[GLOBAL SOUTH] China Forced to Regroup After Israel-Iran War
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Hello and welcome to another edition of the China Global South podcast, a proud member of the Seneca Podcast Network. I'm Eric Olander, and as always, I'm joined by China Global South's managing editor, Kobus Venstaden, from beautiful Cape Town, South Africa. A very good afternoon to you, Kobus.

Good afternoon. Kobus, today we're going to start a series of three programs that are exploring China's role in the Iran-Israel-United States war that has escalated considerably over the past few weeks. Today we're going to focus on the Gulf countries. Next week we're going to speak with Gedalia Afterman from Reikman University about the Sino-Israel relationship and where that stands now. And then finally we're going to speak with the Iran-China guy, William Figueroa,

and he's gonna talk to us about specifically what the situation is between Iran and China. So today we're looking at the Gulf, and there's been a lot of discussions this week about the Gulf. In fact, Donald Trump earlier this week

posted on Truth Social. Let me read it to you, Kobus. He said, quote, China can now continue to purchase oil from Iran. Hopefully they will be purchasing plenty from the U.S. also. Now, in some cases, a lot of people were surprised by this because all of the rhetoric coming out of Washington against China and surprised that the

this vital oil pipeline for the Chinese, which is a vulnerability for the Chinese, that Donald Trump would let him go. But interestingly though, Kobus,

Donald Trump reached the same conclusion that previous presidents have as well, that cutting off the Iranian oil supply to the Chinese would also reverberate to the United States because it forces up the cost of production in China if the cost of energy goes up. Now this is very important because about 14% of China's oil imports are sourced from Iran, but more importantly for Iran, 90% of Iranian exports

go to China. Now a lot of that makes its way to China through third countries like Oman and Malaysia trying to circumvent the US sanctions and there's a whole black fleet that goes that brings the oil all the way up to northeastern China which is in Shandong province where a lot of the independent what they call the teapot refineries who process the Iranian oil.

But before the oil gets to Shandong province, it has to pass through this tiny little passageway, this waterway called the Strait of Hormuz. A lot of you have been hearing about this. And this has been a big topic of conversation in major capitals around the world this week over whether or not Iran will close the Strait of Hormuz in retaliation for last week's US attacks on their nuclear facilities. Now,

Just consider this, and this is gonna set up our conversation today. 20% of the world's oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz. And about a third to about 45%, that's the estimates, of China's oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

Now, the Iranian parliament last week after the attack passed a measure that authorized the government to close the Strait of Hormuz. We don't have any confirmation from Tehran that they actually are going to do that. They've said that all of the options are on the table and it's one that would have very severe consequences for

on the global economy if the Iranians did that. Now what's interesting here, Kobus, is that the United States is once again calling on the Chinese to use their purported influence, their leverage with the Iranians

to discourage Tehran from closing the Strait of Hormuz. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, he raised that specific issue in an interview with Maria de Bartiromo on Fox News right after the U.S. attacks on Iran. Let's take a listen to what Rubio had to say.

Secretary, final question here. Do you expect Iran to move to close the Strait of Hormuz to try to disrupt oil transportation across the world? Well, I encourage the Chinese government in Beijing to call them about that because they heavily depend on the Straits of Hormuz for their oil. If they do that, it will be another terrible mistake. It's economic suicide for them if they do it. And we retain options to deal with that. But other countries should be looking at that as well. It would hurt other countries' economies a lot worse than ours.

It would be, I think, a massive escalation that would merit a response, not just by us, but from others. - Kobus, if this sounds familiar, it should. Let's kind of dial back the rewind machine to last January. If you recall then, US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, Jake Sullivan, who was then the National Security Advisor and former US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, called on Beijing repeatedly to again use their influence with Iran

to back then it was about the Red Sea and the Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen from launching attacks on Red Sea cargo that was passing through there. Let's also remember the outcome of what happened in that whole Red Sea thing. So the Chinese, they kind of feigned that they talked to the Iranians, but they really did a half-ass kind of discussion with them. But when it came out that the Houthis said, "We're gonna give safe passage

to Russian and Chinese ships, that should give us an indication of what might happen if the Strait of Hormuz is also closed. So Secretary Rubio is right saying that the consequences would be grave, but they may not be as grave for the Chinese if what we saw in the Red Sea is anything to go by. So there we have, Kovacs, that's kind of a rundown of where we are. One other final data point before I get your reaction.

Bloomberg came out this week with a fascinating new chart that showed that Chinese oil purchases from Iran have been steadily declining. That may be also a factor that the Chinese are weighing that it's not as important to them or they have to wean themselves off of Iranian oil in order to reduce this vulnerability. You've been covering this story all week for our subscribers in the daily newsletter and on the site. Give me your take on everything that we've kind of run through and what you've been reporting on.

