Just in case Washington gets too comfortable with the idea it has got Russia back onside, Vladimir Putin, Russia's prime minister, was in China yesterday to keep the US on its toes. Barack Obama has certainly made progress in “resetting” the relationship with Moscow. The US president has already reaped some rewards in terms of Russia's more accommodating line on Iran. But Mr Putin's visit to Beijing, coinciding neatly with US secretary of state Hillary Clinton's own trip to Moscow, underlined that Russia has other options.

Indeed, Moscow was busy yesterday signing billions of dollars-worth of trade deals with China. It was also making noises about eventually settling bilateral transactions in renminbi or roubles, rather than dollars. Mr Putin will attend a meeting of the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, a grouping whose purpose is generally understood to be to squeeze the US out of central Asia. The US was evicted from a military base in Uzbekistan in 2005. In February, it was ordered out of Kyrgyzstan after Russian machinations, though that decision has been reversed – for now.

Such trends have led some to conclude that the world's most formidable authoritarian states have found common cause. Certainly, the new Great Game in central Asia does not appear to be going Washington's way. Yet talk of a confluence of Chinese and Russian interests is overdone. The truth, comforting for Washington, is Moscow and Beijing remain more rivals than partners. China, whose economy, unlike that of Russia, is still motoring ahead, has recently flexed its muscles, concluding several big hydrocarbons deals in Kazakhstan and elsewhere in central Asia. In December, Turkmenistan is due to start pumping gas to China through a new pipeline. Moscow remains deeply suspicious of Chinese influence in central Asia, a region it regards as its “sphere of privileged interest”.