Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Global South strategic cooperation

SDtom · Feb 13, 2023

China can/should have good economical, political, and/or military relationship with SA and Iran at the same time; like China with North and South Korea, Ukraine and Russia, and Palestine and Israel, etc. Both SA and Iran is and will be an important partner country for China. China will not elevate one to the disadvantage over the other.

As for membership for SCO, if India can join then so can Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Chevalier · Feb 13, 2023

SDtom said:
China can/should have good economical, political, and/or military relationship with SA and Iran at the same time; like China with North and South Korea, Ukraine and Russia, and Palestine and Israel, etc. Both SA and Iran is and will be an important partner country for China. China will not elevate one to the disadvantage over the other.

As for membership for SCO, if India can join then so can Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Saudis and Iran are by far much more valuable members than India; a state that boasts its large internal market and yet is proven time and time again, to be Fool's Gold with bureaucratic corruption, shakedowns, and such low median wealth that India's actual consumer market is probably comparable to Indonesia.

Overbom · Feb 13, 2023

SDtom said:
China can/should have good economical, political, and/or military relationship with SA and Iran at the same time; like China with North and South Korea, Ukraine and Russia, and Palestine and Israel, etc. Both SA and Iran is and will be an important partner country for China. China will not elevate one to the disadvantage over the other.

As for membership for SCO, if India can join then so can Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Iran is welcome to join. Its not exactly a 1 to 1 comparison though because where India was forced through China's throat by Russia to join SCO, here China itself welcomes and would like Iran in SCO.

Saudi Arabia should be guarded though. Yes, SA is showing some elements of independence from the American Empire, but in the end, SA hosts many US bases and thousands of US troops in its soil. I trust MBS but what about the rest of the political and Nat. Sec apparatus though? Has he thoroughly cleaned up Western influence?

Chevalier · Feb 13, 2023

Problem with mass alliances is that too many competing factions can tear it apart or lead to inaction for eg look at Turkey and Germany preventing the Anglosphere from enacting Total War against Russia, whilst Poland sabotages any meaningful attempts at peace sometimes against the will of the Imperial Core.

Under SCO, India is obligated to come to China's aid against US Terrorism but chances are high that it will instead join the Terrorists as part of AUKUS.

Abominable · Feb 13, 2023

Overbom said:
Why do you even say stuff like that?
Can't you think of something that China really, like really really, needs from Saudi Arabia??

As I have already stated, China's number one priority in Middle East for the foreseeable future is going to be that black sticky liquid. Anyone who tries to block/interrupt China from getting that liquid will automatically become China's enemy in like 1 millisecond.

This will only change when that black liquid can be completely sourced by other countries immediately. Anti-West, anti-imperialism(lol) Iran and all that is cool and nice, but if it tries any funny business with Saudi Arabia's production of the black liquid, all these things will take a backseat

Saudi Arabia needs China more than vice versa. It suits Saudi Arabia to cooperate with China, even if it is.

MelianPretext said:
There seems to be some fundamental misreadings on the dynamics of Middle East geopolitics and the goal of China’s ME foreign policy that I feel like it’s necessary to clear the air. A decision by China to disproportionately favour the GCC over Iran and alienate the latter partnership would be, to put it frankly, catastrophic for Chinese foreign policy objectives in the Middle East.

The Iran-China Relationship
It’s important to keep in mind that the heart of contemporary Chinese foreign policy is the promotion of the BRI and the fundamental core impetus of the BRI is not economic development but national security. China’s maritime east, its main route of access to the rest of the world, is under perennial threat of blockade from adversarial activation of the first island chain. This is the background under which the OBOR was uncoincidentally formulated shortly after the announcement of the Obama-era "Pivot to Asia,” because the land route networks that the BRI would establish from Xinjiang and Tibet into Eurasia would ensure China’s immunity from the impact of such a containment scenario. Although there is a “Maritime Silk Road” where the GCC can play a peace-time role through being an intermediary for shipping from the CPEC corridor and acting as crude oil supplier in return, it does not address the security concerns underpinning the BRI project and would only move a maritime blockade from the waters of the SCS and the Strait of Malacca to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.