You know, this is a great example of the difficulty of tracking the news at the moment, you know, because there is an entire set of relationships and interactions between China and Iran that we know are happening, but we have very little idea of what their content really is. And then on top of that, we have a set of like mega charged, you know, kind of like very high volume narratives.

about a purported extremely close relationship between China and Iran, where China has all kinds of leverage. So making your way through the one in order to get to the other is difficult. I think from my perspective, and I'm very much not an expert, it seems that there is...

more ambiguity within the Iran-China relationship than is assumed, I think, in Washington. I don't know how close they really are. I mean, one thing that, you know, obviously they...

China's done a lot of work in bringing Iran into folds like the BRICS, for example. They've done a lot of normalization between Iran and other kind of regional powers. But at the same time, like the big quote-unquote 25-year deal signed between Iran and China, one still sees more pressure from the Iranian side to kind of move that forward than necessarily enthusiasm on the Chinese side.

And, you know, so it's very difficult for me to pass exactly how close the two actually are. And then with that, then, you know, kind of that raises a bunch of other questions about Chinese, you know, involvement in the conflict. And, you know, overall, what we do know is that China has been really working very hard to set up alternative shipping routes and at the same time,

you know, China's decarbonization drive, complicated and slow as it is, is also real, you know, in the sense that, you know, we see less kind of like oil being used slowly over time, you know, so there's also this kind of overlap between decarbonization and national security in China is another kind of entire kind of factor that I think, you know, kind of needs to be pulled into this conversation.

Well, let's get a view now from somebody who is expert on this much more than we are. Ahmed Abudu is the head of the China Studies Research Unit at the Emirates Policy Center and also an associate fellow with the Chatham House Middle East and North Africa program in London. We are thrilled to have Ahmed back on the show again to help share some insights as to where we are in this current moment in the Iran-Gulf relationship and particularly what's going on in Iran. A very good afternoon to you, Ahmed.

Good afternoon, Eric. Good afternoon, Corpus. Thank you so much for this kind invitation. I'm very, very glad to join you. It's wonderful to have you back again. You always help enlighten us so much when you're on the show with us. Tell us a little bit about what your thoughts are about the Stratiform Moves issue before we get into the broader issue of

Where are we right now, given all that's happened? So let's start with your reaction to the events related to the Strait of Hormuz, and particularly as it relates to China. It is, obviously, as you rightly said earlier, and your interesting data points, that it is a very vital and strategic waterway for China, especially energy imports from the Gulf. 45%, as we know, of oil imports going to China come from the Gulf region. That includes Iraq, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Syria.

It is a very sensitive topic when it comes to China's energy security. Now, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has been a very heated debate, both in the Gulf and Iran, I would imagine.

But historically, we could see that Iran has never closed the Strait of Hormuz before, whether that is lack of ability to do that militarily or strategic calculations. And I lean towards the latter. Iran knows, as Secretary Robio rightly said, that this might actually be a strategic suicide for Iran for two reasons. The first is,

it will badly affect oil trade all over the world. That will be implemented in the spike of oil prices, but also insurance premiums. So the ability of Iran to close the Hormuz Strait or not is not very important because oil tankers will avoid this, as we could see also in the Bab el-Mandab Strait when the area was militarized by the Houthis.

The second is it will invite a major military response, as Secretary Robu hinted at. And I think this will destabilize the region in the long term. And the Gulf states and Iran both don't want this to happen. When it comes to China...

It is very important for the Strait to remain open, but also I think China has some tools in its toolkit to deal with this situation. One of them is sending a flotilla from its military base in Djibouti to escort ships, not to intervene directly head-on with Western forces operating in the area or assisting anybody for that matter. It just will be very focused on its own interests

as we saw in the Bab el-Mandab Strait, or reaching some sort of a deal similar to that deal they struck with the Houthis to give their oil tankers a safe passage in this regard.

But in the end, in the bigger picture, this will be another dilemma. I call it Holmo's dilemma for China in the long term, just like the Malacca dilemma that will incentivize China to diversify its energy sources. And we already started to see...

Great emphasis on China and resuming the work on the power of Siberia to buy blind, gas buy blind, because they foresee long term instability. And this can be enforced by the preliminary bomb damage assessment that we saw in the New York Times that says that the nuclear program hasn't been obliterated as President Trump predicted.

said before, which means or tells me that there is huge worry in the Gulf and China that this war was just the first opening scrimmage between Israel and Iran. And Israel might resume its strikes at some point in the future, which will destabilize the region, given that Iran might actually respond by the closure of Hormuz.

I was wondering on a broad level what your impressions were of the quote-unquote ceasefire that was announced by the Trump administration and then, you know, the kind of fights between the Trump administration and some of the actors on the ground since then. Like, how should we think about the conflict and about the ceasefire as it stands at the moment?

