Russian Schools in Vladivostok and St. Petersburg to Train Chinese Skippers of Ships Plying the Northern Sea Route

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 3 – Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin and his Chinese counterpart Li Qiang have signed an agreement under the terms of which Chinese pilots of ships plying the Northern Sea Route will be trained to do so at Russian universities in Vladivostok and St. Petersburg.

            The two sides hope that such Russian training for Chinese pilots will dramatically expand the number of Chinese ships which can pass along this route between Asia and Europe and thus help boost the amount of trade carried along the NSR (rosbalt.ru/news/2025-11-03/v-peterburge-budut-uchit-kitaytsev-prohodu-po-sevmorputi-5501194).

            That is not an absurd expectation, but Russia’s willingness to train Chinese ship captains in this way highlights both Russia’s own problems with building enough ships to come anywhere close to meeting the cargo goals Putin has set and China’s assumption of an ever larger share of the shipping along this route.

            In the short term, Moscow will likely be able to claim success if the amount of shipping goes up; but over the longer term, the increasing dominance of Chinese ships and crews will likely allow Beijing to dictate terms and ultimately Russia aside from what Putin views as a key Russian artery. (On that possibility, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/10/as-russia-falters-in-north-china.html and jamestown.org/program/china-exploiting-russian-weakness-in-arctic-and-moscow-has-reason-to-worry/.)