How the Iran War Is Shifting Power Toward China
"As the U.S.’s credibility and military capacity are tested abroad, China has gained leverage by staying out of the fight and learning from it.
Last week, the German Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, offered a gloomy appraisal of the war in Iran, a two-month-long conflict that has devolved into a standoff in the Persian Gulf. A ceasefire is now in place, but it’s fragile: the U.S. has blockaded Iranian ports and vessels; Iran has attempted strikes on U.S. ships; and, in the midst of negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz, President Donald Trump is reportedly considering whether to resume hostilities. “The Iranians are clearly stronger than expected, and the Americans clearly have no truly convincing strategy in the negotiations, either. . . . An entire nation is being humiliated by the Iranian leadership,” Mertz said—a notable shift from his cautious support for regime change in Iran. Trump fired back, vowing to withdraw U.S. forces that have been stationed in Germany for decades. The episode fits a pattern that has played out in Europe and the Middle East, wherein Trump makes new threats, punishes perceived slights, and shows little regard for allies or for the broader fallout from his decisions. His actions have made an impression at home, too: for the first time in more than two decades of polling on the question, the Pew Research Center recently found that a majority of Americans believe their country largely ignores the interests of others.
This is all welcome news in Beijing. For years, the Chinese Communist Party has tried, with middling success, to cast itself as a responsible world power in the face of what it has labelled imperialist America. It has issued one jargon-filled statement after another warning against American “hegemony,” condemning Washington’s “Cold War mentality,” and framing China as the true custodian of a rules-based international order—the same order that the U.S. helped build but now undermines. In 2023, the Chinese President, Xi Jinping, unveiled a grandiose, if vague, project called the Global Civilization Initiative, which proposed an appeal to comity between civilizations and cultures—something of a Chinese counterpoint to the Western status quo. For China’s neighbors, such airy visions are unlikely to assuage fears over China’s own perceived hegemonic designs; meanwhile, smaller countries in the so-called Global South are already seeing their societies and politics bend to Chinese influence. But the war in Iran—and Trump’s disruptive behavior on the world stage, including his chaotic social-media presence—is helping China reframe its geopolitical role, according to Yuen Yuen Ang, a professor of political economy at Johns Hopkins University. “The war in Ukraine left China in an awkward position: narrowly aligned with Russia and viewed with suspicion by Western powers,” she told me. “For China, the Iran conflict brings no economic upside, but it creates diplomatic space. It allows China to step out of a previously isolating alignment and reposition itself more broadly, not just in the Middle East but globally.”
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