I think there is huge optimism in the region that it will last and it will hold, mainly because President Trump seems to be throwing his weight behind it and seems to be willing to use great level of pressure on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and on Iran to stick to this ceasefire. So there is optimism, although it is still very fragile and it's still very early to assume that it will hold.

On the other hand, I think in the long term, the war is going to repeat, in my view, not only because of the nuclear program assessments on the side of Israel, but also because it's all about regional dominance between Israel and Iran. And you could see that when it comes to our conversation about China in China's reaction, which is starkly different, in my view, from China's response to the Gaza war.

They understand that the Gaza war is a global conflict. It resonates with the majority of people in the Global South.

And it will give China some political points to score. But when it comes to Iran, it is a very controversial country with very controversial influence in the region, especially for Gulf countries. And it's all about hegemonism or hegemony. That's why you could see that Prime Minister Netanyahu calling it the rising line, this campaign.

vis-a-vis Iran. So in the end of the day, I think we are just at the beginning. It's a long-term thing, but we could cherish and celebrate the short-term ceasefire for now. Yes, at least now the rockets temporarily, as we are recording this today, are not flying back and forth. And it's interesting you point out the different tone that China took

in response to this conflict and what they've been doing on Gaza. In particular because we've heard from a number of your colleagues in the China-Persian Gulf analysis space, namely Jonathan Fulton, who has been on our show a number of times talking about the primacy of the China-Saudi relationship in terms of China's geopolitical hierarchy of interests in the Persian Gulf, Qatar, the UAE,

are much more important to the Chinese than Iran. Iran is nonetheless important, but nowhere near as important strategically as the Saudis. And so I guess I'm curious because the discussion that's happening in the United States, and again, I'd like to hear you challenge this or agree with it, is that

What Donald Trump demonstrated is this notion that in Beijing, there is the perception that the West is in decline and the East is in ascent or China is in ascent. And flying B-2 bombers with bunker busting bombs, with the level of precision that they had, they may not have destroyed China.

the nuclear facilities, but they demonstrated a type of military power that the Chinese are a long ways away from. And they demonstrated also that the United States is still a formidable military power and that can project force far from its borders. And I'm wondering what you interpret how this frames China's

kind of framing of this in the Gulf in particular, where it saw itself as a new power. It was negotiating detente between Iran and Saudi Arabia. It was bringing billions of dollars of investments. It was kind of carrying the upper hand on Gaza and beating the United States as it was an outlier in the international community. And things seem a little bit different today. And there's a different tone coming out of Beijing after all this. What's your take on all of that?

This is a very important question, Eric. And I think when it comes to tone, first of all, I could see a very different one because this is based on balancing. And the Chinese, in my view,

don't want to burn all the bridges with Israel. And you could see that they are very, very cautious in the messaging they are putting out there, unlike a lot of rhetoric coming from the US that China is standing behind Iran, that China is supporting Iran unequivocally. This is not true, in my view. And I think the American decision makers, policymakers and Israeli policymakers got the message right.

this time. Why? Because Iran demonstrated very floppy way or ability to defend their own land and security. And China doesn't want to put its eggs in one basket, knowing that it is very hard for Iran to emerge as a winner in this fight. When it comes to the, and this ties into the assessment that you asked me about the difference in relations between China and Iran and China and the GCC.

And I think I can say maybe that after the war, I think Iran's strategic importance in Chinese assessments in the Middle East has been reduced dramatically. Why? Because...

If I was a Chinese policymaker sitting in Beijing now, I wouldn't be able to continue to see Iran as a bargaining chip, a valuable bargaining chip in my deliberations with the United States, because Iran has been completely weakened by attacking its proxies or forward defense strategy and weakening its missile program and setting back its nuclear program as well.

On the other hand, on the long term and at strategic level, if I was Chinese, I wouldn't continue to see Iran as a balancing weight vis-a-vis Israel and the United States anymore in the Middle East. It is not going to be able to provide me with this function anymore in the strategic assessment in the Middle East. So what does that mean after the war? It means that

We could see China delays the implementation of all the initiatives under the comprehensive strategic agreement signed in 2021 even further. And on the other side, we could see more reliance from the Chinese side on their relationship with the Gulf states.

whether that is in investments, trade, high-tech cooperation or infrastructure. Because there is great uncertainty now that Iran may stay stable in the long term as a country and as a regime. And this weighs heavily on any calculations coming from China. On the other hand, I would say that China's

China wants to preserve the Saudi Iran rapprochement for its own interests and for its image. But as you rightly said, as a mediator, but as you rightly said, the United States, every time there is security tensions in the region, everybody look for the United States to come in and sort it out, whether that is militarily or diplomatically.

And this war reinforced the idea that China can call itself a great power, can position itself as a potential alternative mediator in peace times. But when security is on the line and national security

interests for regional powers is in line, it's always the United States that is able to come and turn things around for them and to provide some sort of protection for their interests. Therefore, I don't think China is even near to being seen or considered from the Gulf states as a security partner anytime soon.

