mistrust. On the other, it suggests that Moscow sees no alternative to Beijing’s support, even as it watches China infiltrate its secrets.
For the United States and its allies, this raises two urgent questions: Can Russia be peeled away from China, or is it too far gone? And if not, what happens when two nuclear-armed autocracies remain tethered—outwardly cooperative, but inwardly locked in a silent war for control and advantage?
One thing is certain: the so-called “no-limits” partnership has limits. They are written in invisible ink in Moscow’s darkest corridors—and whispered in Chinese through the bugged phones of betrayed scientists.
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Matteo Bianchi
Matteo Bianchi is a geopolitical analyst and author. With a distinguished career in information and security in government and the corporate world, Bianchi has lived in 4 continents and worked in several verticals. He is currently retired and writes on geopolitics, AI and cybersecurity.
