Angry mobs clashing with police in eastern cities. Networks of saboteurs smuggling arms across the border for attacks on police stations and military barracks. A resentful nuclear power boosting defence production as it accuses its neighbour of ethnic cleansing.
These all sound like Russia’s playbook when it first invaded Ukraine in 2014, then launched a full-scale war in 2022. But the storylines are all from Russian military training exercises based on a hypothetical Chinese invasion of its far east.
