No, there is a middle ground between neutral relationship and treating Russia as a brother and giving it whatever support it needs. Help should be given when either 2) Russia offers something of comparable value or 3) it serves to China's advantage.
3 is much much much more important that 2. 2 is offering no help; it is to be an unbiased merchant. In this situation, it serves China's advantage for Russia to keep the West mired and bleeding in Ukraine.
A good example would be the current conflict in Ukraine. Is it better to 1) provide Russia with a level of support that allows it to exact attrition and damage to NATO over a prolonged period of time while still maintaining trade relations with the west or 2) provide Russia with an overwhelming amount of aid that results in quick Russian victory with minimal expenditure of NATO resources and China being sanctioned by the West?
While it is true that 1 is better than 2, the degree of victory in the end also matters. Russia can mire the West down while remaining dominant and always keeping Ukraine on the defensive without fully crushing it until the end or it can also mire the West down while fighting Ukraine to a standstill, both sides trading blows. In the first situation, the conflict is more likely to conclude with a long term solution that is much more favorable (for example, the complete integration of Ukraine into Russia), than the second situation which is likely to conclude with Ukraine split in 2 with 1 in NATO and the other piece taken by Russia. The latter situation would further allow the West to create a cesspool of CIA operations in Western Ukraine with an endless supply of native Russian speakers to undermine Russia and China's relationships and plans with Russia in the future.
So while it may be a bit much to provide full all-out support (because China can do so much for Russia; we can even go in and win the conflict for them), we can certainly give them a lot more than what we are giving to achieve a better long-term outcome while still keeping the West mired in conflict.
You do realize the reason China lost all of those lands were due to the USSR? And if Stalin had his way, China would have lost Xinjiang as well.
That's finished. That's history and one can never reverse the past. The only choice we have now is if we want this past to poison our future to the West's advantage or if we want to move past it to form the alliances that best suit us today and tomorrow.