So if we flip, move to the flip side of that, of that issue, like China's own security, I was wondering how you see the conflict in the context of the Global Security Initiative. You know, so, you know, obviously for a long time, the Global Security Initiative was very studiedly very vague. And in a lot of ways, it was kind of, you know,

A lot of times one would read documents and not really be sure what you're reading, right? Kind of like the whole thing felt like vibes in lots of ways. But at the same time, we're also seeing, like, you know, last week we saw Xi Jinping's meeting with the Central Asian states. This week we're seeing calls for greater, you know, kind of security cooperation within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. All of these blocks that are sitting between China and this, geographically between China and this war.

So I was wondering how, like, are we, like, how, like, taking into account that, you know, that the Global Security Initiative is a key kind of, you know, initiative in Xi Jinping's arsenal, how should we think of it in the context of this particular conflict? This is a very interesting question. And I could focus on two things. First, the Global Security Initiative, one of Global Security Initiative main principle is common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security.

And this war showed that the Middle East is so far away from this being reality. I would call even the GSI very inspirational because it will take years, if not decades, for something like that to happen in the Middle East. I could also link the Global Development Initiative. And the main principle is that is security through development. And the

the Middle East is the embodiment of invalidation of this principle because it's very highly securitized and antagonistic relations dominate networks in the Middle East that it is

not the place to talk about such principles that early in China's journey to become a normative great power. The second point is the multilateral platforms that China is trying to build its vision on.

mainly SEO, but also I would like to add the BRICS. And Iran is a member in both organizations. And this war showed us that these organizations are not able to provide any sort of protection for its members.

And although there is a lot of security-related rhetoric coming out of these meetings, especially the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, it is all theoretical and is all inspirational as well. And there is no practical mechanism that...

these members can actually refer to ask for protection or security cooperation. So in the end of the day, I think this war exposes all these mechanisms, China-led mechanisms, and doesn't help China perspectives on China in the Middle East, especially, but also across the global South. One last point I would say is,

This also throws Spander in the works of China trying to position itself as a leader of the Global South, because there is no true leader that behaves like that when rockets start to fly. They don't only rely on rhetoric and diplomatic backing, even being cautious in backing their own allies and partners. Yeah. We saw a very big crack, by the way, in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,

Shortly after the missiles started flying, the SCO got together and issued a statement condemning the Israeli attacks on Iran.

But, very importantly, the Indian delegation was not present at the drafting of that communique. In very rare diplomatic form, the Indian Ministry of External Affairs issued a statement that said, "We were not part of this drafting." And the reason why this is so contentious is because not only is Iran a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, so is Pakistan.

And I guess the feeling was that they would not be able to draft a statement condemning Israel and Israel and particularly Modi and Netanyahu have a particularly close relationship. They would not have been able to get a unanimous consent on that statement had India been there.

And again, that shows the weakness of these organizations as well. And so the BRICS faces a very similar challenge now that it's getting larger. Koba said he wanted to flip the script. I'm going to flip the script again because we have been looking very closely at Chinese media coverage and the discourse that's happening in China. Whereas in the United States and in the Gulf and in a lot of the media narratives,

are talking about how China was hapless. That was a word that we saw a lot, and that this revealed China's weakness, and that this revealed also all the different things we've been talking about. In China, and not only in the propaganda, but also within the academic and analyst policy discourse, they're saying it was very tactical on their part not to get sucked into this region that has been a viper's nest for not only the Americans, but also the British, and I mean,

the Middle East has not been a very healthy place for major powers to grow.

And so they are very limited in their engagement in this part of the world because the risks are so high. So they limit their engagement to economic and to technology and to the safe spaces. And then they'll let the Americans get dragged down into another 10-year war. And no doubt, people were giddy over the idea of the Americans getting back into another Eurasian landmass war. I mean, they might have been listening to the War Room podcast by Steve Bannon who was saying, don't do this.

for the Americans. But remember, the last time this happened, the United States spent the equivalent of what, five, six, seven Belt and Roads in Iraq and Afghanistan?

And so nothing could be better for the Chinese if the United States gets bogged down in another Mideast war. So the view in Beijing was very, very different. They said this was more tactical, it was more strategic. Let's not get involved. This is a mess. Why would we want to get involved? And they tried to limit their exposure. How do you see it from a Chinese perspective? And you speak a lot with Chinese analysts. Try to understand it from their point of view.

I think they're right, but also that the narrative coming from the US or the West in general and the narrative coming from China don't contradict each other. They are tactical because they don't have the ability to be strategic. So they have to be very risk averse as usual. And if you are Chinese and not risk averse in the Middle East, where would you be risk averse? Especially if you don't have the capabilities and assets on the ground to help you to project power or influence.

