The centerpiece of Xi Jinping’s Middle East strategy, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been under the wrath of the Israeli and American armies for nine days. A blitzkrieg that is knocking out the country’s economy and stifling its exports. For China, the leading importer of Iranian crude, 12 million barrels of oil are missing in one week. After the capture of the Venezuelan head of state last January, Donald Trump once again deprives his great Chinese rival of a valuable economic ally.
Beijing and Tehran signed a twenty-five-year partnership in 2021
The eastern crossroads of the Silk Roads, Iran embodied a long-term investment strategy that Beijing had been intensifying for several months. A few weeks before the start of Operation Epic Fury, many Chinese state-owned companies accelerated the conclusion of major contracts. Construction giant Shanghai Baoye signed lucrative steel contracts, state-owned major Pinggao Electric contracted electricity substations that met state grid standards, and China Railway Container Transport organized freight corridors to Central Asia. The energy sector remained central to these activities, with regular imports of Iranian petrochemicals and iron ore, followed by the re-export of Chinese technology and equipment. So many investments proving Beijing’s economic appetite for Tehran, the two countries having signed a twenty-five-year partnership in 2021.
Control of rare earths
It is therefore an all-out offensive that Trump’s United States has launched against China. The head of the State Department, Marco Rubio, had explicitly declared this a few weeks earlier: “America will do everything to prevent Beijing from using strategic resources as a lever of geopolitical influence over the United States. » But the confrontation goes beyond the energy framework. Rare earths – essential for electric batteries, defense and technology industries – remain 70% under Chinese control. Trump understands, we must regain control, or at least diversify the sources. Same strategy for semiconductors: Taiwan, a global producer of advanced chips, remains the weak link in the Chinese chain.
AI is also exacerbating tensions. The United States dominates in language models, in cloud capabilities, in global infrastructure. But Beijing is catching up – its investments in generative AI are exploding – while remaining dependent on large American companies like Intel or Nvidia. The US president’s sanctions on advanced chips are deliberately stifling Chinese innovation.
The fact remains that the Middle Kingdom has not said its last word. Behind the timid condemnation of the Israeli-American strikes, Beijing observes and constitutes a veritable encyclopedia of American military doctrines thanks to the constellation of its satellites dedicated to espionage. Sitting on a comfortable trade surplus of 1.2 trillion dollars, China, which remains the world’s leading manufacturer, is biding its time and eyeing Taiwan a little more every day.