There are therefore two principal land routes, from Central Asia southwards to Iran and northwards to Russia. Ensuring the stability and cooperation of Central Asia to diversify access routes is therefore crucial, as elsewise, China’s Eurasia routes would be entirely dependent on Russia and at the mercy of volatile Russian leadership attitudes. Establishing an Iranian route, which was the traditional transitory path of the historical Silk Road to the West, gives China the same leverage we see right now in the Russo-Iranian competition for China’s oil import market. Furthermore, the optimal path to keeping Central Asia secure means requiring the partnership of Iran. With Iran, Pakistan and Russia on board, this China-partnered bloc would win the so-called “Great Game” over Central Asia that foreign powers like Britain, the Russian Empire and the United States have been unsuccessfully competing for since the 19th century.

Keeping Iran on board is also necessary to check Turkish and Indian influences on Central Asia, which can both be contiguously blocked from the region with Iranian cooperation. The former under the Erdogan government is a irredentist power whose historically unattainable ethno-nationalist fantasies of Turkism are now a real threat through being co-opted as the vehicle for NATO and American re-entry into Central Asia and infiltrating Xinjiang after their loss of Afghanistan. The latter would be deprived into an outsider looking in position with respect to Central Asia so long as Iran and Russia cooperate with China and Pakistan in keeping it out. This also prevents the latter from "its have your cake and eat it too" attitude of expecting to fully reaping the benefits of accessing those BRI-developed regions despite its own non-participation in BRI and its hostility towards China.

The feasibility of this Central Asian grand strategy can only be made manifest from the cooperation of the state holding Iran’s geographic position and that geographic position alone is frankly all that China really needs out of its bilateral partnership with Iran. Therefore, so long as a Sino-Iranian relationship can sufficiently secure these stated regional security concerns, in the long-term its value to China will actually be more fundamentally important than anything the GCC could provide in the current geopolitical environment, even if Iranian cooperation is a complete wash in other areas like bilateral economic ties.

The GCC-China Relationship
I think the excessive focus and cheery optimism on potential Chinese benefits of the developing GCC relationship, such as the elusive Petroyuan, have made some forget why the Saudis chose to roll out their blue carpet, fire off their 21-gun salute and have their royals greeting Xi like kin in the first place: because, from a geopolitical perspective, the Saudis (and the GCC) have gained something massive from this summit, which is that an invitation of China acts as a guaranteed catalyst for triggering the “Solomon Islands” response from the West. The lackluster state of their relationship with America following the latter’s Asian pivot has coincided with the current US Democratic administration marginalisation of its Middle East allies through its ‘axis of democracy’ diplomatic narrative. Introducing China into the picture recontextualises the ME from the apparent American notion that their withdrawal means the region will simply sink into irrelevance with little geopolitical value, which has led it to so publicly attack its GCC partners like Saudi Arabia. Approaching China therefore reactivates Western interests by exploiting their Cold War “dominos” mentality and this is made obvious by how the entire Western bloc has immediately lined up to reengage the region like clockwork after China’s Dec 7-10 summit.

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The use of China as a "rebound partner" and as leverage for countries to renegotiate their relationship with the West is often indirectly beneficial to China but it also leads to instances of China being pulled by the nose by “two-faced" leaders using the tactic and then dumping China afterwards without any means of Chinese recourse. This is most evident in its Philippines relationship, where the two Dutertes have continually played the China card, starting with the previous one’s hyped up threat to the US to cancel their Visiting Forces Agreement, which ended up as a big nothing burger episode that merely served to induce American concessions towards furthering their bilaterial relationship. Securing an Iran relationship introduces a means for China to reduce the GCC incentive from expressing such a similar degree of duplicitous insincerity and riding roughshod over China with diplomatic impunity. This is as the threat of alienating China and allowing Iran to gain its full backing would be costly for the GCC’s security concerns (aka the "Ukraine dilemma"). In parallel, securing a GCC relationship bolsters the Iranian impetus to maintain its own China ties through similar concerns of its own.