All you could see coming from China is diplomatic posturing, balancing between Iran and Israel, but not when it comes to the United States. And this was very, very important as well, because if you compare the language in Chinese statements towards Israel, it's very cautious. But when it comes to the US, which reinforces your point,

they want the United States to appear as if they are hypocrites, don't have any credibility and biased, and they can't be mediators just like China, for example. But the biggest thing that really caught my eyes in the Chinese discourse is how less respect Chinese analysts and also netizens started to grant Iranians

That was very interesting. They really were throwing shade on Iran. And that was permitted by, because the censors do guide some of these discussions. And so that was very, I'm glad you brought that up because one of the themes in our China watching on these discourses was very negative towards Iran.

Yes, because how it wouldn't be? Iran approved that it is very easy country to infiltrate by spies. It has, from a Chinese point of view, very outdated military. The economy has been under sanctions for too long and crippling, and its forward defense strategy has been demoralized.

So how could you rely from a Chinese perspective on Iran to do business in the future, even not only to put pressure on Israel and the United States? Plus, there is very important point from a Chinese perspective that it is not only Iran that doesn't trust China very much. And this heated debate dominating Iranians perspectives towards China, but also the Chinese perspective.

don't trust that Iran is fully locked in with China, just like other countries like Russia or Pakistan. They see this inclination within the Iranian society of wanting to be closer to the West, of wanting to do more business with the West.

and they can't trust that Iran will support China. And you could see that in Iran's attempts to balance between India and China, Russia and China, even having a deeper relationship with North Korea. So I don't think there is great level of confidence in China towards Iran, which makes the relationship much more complicated and nuanced than the rhetoric and narrative coming from the United States.

I wonder how you think this conflict kind of affects China's wider position in the Middle East. Because obviously, in this conversation, there's a lot of focus on China's strategic engagement in the Middle East and like also around, you know, around the wider kind of issue of, you know, the ongoing violence and, you know, the Palestinian areas and, you know, and like the wider region.

There was a lot of talk about, you know, all the talk and also to a certain amount of fantasy projection about whether, you know, which role China wants to step into security-wise.

But at the same time, what we're also seeing is a lot of action on the investment side, a lot of back and forth between China and Saudi Arabia, between the UAE, a lot of talk of cross-continental transport and logistics links connecting to Europe, working with Turkey around some of those issues and so on. So it seems like that's where a lot of the action lies on the Chinese side, rather than this kind of security-related role.

So I was wondering where you see the real kind of energy lying in Chinese engagement, broader Chinese engagement with the region. First of all, there is a great concern in my view, and I want to bring this back to our conversation because it's very, very important and timely, about what is going to happen in the short term after the war when it comes to Iran's nuclear program.

I think the first objective in Beijing, I would imagine, is to shield Iran from the snapback mechanism that can be implemented before the expiration of the GCPOA in October. Could you explain what the snapback mechanism is for those of us who...

The snapback mechanism is a mechanism that allows the re-imposition of UN-led sanctions on Iran based on an assessment that it didn't show compliance with its commitments under the GCPOA and under the NPT, the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

And the main concern in Russia and China is if the Europeans try to bring back sanctions on Iran after October, this will push Iran to withdraw from the NPT, which means pursuing a nuclear breakout, which means for great powers, a nuclear race in the Middle East. So this is the first thing that the Chinese want to prevent by trying to moderate sanctions

indirectly Iran's behavior when it comes to nuclear program using Russia's rotating presidency of the Security Council in September and other mechanisms. When it comes to energy, I think there is a great emphasis now in China on renewable energy. And renewable energy plays a very important role because it falls in China's strategic outlook to become the leader of the renewable energy throughout the world.

And the Gulf want to pour billions of dollars into this sector in the long term, but not only the Gulf, Egypt and Morocco and other countries as well. So they want to dominate this transition in the Middle East towards renewable energy. When it comes to traditional energy, I think they are in a bind. They will try, I suspect, to find other more secured routes to

One of them is the Guadalchinjang route, for example, which is very early on and it needs a lot of... Yeah, but that is plagued by problems and terrorism and just a money pit the size of...

you know, of the White House that's there. I mean, so that's not necessarily a guarantee either. Exactly. And other tactical routes such as the pipeline that ends in Fujairah, UAE airport that avoid the Strait of Hormuz and so on and so forth. These are not strategic solutions, as you rightly said. This will keep the pressure on energy security in China. That's why I can comfortably call it the Hormuz dilemma.

But they will try to diversify regardless because they don't have anything else to do. They don't have any other option to do. But from a connectivity point of view, this war will delay normalization between Gulf states and other Arab states and Saudi Arabia, which will put a hold on AIMEC cooperation.

corridor and other initiatives to connect Asia, Africa and Europe, which is a positive for China, given that all these initiatives were designed to compete with the BRI. So China will benefit from the delay in these initiatives. But the question is, if Gaza war stops, and we could see some positive signs coming out of the NATO summit today about this,

Will this normalization stay on hold for so long? And this is a challenge for China as well. The other challenge is if the war resumes and Iran try to strike another Gulf state, just like it did with Qatar, will that sit well with the rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran?

