China’s Mideast Strategy in the Trump 2.0 Era
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Hey everyone, Eric here. We have a very special treat for you this week, an extra bonus episode that explores Chinese engagement in the Middle East in the Trump 2.0 era. We teamed up with our friends at the China Med Project to bring together scholars and analysts from both the U.S. and China for what turned out to be an absolutely fascinating discussion that I think you’re really going to enjoy.
Now, the timing for this couldn’t have been better, given the fact that it came right at the end of Donald Trump’s week-long tour of the Persian Gulf. Of course, we want to hear your feedback. Let me know what you think. Email me directly at eric at ChinaGlobalSouth.com.
Hello, everybody, and welcome to this final installment of the China and the Middle East from the Cold War to the present. This has been a seminar series that’s been going on for the past several months, looking at all phases of China’s engagement in the Middle East. We’re ending at a really unique time when we’re looking at what lessons can all stakeholders learn from what Donald Trump did in his first presidency that are now playing out in his second presidency. What lessons can China in particular learn from all of this?
So we’re going to explore a question today about how did Trump’s first-term policies, the Abraham Accords, as we mentioned, and the Iran sanctions reshape the Middle East? What lessons is China drawing from it in the Trump 2.0 era? One of the things that we heard today and this week from his trip in the Middle East, where he visited three countries—Qatar, United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia—was the urging of the people of the region to, quote, “chart your own destinies in your own way.”
What’s interesting about his time in the Middle East this week is that a lot of Trump 2.0 sounds a lot like what Xi Jinping would be telling these countries as well, in terms of focusing on deals, business, trade, and commerce, and not getting involved in wars and politics. To explore this question, we’re thrilled to have four partners behind today’s events: the University of Naples-Loriental, the China Med Project, the Torino World Affairs Institute, and the China Global South Project.
We have two fascinating guests who have been part of our previous discussions and are very well known in this space to join us for this. We’re going to bring in two discussants later on to talk about it. But before we get to our guests, I want to lay the groundwork for what we’re going to discuss, especially the timeliness of this conversation about China in the Middle East, given that President Donald Trump finished up his tour in the region.
He was accompanied by 30 business leaders representing America’s top corporations. The focus was very much on deals and commerce. In his speech, he said, “We’re not going to give lectures on how you live,” really a break from the past where human rights and political reforms were very much part of the conversation. He also said, “We’re not going to do nation building,” a clear reference to his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush, and the adventures he had in Iraq.
Notably, he met with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Shara, on Wednesday while he was in Saudi Arabia, which was very interesting. Also, the president did not visit Israel on this first trip of his overseas. This is part of the chill that has set in between Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which will factor into some of the discussions.
It’s interesting to think about this in the Chinese context because so much of this does seem to mirror the Chinese profile in the region as well, where Sino-Israeli relations are also quite frosty but warming up a little bit. Again, the focus is on trade. Underlying the president’s visit was a determination to challenge China. White House officials repeated that these deals are meant to confront China, particularly on issues related to technology and AI.
Now, we’re going to dive into these issues with two experts who follow these topics very closely. Zhang Chuchu is an associate professor at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs at Fudan University in Shanghai and is joining us very late today. Dr. Zhang, thank you so much for joining us again. It’s wonderful to be part of another conversation with you. Thank you for having me. And we’re joined also by Grant Rumley, who’s a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the director of the Diane and Guilford Glazer Foundation Program on Great Power Competition and the Middle East. Grant, so wonderful to have you join us as well.
Thanks for having me, Eric. Well, let’s start with the China question because it’s very easy for us to get sucked into all of the dynamics that are going on in this very lively region. But Chuchu, when you see what’s been happening over the past three to six months, especially as Trump 2.0 is really ramping up and you’re thinking about China’s role in this region and the impact and the lessons that China’s learning, tell us a little bit about your thinking about what some of the takeaways are.
Right. In fact, I think much has changed at the moment. Actually, I just arrived from Qatar to Shanghai yesterday. So I think right now a lot of things are happening. Talking about Trump, everyone is shocked by his predictablism. But also, it’s very interesting that Trump 1.0 is very different from Trump 2.0 because I think, first of all, if we just talk about Trump himself, we can see that actually Trump 2.0 has a lot of even bolder ambitions.
Also, it’s very interesting that we can see he has changed a lot of the internal structures of the United States. For example, right now, I think he has two sets of political groups. On the one hand, there is still the administration. But on the other hand, there is another parallel administration and a group which are not very institutionalized, led by Elon Musk. For instance, when it comes to Iran, it is very interesting to note that at the very beginning of Trump’s second administration, there were a lot of rumors about Elon Musk’s meeting with a high official and representative of Iran to the United Nations.
So, you see that he’s trying to leave some leeway for his maneuver, and also, he’s trying to give himself more flexibility to gain more transactional benefits. But as for China, we can discuss more about that. I think, since this is already Trump 2.0, a lot of things have changed. At least China has already gotten some experience dealing with him. It’s not like at the very beginning, when it was, okay, who is Trump, and we knew nothing about him. But right now, at least China has dealt with him before, so they have some experience working with him.
When it comes to the Middle East, I would say it is true that there are competitions between China and the United States, like what happened in Trump’s first administration. In his second administration, it is the same thing, and I would expect even more competitions between China and the United States in the region. Of course, China does not want to compete with the United States, but unfortunately, we can see that Trump is going to shape the regional order. At the moment, he aims to form a new regional order favored by Trump.
Right now, he’s in the Gulf countries, and I think more information is going to be covered. In any case, it is very likely that Trump is going to exert more pressure on the regional powers to say, “Okay, you should be cautious about working with China,” especially when it comes to high-tech cooperation in sectors like 5G or the digital economy. But at the same time, I would say, contrary to common assumptions, the Middle East is not the primary arena of this kind of rivalry.
For China at the moment, our core interests lie closer to other issues. First of all, our primary concern is our neighbors, such as the East China Sea, the South China Sea, and Southeast Asia. I think Taiwan is another significant concern. So, I would say there are competitions between China and the United States in the Middle East, but that would not be the highest priority for China. Instead, China might be more concerned with the Taiwan issue.