Excellent post, and I'd like to add Saudi (or the GCC as a whole) clearly aren't tied to America and the west for ideological reasons.

It's 100% on self interest, America is the biggest most powerful nation, producing the most advanced weapons.

I don't think pan-Turkism is much of a threat to China. The only central Asian state that is culturally close to Turkey is Azerbaijan. Regarding Xinjiang, there's not much Turkey can do that the US and Soviet have tried and failed at already. If they choose to remain on the sinking ship that is NATO it's them that will be losing out.

TK3600 · Feb 13, 2023

Jono said:
Russia has ( or should I say, had ) a powerful pro west faction too before the Russian-Ukraine war.
Where are such political elites now? They have been sidelined to say the least. So never say never.
Russia has decided to look eastward from now on, with resultant policy shifts in China's favor.
I am sure Iran is contemplating a similar strategic shift because US sanctions with European acquiescence show no sign of abating. Iran's economy is in a shamble, and the pivot to China is possibly the only viable way out of it, hence President Raisi's visit.
I am sure Beijing will welcome him with big fanfare, and rightly so, to make the guest proud.
Things are really turning to China's advantage, and 2023 may be a golden diplomatic year for China.

The moment Russia is hit with terrorists, heavy sanction, Russia immediately switched side to China. I am not seeing such self-respect from Iran after decades of sanction.

Minm · Feb 13, 2023

Overbom said:
Does Iran have the infrastructure today to completely replace Saudi Arabia's oil production and also to transport it to China?

It doesn't now, it won't in 5 years. It probably won't in 10 years.

I think you're overestimating the importance of Saudi oil to China. Last month, Saudi Arabia supplied 1.7 million barrels per day to China. Iran's production is officially around 2.5 million bpd today but was at almost 4 million before Trump's maximum pressure campaign. So if we trust those numbers, Iran could easily replace Saudi supplies to China. But we're talking about a commodity anyway. China won't run out of oil, but the price will go up. Iraqi production is also increasing again and Russia is sending everything to Asia now, so there are plenty of suppliers.

Whether China would support one side in a Saudi Iran war would depend on who started it, won't it? The Saudi led invasion of Yemen and Saudi support of Syrian rebel forces was very destabilising for the region. Iran's attack on Saudi oil was in response to that. They're both sponsoring their pet extremist groups in various countries. Which one is more guilty? I don't think there's any innocent country in the middle East.

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MelianPretext said:
There seems to be some fundamental misreadings on the dynamics of Middle East geopolitics and the goal of China’s ME foreign policy that I feel like it’s necessary to clear the air. A decision by China to disproportionately favour the GCC over Iran and alienate the latter partnership would be, to put it frankly, catastrophic for Chinese foreign policy objectives in the Middle East.

The Iran-China Relationship
It’s important to keep in mind that the heart of contemporary Chinese foreign policy is the promotion of the BRI and the fundamental core impetus of the BRI is not economic development but national security. China’s maritime east, its main route of access to the rest of the world, is under perennial threat of blockade from adversarial activation of the first island chain. This is the background under which the OBOR was uncoincidentally formulated shortly after the announcement of the Obama-era "Pivot to Asia,” because the land route networks that the BRI would establish from Xinjiang and Tibet into Eurasia would ensure China’s immunity from the impact of such a containment scenario. Although there is a “Maritime Silk Road” where the GCC can play a peace-time role through being an intermediary for shipping from the CPEC corridor and acting as crude oil supplier in return, it does not address the security concerns underpinning the BRI project and would only move a maritime blockade from the waters of the SCS and the Strait of Malacca to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.

There are therefore two principal land routes, from Central Asia southwards to Iran and northwards to Russia. Ensuring the stability and cooperation of Central Asia to diversify access routes is therefore crucial, as elsewise, China’s Eurasia routes would be entirely dependent on Russia and at the mercy of volatile Russian leadership attitudes. Establishing an Iranian route, which was the traditional transitory path of the historical Silk Road to the West, gives China the same leverage we see right now in the Russo-Iranian competition for China’s oil import market. Furthermore, the optimal path to keeping Central Asia secure means requiring the partnership of Iran. With Iran, Pakistan and Russia on board, this China-partnered bloc would win the so-called “Great Game” over Central Asia that foreign powers like Britain, the Russian Empire and the United States have been unsuccessfully competing for since the 19th century.