You could see the forceful reaction from Saudi Arabia, putting all the kingdom's capabilities behind Qatar to defend it, the initial reaction. So this time it didn't spiral to a wider war, but will it stay contained in the future? This is another question. So all these challenges facing Chinese normative positioning,

and great power, responsible power image, and also energy and investment challenges. For example, between two brackets, the rockets from Iran hitting the Haifa Bay was a very, very dangerous and direct threat to Chinese investment. Because China is one of the operators of the port of Haifa. It's a Chinese state-owned company. Absolutely. So all these questions should be asked.

and carefully assessed by Chinese strategists. Now, the concern in Europe and the United States is that

The Chinese are going to do in Iran what they have been accused, and again I don't have the information to determine whether it's happening or not, of what they're doing in Russia by providing dual-use technology to the Russians that ultimately support the Russian war effort in Ukraine. We heard all week about these mysterious flights that were going from China to Iran. And I want to caution everybody because this is very much in dispute.

There are a lot of people out there that credibly have said these are misinformation and disinformation campaigns to try and portray China as providing technology and ballistic missile materials to the Iranians. There are also very credible people who are saying it is happening. And what we wrote on our site is we don't know if it's happening. We want people to be aware of

that there's a discussion that these flights have been taking place, but we cannot validate whether or not these three planes happen. But what we do know is that Iran ran low, if not depleted, big parts of its ballistic missile inventory, and that it's going to have to rebuild its arsenal. And one has to wonder, can it do it without Chinese support?

Because where would they get the materials from, given the fact that they're under sanction? And the Chinese have shown a willingness to bring materials to Russia that have been used in the war effort. Would they then be complicit in bringing potentially to Iran? What you've said is that the strategic risk of doing that may be too high for the Chinese.

that this is not worth supporting Iran because it puts in jeopardy their relationships with the Saudis, even the Israelis to some extent, which are more important, and certainly the Emiratis. Talk to us a little bit about forward-looking now. What does China do with Iran that comes knocking on its door to say, we need your help, we need materiel, we need technology, we need to be resupplied in order to be able to stand up to the Americans and the Israelis? All

I think the war gave us lessons on that interesting question. So the Chinese would prefer for Iran to have stable and peaceful relations with all its neighbors, including Israel. And in fact, there's a lot of debate in China about what Iran should do, which is to take the Chinese journey of opening up and reform as an example to avoid the Soviet Union model and to align with the Chinese model.

Now, this is not going to happen, as we all know. The other scenario was a war, full-on war with the United States and Israel that involves boots on the ground. And that takes...

very long time to resolve, just like Afghanistan and Iraq. And this didn't happen. So what happened is a tactical military strike that is part of the diplomacy that the United States is leading and wants to only weaken Iran to push it to give some concessions on the negotiating table.

And this is the worst case scenario from a Chinese point of view, because it weakened Iran dramatically that it became obsolete when it comes to putting pressure in the future on the United States, meaningful pressure on the United States policies in the region and serving subsequently China's vision. But also it didn't give the Chinese anything in return.

So the only scenario that I see China taking the risk of supplying Iran with weapon grade assistance, including the dual use tools and components of rockets, is when we have the latter scenario, which is Iraq style war with the United States, because this will help bog down the United States for longer and deeper that it is strategically distracted from the South China Sea and the Indo-Pacific.

in general, which gives China the strategic space to broaden its influence, sometimes its coercive behavior in the South China Sea and towards Taiwan. This is the best case scenario. But I think the cost also is very high because, as we said, energy security relies on this region in Beijing. And Beijing so far doesn't have any alternatives.

that can satisfy its attempt to reinvigorate its economy and its manufacturing base, stand up to President Trump's tariffs. So I think there is a huge dilemma here that China, quite frankly, in my view, at least, doesn't have a way out yet. And they need to sit down and think deeply about it. The question is,

Will these components of rockets really strategically help Iran to regain its power in the Middle East? I don't think so.