Another issue here is the economic problem because right now there is a trade war. As we can see, there are many new changes regarding tariffs, but I would expect that more negotiations will continue in the following weeks or months. Meanwhile, the United States directs much of its attention toward other issues, like Europe and the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine. So, although right now Trump chooses his first state visit to Gulf countries, I think this is actually a concern for economic gains. But at the same time, I would say still in his political agenda, he has a lot more concerns than the Middle East. So, I think competing in the Middle East for both big powers offers very limited strategic value and very poor cost-effectiveness.
Secondly, I would say the two states wield power in fundamentally different ways. There are competitions, but at the same time, in most of the sectors, we have different preferences for dealing with the region. For example, on the one hand, the United States maintains a robust military and geopolitical footprint with military bases and troops stationed worldwide. I think this time, during Trump’s visit, a key concern, as far as I know, of the Gulf countries is to guarantee more security protection from the United States.
But as for China, by contrast, China does not have a lot of interest in strengthening its military presence in the region. I think China has a minimal military presence and instead prioritizes socioeconomic cooperation in the region. The third point I would like to make is that actually, the real beneficiaries of any Sino-American competition in the Middle East are not the two powers themselves. In the past, many of our experts here in our discussion today are IR scholars. Traditionally, IR scholars often look at issues through the so-called big power politics.
However, at the moment, maybe sometimes the big powers are very arrogant. Instead, right now, the regional powers and even the so-called small and medium states are playing a bigger and bigger role, especially in the Middle East. An interesting thing is who is interested in talking about the subject of Sino-American competition in the Middle East? I would say that it is the regional powers because they can gain a lot of leverage, resources, and opportunities as the global giants rise for influence, so they can benefit from this kind of big power competition.
Last but not least, personally, I am not worried about China-Gulf relations at the moment because it is very interesting to note that Trump is a transactional politician. At the same time, we need also to note that his transaction logic is not commercial mutual benefits, but that only he should make money and be the only one that gains benefits. Therefore, the Gulf countries are very clear that interacting with the United States can only make them lose money, but cannot make money.
We are going to look at how the United States will deal with the Gulf countries. For example, we already know a lot of subjects and more important agendas. Why does Trump bring so many CEOs along with him during his delegation trip? One of the biggest issues here is that he wants to gain a lot of contracts and deals. Trump expects that the Gulf countries will buy more weapons from the United States. He also wants to gain more investments from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, etc.
There are still a lot of other initiatives, such as the Grand Initiative of IMAC. I have done some research about that and talked to different parties concerning participants of this IMAC initiative. Interestingly, the United States is the proponent of this initiative, but the United States has no interest in investing in IMAC, nor does the EU, nor does India. So who is going to pay for it? Everybody expects that the Gulf countries will pay for it.
Now, as for the Gulf countries, in order to make money, I think they must cooperate with other countries, including China. But not only China; they should also engage with other countries like Japan, South Korea, the EU, etc. Thank you, Chuchu. Just very quickly, when Chuchu was talking about IMAC, that’s the India-Middle East-Europe corridor, one of the new trade corridors that’s competing not only with the Belt and Road but also with some of these new corridors like the Middle Corridor that’s running from China through Central Asia and through Turkey.
So, there is a lot of competition in that corridor space. Chuchu, very quickly before we move on, just one quick question. You’ve mentioned that, of course, the near abroad or the neighborhood diplomacy for China is by far the most important. Southeast Asia, South China, CEC in Central Asia. But at the same time, Chinese interests in the Middle East are quite substantial. I mean, Saudi Arabia was the largest recipient of Belt and Road money. The Gulf region now is collectively probably the largest source of imported energy, second probably to Russia. At the same time, we have seen opportunities for Chinese weapons makers. The Abu Dhabi air show, we saw a lot of the Chinese were the biggest presence there. The J-10Cs were on display in Egypt. This is also a key area for China to promote its diplomacy and, obviously, the Iran-Saudi reconciliation. And then at the same time, too, it’s been a very important vector for China to be talking about Xinjiang and the issues there as well.
So the importance of the region to China is substantial, if not maybe in direct competition with the United States. But I’d be interested to get your take on that. Sure. I think just several very points. First of all, when it comes to the Xinjiang issue, I don’t think that this is a very big issue at the moment when it comes to relations between China and the Gulf countries. Quite the opposite, Chuchu. In fact, it’s been where Wang Yi went to Cairo to make his policy statements on Xinjiang.
Also, Mahmoud Abbas came back from a tour, very enthusiastic, endorsing China’s position on Xinjiang. And also, Wang Yi in Saudi Arabia has made numerous statements backed by the Saudi governments that have endorsed China’s position. So it’s not that it’s a contentious issue; quite the opposite, the Arab and Gulf governments have really supported China’s stance on this. Right, exactly.
And just one more maybe evidence or story is that I have met some of the Qatari people and officials there. And they actually have just visited the Xinjiang province in China. So they had a trip there and they encouraged the Chinese government to organize more of these trips for the officials.
The second issue here is that, yes, obviously, China has a growing presence in the Middle East. And obviously, China has a lot of interests there, including both personnel security and also we are concerned with our commercial interests. But at the same time, I don’t think Trump’s business to this region is going to affect China’s interests to a great extent because when it comes to the weapons export, as you have mentioned, actually, China’s proportion is very low, is minimal in the region.
Actually, even South Korea and Turkey export more weapons than us to the regional powers. The second issue here is that I think you have mentioned something, another issue at the very beginning. The Belt and Road, that Saudi Arabia was the largest recipient of Belt and Road financing. And Huawei, for example, is building the largest battery storage in the world in Meituan, just announced a billion dollar investment in Saudi Arabia.
So a number of different engagements on Chinese commercial diplomacy. Right. Yes, absolutely. So when it comes to infrastructure, I think, of course, the infrastructure cooperation is going to continue. That is for sure because there are already a lot of infrastructure projects there and you can’t just stop them.
And also, I don’t think it’s Trump’s biggest concern to disrupt the infrastructure cooperation between China and the Gulf states. I think his concern is mainly in the sectors of high tech. And also, there is another very important issue here, that is the oil, because as you mentioned, China is the largest buyer of oil of Saudi Arabia, that is for sure.
