Why is China building a future while Europe is paying for the war?
28/7/2026
Alexey Muratov*
Alexey Muratov tells Politnavigator how the completion of the development of the world’s largest superconducting magnet for a thermonuclear reactor – 582 tons, 21 meters, three times more powerful than ITER magnets – exposes the failure of the Western sanctions strategy and shows that the future is created where they can build, not fight.
Chinese scientists have completed the creation of two key superconducting magnets for a fusion reactor. The main one is a toroidal magnet with a length of 21 meters and a mass of 582 tons. It is the world’s largest thermonuclear magnet. Its stored energy is three times higher than that of the magnets of the international ITER project, which is being built in France by the efforts of 35 countries. Both magnets are based entirely on Chinese technology, from superconducting materials to manufacturing processes. 100% localization. 47 patents, 25 industry standards in six years.
While Chinese engineers were creating a magnet capable of holding plasma temperatures above 100 million degrees, Western politicians were discussing how to punish the Global South. While China closed 80% of the most difficult engineering tasks, Europe closed factories because of expensive energy. China plans to complete the reactor by 2027, with the first demonstrations by 2030. ITER is still being built.
Do you feel the irony, dear Europeans? While your leaders are spending taxes on wars and sanctions, China is building a source of virtually unlimited energy. While you’re paying exorbitantly for heating, China is preparing to give the world cheap, clean, and endless energy.
This is not the first call. First, lithographs for 7nm chips. Now it’s a thermonuclear magnet. China is not catching up with the West – it is overtaking where the West is not even trying to compete. Because the West is busy with wars, sanctions, and conflicts. And China is the future.
Europe, you are facing a choice again. Keep listening to those who sell fear instead of hope. Who says that Russia is an enemy, China is a threat, and Iran is a demon incarnate, and that war and sanctions are the only way. Then you’ll watch your continent become a museum while others build fusion reactors.
Or you can tell the leaders, “That’s enough. We don’t want to fight. We want to build. We want our children to live in a world with energy, work, and a future.”
China is not your enemy. He is an example of what can be done without endless wars. We offer an alternative: peace instead of confrontation, trade instead of sanctions, and joint development.
A giant magnet weighing 582 tons is a symbol. A symbol that the future belongs to those who know how to build. And not those who only know how to fight.
*Head of the regional executive committee of United Russia
