Donald Trump's (centre) return to the White House has created potential challenges and opportunities for Xi (left) and Putin (right). (Reuters: Ekaterina Shtukina/Evelyn Hockstein/Mikhail Metzel)
It would be hard to find two men on the international stage who are right now more willing to regularly advertise their bromance than China's leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The pair announced a "no-limits" partnership between their two countries days before Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
There have been many opportunities for Xi to walk back support for his best mate's imperialistic ambitions in the intervening three years, but each meeting and phone call they've had since has been a further reinforcement of their close friendship.
So the recent thawing of relations between Russia and the US left some analysts wondering if Washington was trying to split Moscow and Beijing, as a way to rob China of some of its power and influence.
New US President Donald Trump has spoken to Putin by phone, and their top diplomats met in Saudi Arabia to discuss the end of the war in Ukraine — in the absence of Ukrainian representatives.
Then of course, there was Friday's disturbing display in the White House between Trump, US Vice President JD Vance and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, during which the two countries' relations disintegrated in front of the world's media for all to see.
"I think Xi Jinping would be very happy to see what's happening with Russia," the Lowy Institute's East Asia fellow Richard McGregor told the ABC's Insiders on Background podcast.
"Everything Putin said that, 'We can outlast the West,' and the like, is turning out to be true and [Xi] will apply that sort of theory to Taiwan and might be emboldened there.
"A disengaged [America] or an America that only sees value in alliances as a sort of insurance company 'you pay us, and we might protect you' is great for China."
Meanwhile, Xi and Putin held a "warm and friendly" phone conversation late on Monday, as described in a statement from the Kremlin, on the third anniversary of the Ukraine war.
"Our bilateral relationship has a strong internal driving force," Xi said, according to the official readout from Beijing.
"No matter how the international landscape changes, our relationship shall move forward at its own pace."
Putin updated his Chinese counterpart on the talks with Washington, while Xi described their two countries as "good neighbours and true friends", saying their relationship would not be influenced by any third parties — a clear reference to the US.
"Thought of pulling a reverse Nixon is a pipe dream," said Wen-Ti Sung, of the Atlantic Council's Global China Hub, referring to then-US president Richard Nixon's efforts to exploit tensions between China and the Soviet Union in the 1970s, to isolate America's Cold War enemy.
"The China-Russia coalition has strategic and ideological underpinnings.
"To meaningfully pull it apart, America will have to make itself ideologically Russia's kin — now is that a price any American is willing to pay?"
China's rise as a diplomatic power player
China's absence from any potential peace talks about the Ukraine War would have rankled some in Beijing.
Among the Chinese Communist Party's global aspirations are not only for the country to become an economic superpower, but also a diplomatic one.
And in recent years, Beijing has been trying to promote its potential as a fair and responsible global arbiter that could rival Washington.
The crowning achievement of this effort was China's successful mediation between Iran and Saudi Arabia two years ago, which saw the two countries normalise diplomatic ties.
When it comes to Ukraine, Xi and his government have repeatedly tried to position Beijing as willing and able to play a key role in brokering peace.
Rallies were held around the world in support of Ukraine on the third anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion. (The Canadian Press via AP: Justin Tang)
A year into the Ukraine War, Beijing put forward a 12-point peace plan, while Xi last year proposed four principles to arrest the conflict and restore peace while meeting with German chancellor Olaf Scholz during his visit to Beijing.
But while Xi has repeatedly met with and even hosted Putin, he's only spoken to Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the phone.
Kyiv and the Biden administration also accused Beijing of supporting the Russian military industrial base, and therefore its war in Ukraine, and of providing Moscow with "dual use" items, which can be used for military or civilian purposes.
Then in September, deputy secretary of state Kurt Campbell went as far as saying China was supplying Moscow with "direct support" in exchange for sharing military know-how and technology.
"These are not dual-use capabilities … These are component pieces of a very substantial effort on the part of China to help sustain, build and diversify various elements of the Russian war machine," Campbell said in Brussels.
Beijing has denied supporting Russia's military industrial base.
It does however openly buy plenty of natural gas from Russia, with imports expected to reach 38 billion cubic metres this year, according to S&P Global.
"If China doesn't buy gas from Russia, which country can provide enough gas to meet the needs of the Chinese people? It's not possible, and it's not safe," China's foreign minister Wang Yi told the Munich Security Conference last month.