And at the moment, I would say that maybe Trump’s policy is going to further encourage and promote the relations between China and the region in terms of oil trade. Because, as I said, yes, you can see that at the moment, due to the tariff policy, the oil price is going down. So, of course, in this kind of context, the Gulf countries are eager to gain more customers to sell more of the oil.
And also, at the same time, as I have already mentioned, the Gulf countries need to invest and pay a lot of bills at the moment. So where does the money come from? So that is why they need to export more. And also, they want to cooperate with China in terms of attracting China’s investment.
Okay, Grant, Chuchu has set the table quite nicely. Thank you for your patience in waiting for us to kind of cover the broad breadth of issues. You’re sitting, I think you’re in Washington. You’re seeing this, obviously, from a very different perspective than someone sitting in Shanghai.
When you look at Trump 2.0 and the dynamics with the Middle East and the Persian Gulf and the China question here, what are you seeing? You know, having worked in the first Trump administration and the Biden administration, but having spent most of my time in the first Trump administration, I often get this question of trying to explain and suss out the exact nature of the Trump administration policies.
And, you know, Chuchu’s right, there is sort of an unpredictability to it, to say the least. I tend to think that there is, though at times, a predictability to the unpredictability, if that makes sense. Especially when it comes to the Middle East, I think about sort of three main themes. The first one is his relation to military force. It’s often a subject of great debate in this town. Is Donald Trump averse to conflict? How do you square the circle of sometimes engaging, but sometimes not engaging? His second inaugural sort of famously said, we’ll be judged not only by the wars we end, but the wars we don’t get in. It’s been sort of a consistent theme. I think the Middle East has been where we’ve tested out his relationship with military force.
I would say he is not averse to actual conflict or the application of military force to achieve a policy objective in the Middle East. We saw that in the first term with two Syria strikes after the chemical weapons usage. We famously saw that with the Soleimani operation. What he is averse to, however, is long-sustained, protracted periods of conflict in the region in particular, but I think broadly as well. That plays out when the Iranians shot down the MQ-9 in the first administration. You looked at the options and deduced that the response necessarily would be sort of a longer campaign and walked away from it. The Houthi campaign in the second administration is a great example as well. The military planners were accounting for a multi-month operation. He gave them 30 days, right?
From his perspective, it’s not that he’s against military force, but that he is against long periods of military force. That’s, I’m sorry to interrupt you, but that’s also what a lot of people are saying is the origin of the chill between Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump over whether or not to launch a war against Iran. Trump is reluctant to do that and Netanyahu wants to do something. Is that correct?
Yeah, I mean, look, I think this is a president that’s averse to conflict in general, to getting America into war. I think he’s the first post-global war on terror presidency in a way. There’s been a generational change in American foreign policy, a sort of view in Washington that you characterize as adventures in the Middle East. I think these advisors and people around the president would characterize it as misadventures. It’s a view echoed by Vice President Vance, Defense Secretary Hegseth, and I think it speaks to his internal instincts, his view that there isn’t a problem in the world that can’t be solved through negotiations and deal-making and finding some type of commercial, mutually beneficial interest there.
The difference, as Shushu was highlighting, between Trump 1 and Trump 2 is in the first Trump administration, I think his instincts were at times constrained, but certainly squeezed a little bit by the people around him. His cabinet looked like a traditional Republican cabinet. It had Pompeo, it had Esper, Mattis, John Bolton for a little while there as well. The second go-around really speaks, I think, more to where his instincts are in foreign policy, which are a little bit more focused on restraint, a little more focused on, I wouldn’t call it isolationism, but it’s certainly similar in its theme.
That’s the big difference for him in sort of his approach in the Middle East. I think it bears that out. His focus will be on finding deals, on minimizing U.S. military commitments, on finding some way to move forward and advance our own diplomatic interests without necessarily getting bogged down there. Another sort of theme that I think of with him in particular is a well-documented fascination with finding deals and finding a way to sort of negotiate into a conflict and resolve and promote stability.
But there’s not, I think, sort of an ideological persistence with such an effort. He will try to make a deal. His instinct is always to try to make a deal. But when it’s met with resistance, he pivots to other topics. Or he’s fine sort of putting it in a box, tying a bow on it, moving to the next thing. In the first administration, we focus a lot on the Abraham Accords. But for the first couple of years, it was the deal of the century. The entire focus was on getting the Israelis and the Palestinians together. There was a big rollout in Bahrain that was the accumulation of years of diplomatic work.
It basically fell flat. It led nowhere. There was that period between the Bahrain rollout, the end of the deal of the century, work and negotiations, and then suddenly the Abraham Accords, where there was just no real concerted American diplomatic effort in the Israeli-Palestinian situation. I think we see that play out in particular right now with Ukraine. I think we’re kind of seeing it play out a little bit with Gaza, as you highlighted, Eric. I think Amen saying, I’m going to sign a deal on day one, wasn’t able to really do it. I think his interest, his focus has started to shift. And so, I would say the focus on dealmaking is thematic.
Grant, let me just read you a quote from an article that was published by Frederick Kempe, who’s the president and chief executive officer of the Atlantic Council. His column this week was, Trump’s remarkable Mideast tour is all about striking mega deals and outfoxing China. He wrote, this is from Kempe, Trump will also measure success by his ability to outmaneuver China in securing a closer relationship with Gulf monarchies than Chinese have. The contest for Gulf money is also about gaining the upper hand in the Trump administration’s ongoing trade standoff and technology contest with Beijing.
Can you talk a little bit about the China question in all of these calculations in the Mideast? Again, Chuchu was talking about how maybe it’s not so significant because it’s not a priority for the Chinese. We hear that also from Jonathan Fulton and other China, Mideast, and Persian Gulf scholars. What’s your take on this China question that Frederick Kempe talked about?
It’s a great question. I think what Trump has brought to bear in Washington is to move the Overton window. There’s a bipartisan consensus that started in this first administration and continued into the Biden administration. If there is one sort of area in this town where both Republicans and Democrats can agree, it is on sort of the need to compete with China and the need to not only think about that competition in terms of military to military and a potential conflict over Taiwan, but think about that in sort of a holistic range of statecraft issues when it comes to U.S. engagement around the world.