I think it's too late for that. I think what the Chinese can truly help Iran with is, A, convince them to change their defence doctrine, the forward defence, by essentially shift from a proxy-based defence strategy, subsequently help them by J-10 fighter jets, just like they did with Pakistan, and rehabilitate their military power from the scratch.

not only missile program and some transactional and tactical abilities like that. But you can imagine their friends in Riyadh are not going to be happy about that. And the folks in Abu Dhabi and Dubai as well would not be happy with that type of engagement, right? I mean... Absolutely, absolutely agree with you. But I'm talking here from an Iranian and Chinese point of view. Right. When it comes to the risk, it is very, very high. Not only the Saudis and the UAE, but also the United States and Israel will be furious

with China if it opts to that. That's why China is locked in in the process of negotiations. It can't take any meaningful step forward in its relations with Iran until there is

long-lasting deal between Iran and the United States. And until they can reach some sort of understanding between Beijing and Washington on what sort of relationship China should have in the future with Iran, especially when it comes to security. That's why I think

Also, given the war and what happened and the humiliation that Iran faced, I think China will be even more cautious, given that its deep relations with Saudi Arabia and the UAE, as you rightly said. Yeah, well, that could be a very long time, given the fact that the Iranians probably do not trust the Americans when it comes to diplomacy, given that Donald Trump said he would take two weeks to evaluate this decision and then went ahead with his strike. So diplomacy may be

Maybe hard to go. Yeah, you're right. But I just want to add, it depends on what the United States and Israel want to do. Yeah. The assessment is the nuclear program is still intact. Will that lead to another confrontation in the near future? And Donald Trump, say what you want. He wants a deal. And I think he would love to walk away from this with a settlement of some kind and saying that he was the one

who brought order to this region and somehow brought the Iranian nuclear program to heel. So we'll see. Ahmed, thank you so much for your insights. As always, it's fascinating. You've given us a lot to think about. Ahmed Abudu is the head of the China Research Unit at the Emirates Policy Center and also a research associate at, or an associate fellow at Chatham House Middle East and North Africa program in London.

Ahmed, thank you so much. Really great to speak with you. We look forward to following up again with you very soon. Thank you so much, Eric and Kopos. Thank you for having me. It was great to be here.

It's fascinating what Ahmed was saying about the difficult situation that China is in right now. And I think that's a position that, again, when you look at the Chinese discourse, that nuance is not there at all. The discourse in China is pretty blunt right now about how this is undermining the U.S. standing in the world, that Iran is weak, but they don't really have a lot of self-reflection in the academic and policy discourse right now. Maybe too sensitive for them to do it.

The part of this that I've been thinking about for a long time is that China may have backed itself into the same corner that Germany did by becoming reliant on Russian oil in the case of the Germans, and that the Chinese have become overly reliant on energy from a very volatile part of the world. Now let's be very clear here.

The imported energy that China buys from the Middle East tends to support Chinese industry, so the factories. It's not the homes. A lot of the homes are being supported by clean renewable energy, solar, wind, hydro, and those others. So this is really going to impact Chinese industry. Chinese industry today is already under enormous pressure given the tariffs and the slow economy situation.

in China, and it makes me wonder that why would the Chinese have consolidated so much of their energy buys into this part of the world, which is prone to these types of disturbances,

And when you and I started the China Global South Project, which first was the China Africa Project back in the 2010s, China relied heavily on Africa for imported oil, Sudan, Republic of Congo, Angola. They've dialed down their African oil purchases in favor of ramping up the Gulf purchases.

I wonder if one of the beneficiaries of this might be a shift back to Africa to buy more oil in order to reduce the vulnerability in the Straits of Hormuz. I think so. I would also assume probably from places like Brazil as well. You know, in the larger scheme, you know, not immediately, of course, but like what this will likely push decarbonization in China, I think. Because as you say, industrial decarbonization is the big hurdle. But

But China has also been making significant advances in that field too. And, you know, obviously we've seen over the last few years, we've seen the full reframing of both countries

kind of green industry and, you know, decarbonization as kind of vectors of national security under Xi Jinping. You know, so, you know, there's a full kind of like discourse of securitization around energy and energy transitions in China now that I think is unique to China in lots of ways.

And, you know, so the kind of rhetoric is there, right? Kind of like the kind of party direction is already aligned in that direction. Even though on the ground, obviously, you know, it's a mixed situation and a lot of Chinese industry, I think, would prefer to just keep running on oil because they're facing a lot of other problems too.

But I think, you know, kind of in the longer term, what we'll probably see is that this will add, you know, kind of more kind of energy, you know, kind of into that push in the longer run. Because in the end, it just, you know, kind of like this kind of Middle East engagement and general oil engagement is increasingly just more trouble than it's worth, you know, because it just exposes China to a lot of different problems. Yeah. Yeah.

And by the way, it's not only the access to the oil, but the price of oil too. So if the price of oil shoots up, that too exposes China and everybody, of course, but China because... And the shipping logistics and everything. But because China is a manufacturing economy, it depends on energy so much more than, say, a tech and services economy. That being said, data centers now are extraordinarily energy...

you know, famished, so that's gonna be interesting as well. So I guess a couple trends to look at that come out of this conversation. What you're talking about is gonna push green energy more. We're probably going to see more diversification away from the Gulf and buying oil in other parts of the world, South America, here in Southeast Asia, other places, further diversification, probably back to Africa. Then the other part is this emphasis on the strategic waterways, and that comes up over and over again.

