Russia has massive oil and gas reserves and is not reliant on international trade the way China is.
China does not necessarily need a Navy as powerful as the US, just one that can do real damage to the US Navy, but it needs to have a more developed economy and one that is less dependent on trade with the Western powers.
I think by around 2025, the conditions will be in place for China to be able to act the way that Russia is doing now.
Agreed.
Oil dependence is a big problem. We need to find ways around that.
We already have pipelines to Russia and to several countries in Central Asia, such as Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. And China has one of the largest domestic reserves of oil, more than America has in fact.
Renewable energy will be a big deal, we are already the number one investor and producer of green energy in the world. Unfortunately even our huge renewable energy production meets only a fraction of our energy consumption, for now at least.
Shale oil/gas is an interesting aspect. China has the 3rd largest reserves of shale oil on the planet, and we have the number 1 largest reserves of shale gas. If we can harness this in a cost effective way, it will go a long way towards helping our strategic needs.
But like you said, it will take at least until 2020-2025 before we can do what Russia is doing today, laughing in the face of American hegemony. We did something similar during the Korean War before, in which we forced the US into the longest retreat in their military history.
However, that was a land war. They are now smart enough not to fight us on land again, given our massive numerical advantage in terms of soldiers. Which puts us back into a disadvantageous position.