I think that theme was echoed in the focus on Panama early on, Secretary Rubio and then Secretary Exith going down there. I think in the Middle East, it’s been a topic of debate for many years here on sort of how we compete with China, what we’re willing to accept in terms of a country’s relationship with China, and what we’re willing to accept in terms of our own risk.
I think the U.S. and Washington tend to at times be a bit simplistic and sort of look at a country and say, if you have a relationship with China and a relationship with the U.S., inherently, we won’t be able to cooperate on a full range of options and interests. I think that view is starting to change in large part because we’re recognizing that China’s economic ties with countries around the world are deep and diverse, and it can spill over into a lot of other realms.
What we are focused on, and I think what this administration is focused on as well, is sort of identifying red lines for us in terms of what we’re comfortable with another country doing with China and also increasing what we’re willing to share. For the longest time, this was sort of focused primarily on the military aspect of it. But I think now, especially with this trip and this administration, it’s starting to really bleed over into the technological realm and the economic realm.
I think the Middle East is sort of the perfect marriage between Trump’s own internal desire to maximize deals and increase commercial connectivity, and the China hawks in his administration and in his party who want to see the U.S. compete in a space that’s primarily benefited China. China’s economic and technological ties to the region are certainly one of Beijing’s key strengths in the region, and it’s what the region looks to Beijing for.
The U.S. not competing in that space, not offering advanced technology, and not offering investment in critical infrastructure projects has been almost competing with a hand tied behind our backs. I expect to see a lot more of this. What I think Fred was getting at in his piece is sort of the underlying theme that a lot of these investments, especially the access to the advanced chips, the access to the advanced technologies, are going to come with second and third order conditions, restrictions, and guidance that sort of limit partner countries in the region’s ties to China in order to move these countries a little bit closer to the U.S. geopolitical movement.
Yes and no, but let’s not forget that these countries also have quite a bit of agency. They have leverage. So when we talk to use Trump’s language, they have cards. The United Arab Emirates, when told about the F-35, told the Americans to go stuff it. They said, we’re not going to take your F-35, in part because there were concerns that F-35 technology would fall into the hands of the Chinese. I think if the Americans started to pressure the crown prince in Saudi Arabia, he would probably push back quite forcefully as well. When we saw, for example, the Saudi-Iran diplomatic engagement a couple of years ago, they leaned heavily into the Chinese on that. This was a space that was traditionally done by the Americans in terms of mediating conflicts. Obviously, the Americans don’t have any standing with the Iranians to do something like that. But the way that the Gulf sees the Chinese, I think, is quite different in the sense of the way we see the Gulf countries with the Chinese.
G-42 is a good example, too, where American pressure on this AI company in the United Arab Emirates paid off. They forced the divestiture of Chinese investment. Again, very interesting dynamics. I think the G-42 is a great example of American leverage. We have leverage with the chips. The thing about the F-35, the F-35 deal was also part of a deal that included the MQ-9s. It would have made the UAE the first country to fly the MQ-9s, the first Arab country to fly the MQ-9s. Yes, which country in the region is going to be the first Arab country to fly the MQ-9s? That’s Qatar.
In large part because the concerns on Qatar’s relationship with China don’t reach the concerns the U.S. has with regards to the UAE’s relationship with China. So, yes, it’s one thing to walk away from the F-35. But I think in their heart of hearts, the UAE Air Force would prefer to have the most advanced fifth-gen fighter jet on the market in their arsenal. There are areas where we do have some leverage. The military and the technological are certainly. But don’t forget that the UAE is also one of the largest buyers of CH-4s in the world. They are shipping those CH-4s to Libya, to Sudan, to Ethiopia.
So that military relationship between UAE and the Chinese is getting stronger, it seems like. But Chuchu, let’s hear from you some responses to what you heard from Graham. Right. Actually, I think I agree with a lot of his points. Yes, I think he’s right. From what I have observed in the Gulf countries, I can see that at the moment, indeed, the military leverage and also the high-tech leverage are the most important parts of the United States in the region. At the same time, I don’t think China is going to compete with the United States in terms of the military domain.
But as we have already discussed, there are going to be some kinds of competition in the high-tech domain. At the same time, I think another interesting issue here is what you have mentioned about China’s mediation between Saudi Arabia and Iran. For the Gulf regions, of course, China has its role. I think the regional powers’ expectations for China is that, first of all, China is very different from the United States because it is a big power, but it’s a neutral power. It doesn’t want to pick sides.
For the regional powers, I think they think China is a very good bargaining tool in the deals with the United States. It’s not that they love China, but when the United States says, “OK, I’m not going to give you this and that,” they are going to say, “OK, then I’m going to turn to China.” For them, China is like a bargaining tool. The second issue for them is that they are seeking more partnership as alternatives, and China is one of them. I think that is the expectation for China.
OK, well, we’re going to make sure we open this conversation up for more voices. We want to hear from all of you in the audience. If you’ve got a question, some are already coming in. Please put them in the chat. We also want to hear from two of our discussants who’ve been with this seminar series from the beginning back in March and have helped to organize all of this. Enrico Fardella is the director of the China Med Project and an associate professor at the Department of Human and Social Sciences at the University of Naples, L’Oriental. We are also joined by Andrea Giselli, who is head of research at the China Med Project and a lecturer in international politics in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Exeter.
Enrico, we’ve had a very robust discussion already here. Let’s get your thoughts, particularly on these China questions related to Trump and the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. Yeah, thank you very much, Eric. Thank you, Grant and Chuchu. It was robust indeed, to the extent that I don’t really have much to say. I mean, I was taking notes and then you were actually thanking my points. Now, I thank Eric for giving me the possibility to look more at the China angle. Let me go first back to what Chuchu said about the interesting word, unpredictability of Trump. It’s true that we always say that Trump is unpredictable, but I think it’s more the execution that is unpredictable. I’m not sure, but I don’t think that Trump is unpredictable in terms of goals. I mean, I think the goal of the Trump administration is very clear. The goal has a domestic origin, which means reforming the U.S. economy and addressing the deficit.
This has a spillover effect in foreign policy, which means addressing the commercial and financial role that China plays in this framework. And that’s actually the logic of tariffs. Maybe the execution of tariffs is unpredictable because perhaps the mathematics was not the best being fixed. Probably we’ll see. But I think that we should look at the U.S. trip to the Middle East from a Chinese perspective within this framework.
