Middle East Conflict: U.S. Helping Chinese Whispers?
In hosting President Trump this week, China feels it is vying, if not achieving, parity with the U.S. as the world’s superpowers; from China’s perspective, it regards Russia similarly. It does seem as if China’s goal at this summit was to get more effective flexibility in shaping Taiwan’s future while the U.S. wanted better trade deals to suits its companies. Both may be disappointed but running on the back burner is the issue of Iran and whether China would exert added pressure to get the Straits of Hormuz open soon. Nothing concrete seems to have occurred or looks to be forthcoming. This does not mean China won’t exert some added pressure but Iran knows it still has the effective weapon in the Straits being close and that as long as they are Trump is looking ever more ineffective as gasoline prices in the U.S. drag his approval ratings even lower. Is Trump therefore making concessions?
Donald Trump has suggested that the US and China “feel very similar” about ending the war implying it was ‘a crazy thing’ conveniently forgetting who started it. Regardless, it is unclear the extent to which there is pressure from the U.S. on China, the biggest buyer of Iranian oil, to use its leverage with Iran to encourage the country to reopen the strait of Hormuz through which half of China’s crude oil comes. And there is a question mark over whether or not Beijing would be willing to accede to that pressure. But the U.S. messages are unclear, if not contradictory. Earlier in the Summit, Secretary of State Rubio, said the US hoped “to convince China to play a more active role in getting Iran to walk away from what they’re doing now w in the Persian Gulf”. However, in a later interview, he downplayed the idea that the US was seeking support from Beijing.
But it does seem as if China does not feel that the crisis in Iran is its responsibility, albeit also wary that a drawn-out closure of the straits could tilt the global economy toward recession and thus dampen China’s strategic shift to export growth away from the U.S. It is against this backdrop that Trump seems to be ceding ground, suggesting less need for finding and documenting ding Iran’s enriched uranium stockpiles. It does seem therefore that Trump is subtly making it easier for Iran to agree to a more formal ceasefire but with nudges from China to this end. After all, China’s media ended the summit repeating an assertion for a “comprehensive ceasefire” in the Iran war and for the restoration of freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, this aspiration having already been offered during a visit by Tehran’s foreign minister to Beijing earlier this month.