So Ahmed talked about the Straits of Malacca, the Strait of Hormuz, and then we have the Suez Canal. These are these choke points that make China very vulnerable to disruptions in their global supply chains should they be cut off.

This is where I would like the conversation about Chinese basing to go to because this is a core security interest for the Chinese, not the West Coast of Africa, for example, not in South America where the United States continually comes up with these fantasies that the Chinese are going to put bases there. It's around these strategic waterways like the Strait of Hormuz, Malacca, and the Suez Canal. This is where I think the Chinese are going to invest more in terms of security.

Yeah, I tend to think so. You know, what will be interesting for me to see is whether this disrupts the larger or slows down the larger engagement between China and Middle East powers. So the kind of the physical kind of like trafficking of oil back and forth, right, is one part of this. But there's a lot of Chinese capital moving in and out of the Gulf region, particularly China.

We're seeing closer coordination between the Gulf region and ASEAN and China. A lot of big investment from the Gulf region into China. So, exactly. And a lot of people, too. A lot of people-to-people exchanges that can't be dismissed. Exactly. So in that sense, there is this kind of interesting kind of like larger kind of trans-historical shift, right? Kind of where, you know, kind of the U.S. and Israel's engagement in the region is

feels increasingly like the kind of dark past of the region. Whereas China is one of the few that actually provides any kind of different alternative view of the future, which is interesting for me. You say that, but...

- But again, security is an ever present issue in that part of the world. So it's not the dark past. The fact is that American security is the balance of power right now in that region and continues to be the balance of power.

I think for the Americans though, they see the Chinese as weak. I think to your point, the Chinese are being very tactical. Now, tactic, as he pointed out, that's out of necessity. Maybe not because they want to be, but because they have to be. But at the end of the day, when Saudi Arabia thinks of electrifying its mobility system or greening its grid, it's gonna think to the Chinese. When we look at the investments of Huawei around the region, they're enormous.

And Donald Trump is aware of this because on his visit to the Gulf, China was very present in the positioning. We saw this in the UAE where they were really trying to push the Chinese out of the AI sector there. And by making, again, these types of agreements that say, if you deal with us, you can't deal with the Chinese. The UAE, at least on AI, seems to be siding with the Americans.

So, again, this is a very complex, nuanced answer, and I don't think the lines are very clear. Americans are security, Chinese are economic. Not quite like that. And let's not forget that a lot of Gulf countries are buying Chinese weapons, including the UAE. So when we think about security, they may not look to the Chinese to patrol their waters, but they will look for CH-4 drones or

And when you go to the UAE and the Dubai and the Abu Dhabi air shows, boy, the Chinese are there in a very big way and there's a lot of buyers. So, again, these lines are crossed. Yeah, no, definitely. I mean, by that I don't mean some kind of like fantasy peaceful future of like harmony, right? Kind of that's not the future I mean. I mean more that some yet undefined future, whereas like China,

I don't think anyone can reasonably expect that

Israel and the US is going to be anything else than they already are in the region. You know, kind of like they're not going to reinvent themselves in some kind of way. They're not, you know, Israel isn't becoming some kind of like vector for peace anytime soon, right? So in that sense, just the Middle East with, you know, kind of through that lens will always be a zone of securitization, always be a zone for bombing. Like, you know, like that's the only, that's its only role, right? Kind of like in that logic. Whereas like China has this kind of like

aspect to its relationship with the region, which I think makes it very difficult to predict. Because, of course, there is energy, there is a lot of weapons trade, there's a lot of security thinking in China, but it's not exactly the same security thinking that's coming out of the US. And that's what I mean, is that there's a zone of ambiguity on the Chinese side that doesn't exist on the US and Israeli side, I think.

I think. But I just, I guess what I'm saying is don't box the U.S. into this corner that it's only there for security. I think what we've seen with the G42 deal in UAE, for example, is that the U.S. is a major tech player in the region. And so it's not only, it doesn't look to the region, it's not only just buying, you know, bombs and F-16s and F-35s.

Yeah, but I mean, you know, tech, that tech is highly securitized as well. Yes, but not only. So everything is seen through a lens and the lens I don't think changes. So next week we're going to look at the...

this whole story from an Israeli perspective with Gedalia Afterman, who is one of the top China-Israel experts. And Israel obviously is a central actor in all of this because ties between Israel and China before this were on the up and up. But as we heard from Hamed, there was a part of this that the Chinese want to preserve those ties. So we're going to talk about that. And then again, the following week, we're going to hear more on Iran because obviously this is a

an issue that we could talk about for the next three years and still never cover it all. So we're going deep on this because this is the story of the moment right now. So I hope that you'll join us for the next couple of weeks. Of course, if you've got questions or comments and you're watching on YouTube, we love the conversations that are going on. We're getting hundreds of comments.

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