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escobar

escobar

Brigadier
Overbom said:
This Saudi-Iranian agreement is of tremendous importance. I have a lot of thoughts about it but in order to keep the post short I will only mention a few of them. Funnily enough I won't focus on China's benefits, only for SA and Iran:

A short background: SA and Iran have been in secret talks for over a year already, but talks seemed to have stalled at some point. IMO Saudi Arabia wanted something out of Iran (Yemen issue?..), but Iran didn't want to give in, and even if it did, SA wouldn't trust Iran as it has a long history of breaking agreements. What's new here is the third party that got involved, China.

From SA's side
  • MBS has a long term plan for SA to become an economic power. When he got wind of the news that Israel and US were planning an attack against Iran, he noped the fuck out because he knew that these two would attack Iran from safe homelands while SA would get slaughtered by Iran which is next door
  • SA has been historically at the mercy of Western countries blackmailing it with letting Iran "loose" if they didn't follow Western orders. MBS just turned over the table, dealt directly with Iran and is now giving a giant middle finger to Western blackmailing.
  • SA doesn't trust Iran, so it asked China to take active part in the deal so that it pressures Iran to hold its end of the deal
From Iran:
  • First of all, the recent news from Israel and US probably sounded as death bells for Iran. They probably knew that its do or die time (not saying that they are out of the woods yet, but there is a possibility they may have foiled US/Israel plans against it).
  • China sent a very clear and, unusually, loud message to Iran. In China's vision for a future Middle East, Iran current actions aren't aligned with it. Either Iran had to change policies or it would have to watch China increasing relations with the Arabs.
  • Iran international strategic environment have been deteriorating. Iran either had to adjust its policies or it would have been surrounded by the US, Israel and the Gulf States.
China's gains and importance are worth entire posts by its own, but I will just say this. China wasnt just a simple mediator. I would bet real money that behind the scenes, both SA and Iran requested China to take an active part so that they could trust that the other party wouldn't break their promise. The extend of China's involvement will remain secret, but there is no doubt in my mind that, if not the most important, it has at least played a huge role here
Click to expand...
This is a win for China, but it also exposes CN. What if, in 3 months or a year from now, things between Iran and KSA go bad again? What will China do?
 
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ACuriousPLAFan

Brigadier
Registered Member
ACuriousPLAFan said:
Such glaringly contrasting body languages seen across both photographs. Posted by
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on Twitter.

View attachment 108879

This guy explained it pretty well:
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1634235116196339713
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1634237241777352704

To put it simply - One is a master, who forced two of his servants to hook their little fingers; The other is a friend to both parties in conflict, who helped both his friends to shake hands.

This is the fundamental difference between the two scenarios.
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One more interesting development - Just yesterday, PRC's special envoy to the Middle East paid a visit to the Israeli Foreign Minister in Tel Aviv.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1634239074684002305

Looks like some big chess move is happening in the region, to say the least...
 
O

Overbom

Brigadier
Registered Member
escobar said:
This is a win for China, but it also exposes CN. What if, in 3 months or a year from now, things between Iran and KSA go bad again? What will China do?
Click to expand...
I don't want to discuss China here because the implications are way too big to be discussed in a single or few posts. My only comment is that Iran and KSA going bad is normal, whats different here is that China has gotten involved.

This is not merely a simple deal between KSA-Iran. It is something far bigger when viewed strategically. The stakes are different
 
escobar

escobar

Brigadier
Interesting
PRC aims to develop into a key player in realm of international conflict resolution (specially focusing on mediation). The (abstract) "Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis" is just the latest example of a general trend-line. On February 16, the inauguration ceremony of the Preparatory Office of the International Organization for Mediation took place in Hong Kong. It will be the world's first intergovernmental legal organization dedicated to the settlement of international disputes through mediation.
Click to expand...
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1634231219004030989
 
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