Emily, to what extent is U.S. proactivity in the Middle East, coming from this trip, going to somehow try to fix the previous uncertainties of U.S. Middle Eastern policies and somehow try to push back the Chinese strategic depth that has been acquired over the last few years? There is the support of the pro-Islamic front, which actually was meant to generate a sort of dialogue between Iran and Saudi Arabia and therefore push back the logic of the Abraham Accords.
To what extent is this initiative of Trump, trying to learn from the errors of the past, going to provide a new space for U.S. influence in the region? Yes, I know that there was a recent report from INSS talking about China’s role in the Middle East. One of the points that we always hear is that, as Chuchu said, the Middle East is not a crucial strategic region for China. It’s a sort of secondary layer of Chinese foreign policy.
Of course, we know the first focus is Asia. So for China, having the U.S. more committed to the Middle East, as much as Latin America, is significant. We’re seeing Chinese initiatives in Latin America that are probably trying to drag the U.S. into the area as well. This is going to keep U.S. focus away from the strategic area of China. I think it’s partially true. To a certain extent, it’s true.
However, at the same time, the U.S. may actually gain the upper hand in a region without overcommitting militarily, as you say, Derek, but just having, especially looking at the relationship with Syria. I think the whole picture has changed. So I conclude with a question I would like to ask our speakers, if you allow me, about how they see, comparatively speaking, that one year ago, we were having a completely different outlook in the region.
To a certain extent, the Trump initiatives may actually ride this new wave that could bring benefits to U.S. regional posture. So my question would be, how do you foresee the evolution of this trend?
Before we get to that question, I’d also like to bring in now Andrea Giscelli for your reflections. Please focus specifically on the China question that Chuchu and Grant have been discussing and your response to the discussion so far.
First of all, thanks a lot, Eric, for hosting this, and of course, thanks to Chuchu and Grant for the great insights. I have to share the comments made by Enrico, as you’ve stated. There are already a lot of things that I’ve been thinking about for a while. I prepared some notes, and then okay, you said that, so.
But the kind of exchange between you, Eric, and Chuchu about the importance of the region for Chinese foreign policy and then the debate about what Trump wants from the region when it comes to interventionism, avoiding misadventures, and so forth, I think we can try to reframe it in different ways.
Especially when we try to compare the importance of the region for the two countries and extrapolate what they want and how they approach it. I think there is a bit of truth in saying that China has a lot of interests there. You can talk about oil, you can talk about Islam and the Uyghurs, and you can also add the importance of the region for the Security Council of the United Nations.
There are many things going on that are of interest to China, broadly defined. However, if we try to speculate a bit about what is going on inside the black box in China, this is part of some thoughts that Enrico and I… And the other people in China’s team have been brainstorming for a while, the issue of constituencies, right? Who are the Middle East constituencies within China? I don’t think you can really include among them the top policymakers. I think for that you have mostly Xi Jinping and Wang Yi, for example, and the other people in the top leadership, again, are mostly focused on international relations in the United States and what’s going on in Asia, really.
And then you have, or they have people, let’s say, central committee level or global business leaders, right? They instead have a lot of interest in the Middle East. Despite this gigantic group, there are a very big number of people that are interested in what’s going on there, as they’re growing in terms of investment, presence, and engagement. Chinese universities have been doing a lot of engagement as well, and so on. I don’t think we have reached the point where the top leadership considers the Middle East as a priority. If something happens, of course, they probably are more willing to travel to the region and include it in their strategic thinking.
This, I don’t think, is comparable with what is still the case in Washington, for example. The thought about the region might have changed, with less interest in human rights, democratization, and so forth. But the Middle East remains much more central to American foreign policy than it has been with China’s foreign policy so far. So I think, in a way, it’s not just about the scale of interest, but also who cares about it and therefore where it’s placed in the country.
Andrea, can I just stop you right there? Grant, let’s pick up that because there’s been a narrative in the U.S. for quite some time after the Iraq War that there was a Mideast fatigue. Trump even spoke to that in his speech in Saudi Arabia, in Riyadh, where he said nation building is not what we’re going to do anymore. That was a vacuum when the United States kind of pulled out that China did step in to some extent, not one for one, but definitely gave them more room to maneuver.
Do you get a sense today when you look out at the broader geopolitical priorities that the United States is looking at in the Trump foreign policy doctrine in the 2.0 era, which is, as you point out, still in very much in development, that the Mideast plays as important role as Andrea is suggesting to the United States? Well, that’s a great question, Eric. You know, I was definitely given a lot to think about by Enrico and Andrea there. I think especially that question of influence to Enrico’s point earlier. You know, I think we saw what it looks like when the U.S. is perhaps not as engaged in the Middle East as it has been in the past.
To my mind, it was between the Afghanistan pullout in 2021 and October 7th, 2023. The U.S. troop presence in the region went to about 30 percent of what it was at the start of the Biden administration. Cabinet officials were going to Europe for Ukraine, to the Indo-Pacific to deal with China. Trips to the Middle East were way down. It was a contributing factor, to my mind, to China’s ability to facilitate that agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia, sort of taking advantage of just the lack of consistent investment that we used to see in the past from U.S. policymakers into the Middle East.
In this new Trump world, certainly, looking at it this week, it seems as if the Middle East is going to be a top priority for this administration. I tend to think the focus is a little more narrow and a little more constrained. It is on China, but it’s primarily Western Hemisphere, borders, immigration, and domestic policies. And then to the extent that there’s international engagement, it’s really focused on burden sharing, increasing contributions from partners to joint U.S. partner interests, and then really focusing on deterring China vis-a-vis Taiwan.
That, I think, will be the focus on paper, whether or not that’s the focus in practice of this administration. Of course, we in Washington, every time something goes sideways in the Middle East or around the world, tend to find ourselves getting involved. So I think it’s very easy to say that the focus will be a little bit more honed in and constrained in theory. But in practice, I think there are a number of ways in which the U.S. can get more involved in the Middle East. And to Enrico’s point earlier, that’s not just a strategic assumption on China’s front. I think that’s a concern within Washington from those within this administration who want to focus more on China and on deterring any potential conflict. There’s always a constant refrain that getting bogged down in the Middle East and elsewhere detracts from that ability. And so I think there’ll just be this inherent structural tension in this administration.
