War With The US, China Will Side With Iran

(WW3) - Beijing's relationship with Tehran is very important given its energy and geopolitical strategy, and with Moscow being involved, "massive destruction" is very likely.

After the US assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani on Friday (1/3), German Spiegel Online observed this was similar to the declaration of war on Iran. Now the US Congress is debating the official declaration of war, although that is unlikely to deter Trump's White House from moving toward the battlefield.

Last March, US President Donald Trump reviewed the Pentagon's plans to send 120,000 US troops to fight Iran, and the current military buildup to send 3,500 more US troops to the region might be part of the plan.

In addition, in 2017, a think tank with close ties to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Trump's White House, sent a seven-page memo outlining plans for regime change in Iran, and the current scenario seems to be taken from the handbook.

The next question is, how will regional powers react to the US-Iran war?

China and Russia appear to have answered the question through their war games in the Gulf of Oman last week, and signals to the US, that Iran is not isolated and has strong allies, according to Christina Lin's analysis in her writing in the Asia Times.

Indeed, last year the retired US Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor had warned that a war with Iran could attract China and Russia.

At present, China's reaction is to urge the US to maintain calm and ease tensions, and monitor the situation closely. Beijing does not want war and needs Middle Eastern stability to pursue the Eurasian Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) integration plan.


China has a big share in Iran's stability: China is Iran's biggest oil buyer, China is Iran's biggest trading partner, and Iran is the main geographical node for BRI.

Until now, China has tried to balance its relations with Saudi Arabia and Iran in the Middle East. China also made a 'big wall' between the two, although Iran was more significant in its strategic calculations, given the fact that Saudi Arabia and other Arab Gulf countries were still under the umbrella of US security and housed US military bases.

"China also opposes further Western-sponsored regime changes in the region, and Iran is an important partner in destroying US hegemony and a drive towards a multipolar world," continued Christina Lin.

Chinese President Xi Jinping raised his glass to toast at a welcome reception, after the welcoming ceremony of leaders who attended the Belt and Road Forum at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, April 26, 2019. (Photo: Pool Photo via AP / Nicolas Asfouri)

If the US-Iran war breaks out and the Iranian government is overthrown, it will destroy China's regional interests. As Robert Kaplan wrote in an article in The New York Times entitled "This is not about Iran. This is about China ", the current US-Iran impasse is about something far more diverse.

Geography problems in geopolitics and the Gulf of Oman not only separate Oman and Iran, but also Oman and Pakistan, where China has completed the latest port in Gwadar. This is the hinge that unites the Middle East, the South Asian subcontinent, and East Asia in BRI China.

Christina Lin explained, China is also an importer of crude oil and obtained half of its supply from the Persian Gulf. However, the US Navy maintains control over the sea communication lines.

Therefore, China is worried about, first, US restrictions on Chinese oil imports due to clashes in the Taiwan Strait or in the South China Sea and, secondly, events abroad that can cause price volatility that hurts the Chinese economy.

Most importantly, China needs Iran on the "east side" of the Persian Gulf to prevent a full blockade by the US Navy.

This insurance plan for long-distance contingencies is spelled out in a 2000 article published by the influential Chinese Society for Strategy and Management (CSSM) in the Journal of Strategy and Management.

The author of the article Tang Shiping, a research associate at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), argues that the US has controlled the west bank of the oil-rich Persian Gulf through pro-American proxies (Saudi Arabia and smaller Gulf states), basically making it an "internal sea" for the US, and challenging that position is likely to fail.

However, if China and Russia expand relations with Iran, they can maintain a "minimum balance" to thwart US measures. Because securing oil imports from the Gulf requires a US-controlled west bank and Iran's east bank supported by China and Russia, this axis will prevent the US from imposing an oil embargo on other countries. Washington will not close Gulf oil supplies to China, because China, Russia and Iran control the east bank of the Gulf.


In March 2019, Qassem Soleimani received Iran's highest military award, 'Order of Zulfaqar'. (Photo: Reuters)

In the past, the Middle East posture of China was a balancing act involving Iran, while simultaneously not alienating the US. However, what has changed now is the deterioration of China-US relations quickly and separately over the past year in the new Cold War.

With US hostility and "maximum pressure" on Beijing, Moscow and Tehran (all under US sanctions), Washington is pushing the three to unite, as evidenced in recent joint military exercises in the Gulf of Oman and the Indian Ocean.

Therefore, as Col. Douglas Macgregor and Dr. Lydia Wilson of Oxford University warned, if the US attacked Iran in a full-scale war, that could be a sign of the inclusion of two additional nuclear forces, and turning bilateral war into one of the major state conflicts.