By tearing up Victoria’s Belt and Road agreements with China, the Commonwealth is playing a high-stakes game

When the federal government torpedoed Victoria’s controversial Belt and Road agreements with China, the state government didn’t respond with fury.

It was more of a resigned shrug.

There were no angry statements or protests, and not a peep from the Acting Premier.

But more than a few people in the state were muttering, “I hope the Feds know what they are doing”, fearing yet another economic strike from China.

The Commonwealth does not have a shred of doubt about what it has done.

It’s convinced it has successfully neutralised a crude attempt to wedge Australia over the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and made it crystal clear that foreign policy will be run by Canberra alone.

But it’s a high-stakes game.

The BRI has enormous symbolic importance…