I’d like to shift our attention to Iran because that is the topic of big discussion going on today. Let’s remember what Grant mentioned at the beginning of the discussion: the Abraham Accords is one of the key milestones of the first Trump administration. We heard in one of our earlier seminars back in April that Iran and the United States are both poised to be well positioned to reach some kind of nuclear deal, that the Iranian government is facing regime survival questions.
So they are facing a desperate economy. Trump has already made it clear that he’s willing to put some distance between him and Israel in order to forge ahead with an Iran deal. I’d like to get both of your takes on the China question here. Amanda, in our audience, asks a really timely question to which I’m going to come to you first with this. How do you think a U.S.-Iran nuclear deal will affect the Chinese position and how will it be received by China?
I just want to add a footnote to that: just this week, the United States put new sanctions on Chinese and Hong Kong companies for apparently being affiliated and supporting Iran’s missile development program. The Americans are keeping up the pressure on the Chinese related to this missile development program.
Trutu, what’s your take on a potential U.S.-Iran deal on their weapons program and what impact could it have on China? I have several points very quickly. The first one is before coming to the Iranian issue, I would say that the Trump administration is not that his first administration focused on the Abraham Accords. Right now it’s like he’s changing his focus and now he focuses more on the Iranian nuclear deal.
I don’t think so, because I think the Abraham Accords is still continuing. Let’s say what has just happened regarding Syria; actually, Trump has already announced his kind of plan to lift the sanctions on Syria. But one condition is that he would encourage Syria to normalize its ties with Israel. I think these are all undergoing under this framework of the Abraham Accords, so I think it’s going to continue.
The second issue here is that Syria is right: there is going to be the Iranian nuclear negotiation. It’s very likely that there is going to be some kind of new deal to a certain extent. But as for China, there was a nuclear deal in 2015, and China welcomed it. Actually, if we still remember it clearly, at that time, China was a very active participant in the P5 plus one mechanism.
Right now, actually, one big change is that I would say not only is China’s role declining, but in Trump’s administration, he’s trying to marginalize China and the other big powers’ role in the Middle East. What he loves is bilateral deals instead of placing everything under the multilateral mechanism.
For instance, this time, regarding the Iranian nuclear deal, there is not a lot of role for the EU or Russia; it’s like a bilateral negotiation. The third issue here is that I would say China’s diplomacy is always inward-looking. China is a country that prioritizes its own domestic interests. A lot of people are saying that China is coming very close to Iran, but in terms of the Middle East, China always tries to balance its relations with Saudi Arabia and Iran.
At the same time, why does China criticize a lot of United States sanctions on Iran? One of the biggest issues here is that China has a lot of economic interests there. If there is an Iranian nuclear deal and the United States lifts some sanctions on Iran’s economy, then it means that maybe China can have more deals with Iran more freely.
Last but not least, China is also respecting the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. That is my feedback to this question.
Okay, Grant, let’s get your take on this, particularly trying to give us a China angle on this. How do you think China would factor into an Iran-U.S. nuclear deal?
I think a fun way to answer this question is to take a bit of a riff on what Enrico was saying earlier, thinking about Trump a year from now and how the Middle East looks. As a thought experiment, let’s picture the Middle East at the end of the Trump administration in an ideal Donald J. Trump world. I think when he looks at it, he would love to see an Iran with a nuclear program that is in some type of box, that is not fully weaponized, that they don’t have a nuclear weapon. The contours of that are a heated debate in Washington at the moment. But from his mind, it’s no nuclear weapon. It’s free flow of commerce in the Gulf. The Babel Mendeb isn’t constrained, and the Straits of Hormuz isn’t constrained; everyone’s able to benefit.
There are Abraham Accords agreements between Saudi Arabia and Israel, perhaps other states and Israel, building off the success of the first round of Abraham Accords. He perhaps has a Nobel Prize because of it. I think he definitely wants one.
There’s a Trump Tower in Damascus and a Syria that is geopolitically aligned more broadly with the West. And there is, I think, a requisite amount of progress on the Palestinian front so as to facilitate the Abraham Accords agreements that he wants to do. I think Trump is willing to basically move as far as needed to make MBS and the Gulfies happy on the Palestinian front so as to facilitate more deals.
And to Fred Kempe’s point, to push the Chinese out. I mean, that would be an idea. If you’re looking in this kind of ideal wishful thinking mode, he’d like to see less Chinese engagement in the Gulf, right? I think his advisors, the people around him, would certainly share that.
I’m not necessarily—sorry, this one is just a Donald J. Trump. Okay. And I think if we accept that as sort of the broad contours of his ideal Middle East by the end of his administration, there’s plenty of areas of agreement there with China.
I think China, to Chuchu’s point, wants to balance its own ties. China wants to be able to maintain its economic connections to the region, to add that stability in the free flow of commerce. They do not want to see an Iran with a nuclear weapon; at least that’s the stated position. And so I think there’s plenty of middle ground there for both the U.S. and China.
You know, there used to be this old view that the Middle East was perhaps a theater competition, but not the primary theater of competition. And there were plenty of overlapping interests between the West and China in the Middle East. Neither one wants to see violent, non-state extremists take control of territories. They want to see the free flow of commerce. They wanted to see non-proliferation.
You know, I think Trump could almost in a way be a reversion to that, whereas perhaps the people around him, his staff, the pressures in D.C., the China hawks in town, the folks that want to focus on commerce, perhaps want to maximize some of the gains in the region. And I don’t get the sense that there’s going to be any great pushback from Beijing on the current efforts to sign a deal with Iran over the nuclear program.
If anything, the most exposed flank for the president right now is from within his own party, from the Republican hawks on Iran who look at this deal and see a JCPOA light, basically.
There’s a lot of support for Israel, too, on Capitol Hill, and they’re not thrilled necessarily with the way that Donald Trump is handling the Iran negotiations. Andrea, let’s get your take on Iran-China-U.S.
I find myself totally agreeing with Grant. I mean, I cannot read Trump’s mind, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he himself is not opposed to some kind of China factor in the deal. I think one of the big questions that we, and I say China watchers, I am not a Middle East watcher, have been discussing is there are different factions within the Trump administration.
