How America Is Pushing China and Iran Together

How America Is Pushing China and Iran Together

The $400 billion Iran-China deal is not the culmination of a process or the start of a new era. It is, however, a critical inflection point in a relationship that will play an outsized role in a new era of great power competition.

Much of what thwarted previous efforts at a deeper economic relationship between Iran and China is not even mentioned in the text of the roadmap. This is not the culmination of a process or the start of a new era. It is, however, a critical inflection point in a relationship that will play an outsized role in a new era of great power competition and in the fate of the troubled Middle East that seems destined (or doomed) to serve as one of its battlefields.

Ali Ahmadi is a graduate student at the University of Tehran and an analyst focused on economic statecraft and US foreign policy in the Middle East. His work has been published by The Diplomat, The National Interest, Palladium Magazine, and others.

Image: Reuters.