China's manoeuvres at sea
As these groundbreaking meetings have continued in the northern hemisphere, three ships from China's People's Liberation Army Navy (PLA-N) have been sailing down Australia's east coast.
Commercial planes diverted course as the ships carried out live-fire drills in waters between Australia and New Zealand.
By Tuesday, they were east of Tasmania, more than 8,000 kilometres from Southern Theatre Command headquarters in Guangzhou in southern China — before heading west through the Great Australian Bight.
People's Liberation Army Navy Jiangkai-class frigate Hengyang in the Tasman Sea. (Supplied: ADF)
"It looks to me like an attempt to test reactions from Australia, from New Zealand and from the United States itself," says Euan Graham, a senior analyst with the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
"And the timing to see to what extent the alliances are being backed in overtly by the Trump administration — you could understand China's interest in doing that right now, it's quite an effective way to take the temperature of these bilateral relationships."
While perhaps not intentional, Graham says the timing has worked out well for Beijing.
Australia stays slow and parochial as global geopolitics deteriorates
Photo shows A man in a dark blue suit with black framed glasses holds up his hands in front of his fact in a square shape
On one hand they are showing just how far their military can project, and also demonstrating the advances they've made in recent years.
In 2019, PLA-N ships did sail into Sydney Harbour, with the permission of the Australian government, while returning from counter-drug-trafficking operations in the Middle East, according to then prime minister Scott Morrison.
"The Chinese navy has been a regular visitor to Australia, both in the sense of scripted and friendly port calls up until 2019," Graham said.
"The key difference now is these ships have their own energy source alongside them, and the ability to resupply [those task groups] for a significant duration.
"So China can now project power without a base in the South Pacific."
The quiet changes on a US website that rankled Beijing
So what does this mean for any possible future conflict over Taiwan?
Certainly Trump's administration includes some of the most strident China hawks you'll find, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio and National Security Adviser Michael Waltz — both of whom were at the talks in Saudi Arabia.
"It is understandable people may see parallels between Ukraine and Taiwan [and that] the discussion between the US and Russia did not include Ukraine adds to that concern," says John T. Hennessey-Niland, who served as the political counsellor at the US embassy in Canberra and as ambassador to Palau, and was the first US ambassador to visit Taiwan since 1979.
"So far however, both the US Secretary of State and Secretary of Defence's public comments on Taiwan have been far stronger than on Ukraine.
"And the Department of State website's language has changed on Taiwan, angering Beijing and hopefully reassuring Taipei."
Ambassador Hennessey-Niland recently completed a Taiwan government-sponsored fellowship to the democratically ruled island.
A discreet change to the wording on the US State Department website, which saw a statement that said "we do not support Taiwan independence" removed, has drawn the ire of Beijing.
The US One China policy recognises the People's Republic of China [that is Beijing] as the government of China — but only acknowledges, as opposed to recognises, Beijing's claim that Taiwan is part of China.
It opposes any one-sided changes to the current status quo across the Taiwan Strait.
Despite this — and the fact the US doesn't have official diplomatic relations with Taipei — Washington is Taiwan's most important international ally.
Under the Taiwan Relations Act, America is obligated to provide the self-governed island with the resources it needs to defend itself against China.
Whether the US would itself send troops into any such conflict is a matter of "strategic ambiguity" — Joe Biden repeatedly said it would, but Trump has said Taiwan needs to pay for US protection.
"We oppose any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side," the State Department website was updated to say.
"We expect cross-Strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means, free from coercion, in a manner acceptable to the people on both sides of the Strait."
But while the second Trump administration has already made clear its positions on the Middle East and Ukraine, the Asia shoe is yet to drop, according to Graham.
Geopolitics watchers are still waiting to see what position the second Trump administration will take on Asia. (AP: Andrew Harnik)
"If we remember the first Trump administration in its first year, many people were similarly inclined to feel that this was an administration that was leaning in dangerously close to China," he said.
"And actually, what we got over the course of the Trump administration was some of the hardest hitting counter China policies which the Biden administration, to significant extent, continued in office.
"The change that's come has been, so far, mainly in relation to Russia and we've also seen the US taking very strident positions on Israel and Gaza — that's why I think we need to avoid rushing to judgement [about the Trump administration's position on China]."
Regardless, Trump's angry interaction with Zelenskyy should serve as something of a wake-up call for Taiwan, argues Wen-Ti Sung from The Atlantic Council.
"Taiwan is feeling a more immediate than ever urgency to prove that it is a positive asset rather than a liability to Trump," he says.