Some of them are China hawks, some of them are Middle East hawks, some of them are pro-trade, and I think the battle is still on. We see changes over time with the tariffs; China in the beginning tried to frame it as a general thing, then as a China thing, and I think we will see this constant reframing, not just over the tariff, but also over the Middle East, depending on who’s got the precedence here in that moment, very likely.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we see some surprising openings, or at least surprising not closure to China in the Middle East, including over Iran. And by the way, just a few things, and then maybe Churchill will contradict me, but my impression is that even in China there is a bit of Iran fatigue in terms of how bad the situation within Iran got.
If you look at what people have been writing in the media, I think there are quite strong and clear calls for some kind of change in the country. Of course, I’m not talking regime change, but some change for sure. Even China probably doesn’t want to be overly dependent without a way to have Iran so overly dependent on it.
And so a change, an opening of some sort in Iran is also good for China, I guess. It frees up a bit of resources, right? And so, yeah, I would stop here, but I’m happy to hear what Chuchu and others have to say about this, of course.
Chuchu, is there an Iran fatigue in some policy circles in Beijing? Well, in fact, I would not say it’s an Iran fatigue. I would say that, in fact, China has always been neutral in the region and is like a balancer in the region in order to maximize its interest in the region and to balance its relations with different powers in the region.
But at the same time, as Andrea has mentioned, I think it’s interesting that over the past year, you see that there are confrontations between Iran and Israel, right? And I think a lot of scholars are just frank to say, OK, so, of course, there are problems faced by Iran. But at the same time, if you look at articles on the Gulf countries, they are also going to criticize the issues such as the anti-terrorism, etc. So it’s like I think they are just frank about what is going on because they are not saying, OK, I am an ally of anybody here.
Last but not least, I think also China just wants to be very clear about its principles in the region. So sometimes you see that maybe some of the diplomats or the scholars criticize the United States for the sake of Iran. People are thinking that, OK, that is why, because you are a good friend of Iran. But I would say, actually, a lot of this kind of criticism comes more from China’s concerns with its own interests.
For instance, when the United States is trying to exert and impose sanctions on Iran, our own economic interests, including Huawei, for instance, our big companies are affected. So China is very frustrated about it. At the same time, China wants to keep talking about the principles such as sovereignty, etc., non-interference, for instance. So it’s just trying to explain and repeat its principles on different issues, including the Iranian issue.
Enrico, we’re going to give you the last word on this Iran topic before we move on. Yeah, just my two cents here. Grant mentioned Trump’s dream of having a Trump Tower in Damascus. I think he wouldn’t mind to have one or maybe even with a golden statue on top in Tehran. And I think that here, the thing is that Iran is geopolitical, as I said before, has always been fundamental for China in order to apply strategic depth at a regional level.
So for the action, the maneuver that Trump is trying to make, again, learning from the errors of the past, without too much military commitment on the ground, without too much emphasis on nation building, but mostly focusing on business and enhancing security. This may actually create a situation where this pressure on Iran may actually achieve something. I don’t know. I mean, we wait and see, but paradoxically, as we said before, it would also be convenient in a sort of new, if we imagine a sort of new Plaza Accord with China, which is actually the most important issue.
I think the core issue of the day is not China-U.S. in the Middle East, but it’s actually China-U.S. economic relations and the kind of agreement they achieve. But if we envision a new, successful agreement between the two sides, which implies China more focusing on domestic consumption and less on supply, the situation may also involve the Middle East and the case of Iran. Because if Iran gets reconnected as much as Syria is being now and maybe tomorrow, Ukraine is being somehow reconnected and new demand is being generated in this country, this is going to be very much beneficial for China as well.
What China is better looking for is finding alternative markets, alternative demand that the U.S. is not willing to provide anymore. This is, in my opinion, a key point.
Okay, I just want to very quickly move on to one last topic before we wrap up with some final comments. One of the key takeaways from our discussion today is that the Persian Gulf and the Middle East regions are not the top priority for either China or the United States. Andrew brings up a very interesting question. He says, to what extent does the U.S. want to secure its relations with Middle Eastern countries and stabilize the region, what Grant was talking about in terms of this future?
By the way, it sounds great, that future. I really, if that’s what happened, Grant, we’re in good shape. So to what extent if the Donald J. Trump dream comes true so that it can focus more attention on the Indo-Pacific? And that, of course, means China. One of the key things that we’ve talked about early on, Grant alluded to, was that while the United States has been pressuring Europe and also Canada, its traditional allies, particularly to pay more for its defense. and has been very hostile in its tone, a very different tone when Secretary of Defense Pete Hexeth came out to the Philippines and Japan, much more focused on the alliances, an ironclad relationship, and in part because of that focus on China.
So, Chuchu, very quickly to Andrew’s question here, how much is it that they want to clean up the mess in the Middle East so they can focus more on the Indo-Pacific? What do you think China’s response to that might be?
Actually, I would say whatever happens in the Middle East, I think, as we have already discussed, both Trump and, so both the Republicans and the Democrats in the United States have a certain consensus that is they are going to compete with China, right? So China is the biggest concern of the United States.
So you see that Trump has already had this kind of tariff policies and whatever is going on in the Middle East. I don’t think what is going on in the Middle East affects his decisions on China. And the second issue here is that, yes, actually, Trump has focused a lot and has placed a lot of his energies and his concerns on the Indo-Pacific. And I would say that maybe he’s going to put more pressure on this issue.
But here, I still think that the issue here is that to what extent would Trump like to make investments, both in terms of military investments and also economic investments, right? If he just wants to shape a new order in the Middle East and also in the Indo-Pacific, but he doesn’t want to put money into it and he doesn’t want to put military into it, then what is the result he expects to see?
And last but not least, actually, there are already a lot of, I would say that I don’t think we should separate the Indo-Pacific strategy and the Middle East strategy, because actually, from my own observation, there is an expansion of the Indo-Pacific strategy and that is moving westward.
So, as we see, there is already the I2U2. Also, as lots of our colleagues here have already discussed, the United States is trying to bring in more partners to marginalize China’s role in the region of the Middle East. And one of them is India. And that is why there is the big initiative of IMAC. But although there are already a lot of the mechanism here, but the issue here is that it has not been institutionalized so far.
And one of the biggest issue here is who is to the real investment. That is the big question. Grant, we’re going to give you the last word before we wrap up. To what extent does the U.S. want to stabilize the Middle East to focus on China?
To a great extent, I think, in the ideal world for U.S. military planners and strategic thinkers, the Middle East is free, stable, secure, and not a drain on what we and the Pentagon would consider sort of these high-demand, low-density platforms. Things like aircraft carriers, air defenses, advanced munitions, advanced fighter jets, et cetera, et cetera.
I think what you saw was a brief window, as I mentioned earlier, between the Afghanistan pullout and October 7th, where you sort of saw an agreed-upon Middle East posture for the U.S. in a time of competition with China. There were no aircraft carriers. There was a decreased footprint. And the focus was on getting those high-demand assets elsewhere. They’d get back, get trained, get the readiness up, and then go and focus on posturing in the Indo-Pacific.
What the trouble for the U.S. is, the balance here, is that the demand from the Middle East most oftentimes pulls us in. Sort of the double-edged sword of us being, to my mind, especially after Russia and Ukraine, really the only external actor that can influence events on the ground in the Middle East. And even then, you know, we can’t influence them completely.
I am not one of those who believes that the U.S. can do whatever it wants and change the effects on the ground in a very complicated region. But we can certainly influence events in some way, for better or for worse. The double-edged side of that sword is that we sort of get pulled into it. And then we also have this belief in Washington that if we were to abandon a partner or to walk away from a previous commitment, that it could have second- and third-order effects for our own perception in the Indo-Pacific with our partners and allies there as well.
And so it’s a constant push and pull between strategic thinkers and planners in D.C. who recognize that, you know, for the past 20, 25 years, we’ve really been bogged down in the Middle East. And that has sucked a lot of our attention and resources. And that the time is now to really pull that out and shift its focus towards the Indo-Pacific with sort of this understanding that we are still called upon often in the Middle East and other parts of the world.
Okay. Well, thank you all for those insights. I want to close this discussion because we’ve covered a lot of ground and at some point it becomes too much for everybody to process. So I’d like each of you to kind of give us the one thing that you want listeners and participants in this discussion to walk away with when going back to the fundamental question of what is China learning from Trump 2.0 in the Middle East? What do you think that they’re looking at? What are the takeaways? And again, that gives us an insight about what we should be focusing on when we think about China in this region.
I’m going to come to all four of you. Chuchu, I’m going to start with you. Okay. I think just three points. The first one is that China knows that Trump is unpredictable. So instead of focusing on what he’s doing, China needs to make clearer its own strategies in the region, for instance.
And my second point is that actually we talk a lot about China-U.S. competition, but I don’t think China wants to compete with the United States. China never wants to challenge the existing regional order in the region. In fact, China only wants to squeeze its own space to continue its economic interactions with regional powers.
And the third issue here is that we have talked a lot about what China wants. But actually, I think a more interesting and important issue here is not just what China intends to do, but to what extent is China allowed to operate? One example is, for instance, about China’s role in mediating Palestine-Israel issues, etc. So it’s not that China wants or does not want, but the issue here is sometimes it might not be allowed to play a role in this region.
And maybe I will add a fourth issue here is that yes, although I would say that the Middle East is not the core interest of China or the United States, absolutely, I think the Middle East is of higher importance for the United States than for China.
Grant, what are your closing thoughts on this discussion? What lessons for China and the Middle East in the Trump era? Probably buckle up because anything can happen. There is going to be, I think, a lot of mixed messaging at times. I sort of go by the old adage: take him seriously, but perhaps don’t take him literally.
I do think we are going to find that the U.S. is going to be more heavily engaged in the Middle East, playing on the terms that the Middle East, in particular, the Gulf states want to play on, focused on the economic, focused on the commercial. If I was China, I would perhaps be a big concern because the advantage for many years has been the economic investment and ties with the region. And now the U.S. really wants to deepen that.
With that deepening comes, I think, inherent conditions and constraints on recipients of U.S. investment. And so, I would say, to paraphrase Trotsky, China may not be interested in competition with the U.S. in the Middle East, but I think the U.S. is interested in competition with China in the Middle East. I think that’ll be the tenor and tone of the remaining years of the Trump administration.
We got a Trotsky quote in there. OK, Enrico, you are going to get the last word of this seminar, and the last word of this series, in fact, is going to go to you. Go ahead. The main takeaway, in my view, is that China is looking at the U.S. trying to regain ground in the region. So, given a very superficial psychological analysis of Trump, neuro-narcissism and difficulty in handling defeat, I think that they’re going to try to use the Middle East more and more as a hedging region, trying to raise the cost of this new commitment of the United States.
And therefore, in order to generate higher and higher prices for the U.S. new commitment in the region, they’re trying to bog down the U.S. in the region. I think here, the role of Iran is going to be key.
Well, I want to thank all four of you for your insights and for this very lively discussion. Zhang Tutu from Fudan University in Shanghai, especially you for staying up so late with us tonight. We really appreciate it. Grant Rumley from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, no pity for you; it’s nine o’clock in the morning, so we appreciate that.
And of course, Enrico and Andrea for putting together this series. Also, just want to encourage everybody, if you’re interested in following these topics, both the China Med Project and the China Global South Project provide truly unique insights and coverage. The China Med Project does these fantastic media analyses looking at both Chinese and regional media.
And we, of course, provide daily insights and analysis on everything that’s going on in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf in both English and in Arabic. So I’d like to kind of put that out there.
So once again, thank you all and thank you again to the University of Naples-L’Oriental, the China Med Project, the Torino World Affairs Institute, and of course, my team at the China Global South Project for putting this together. This is the end of the series, so I won’t say that we’ll be back again, but we have appreciated everybody who’s participated in all of these discussions going back all the way to March.
We’ve learned so much. If you want to see more of this, go to the China Med Project’s website and there are recordings and transcripts and all sorts of great things that are there.
So thanks so much and thank you all for joining us today. The discussion continues online. Follow the China Global South Project on Blue Sky and X at ChinaGS Project or on YouTube at China Global South and share your thoughts on today’s show.
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