Keeping Iran on board is also necessary to check Turkish and Indian influences on Central Asia, which can both be contiguously blocked from the region with Iranian cooperation. The former under the Erdogan government is a irredentist power whose historically unattainable ethno-nationalist fantasies of Turkism are now a real threat through being co-opted as the vehicle for NATO and American re-entry into Central Asia and infiltrating Xinjiang after their loss of Afghanistan. The latter would be deprived into an outsider looking in position with respect to Central Asia so long as Iran and Russia cooperate with China and Pakistan in keeping it out. This also prevents the latter from "its have your cake and eat it too" attitude of expecting to fully reaping the benefits of accessing those BRI-developed regions despite its own non-participation in BRI and its hostility towards China.

The feasibility of this Central Asian grand strategy can only be made manifest from the cooperation of the state holding Iran’s geographic position and that geographic position alone is frankly all that China really needs out of its bilateral partnership with Iran. Therefore, so long as a Sino-Iranian relationship can sufficiently secure these stated regional security concerns, in the long-term its value to China will actually be more fundamentally important than anything the GCC could provide in the current geopolitical environment, even if Iranian cooperation is a complete wash in other areas like bilateral economic ties.

The GCC-China Relationship
I think the excessive focus and cheery optimism on potential Chinese benefits of the developing GCC relationship, such as the elusive Petroyuan, have made some forget why the Saudis chose to roll out their blue carpet, fire off their 21-gun salute and have their royals greeting Xi like kin in the first place: because, from a geopolitical perspective, the Saudis (and the GCC) have gained something massive from this summit, which is that an invitation of China acts as a guaranteed catalyst for triggering the “Solomon Islands” response from the West. The lackluster state of their relationship with America following the latter’s Asian pivot has coincided with the current US Democratic administration marginalisation of its Middle East allies through its ‘axis of democracy’ diplomatic narrative. Introducing China into the picture recontextualises the ME from the apparent American notion that their withdrawal means the region will simply sink into irrelevance with little geopolitical value, which has led it to so publicly attack its GCC partners like Saudi Arabia. Approaching China therefore reactivates Western interests by exploiting their Cold War “dominos” mentality and this is made obvious by how the entire Western bloc has immediately lined up to reengage the region like clockwork after China’s Dec 7-10 summit.

Dec 14:
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Dec 24:
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The use of China as a "rebound partner" and as leverage for countries to renegotiate their relationship with the West is often indirectly beneficial to China but it also leads to instances of China being pulled by the nose by “two-faced" leaders using the tactic and then dumping China afterwards without any means of Chinese recourse. This is most evident in its Philippines relationship, where the two Dutertes have continually played the China card, starting with the previous one’s hyped up threat to the US to cancel their Visiting Forces Agreement, which ended up as a big nothing burger episode that merely served to induce American concessions towards furthering their bilaterial relationship. Securing an Iran relationship introduces a means for China to reduce the GCC incentive from expressing such a similar degree of duplicitous insincerity and riding roughshod over China with diplomatic impunity. This is as the threat of alienating China and allowing Iran to gain its full backing would be costly for the GCC’s security concerns (aka the "Ukraine dilemma"). In parallel, securing a GCC relationship bolsters the Iranian impetus to maintain its own China ties through similar concerns of its own.

Thank you for the great post!

TK3600 said:
The moment Russia is hit with terrorists, heavy sanction, Russia immediately switched side to China. I am not seeing such self-respect from Iran after decades of sanction.

How did China vote at the UN when the West was calling for Russia to be condemned? How did China vote when the US was demanding sanctions against Iran? China is offering Russia an alternative to the West. It hasn't offered the same to any other country under sanctions.

Jono · Feb 13, 2023

TK3600 said:
The moment Russia is hit with terrorists, heavy sanction, Russia immediately switched side to China. I am not seeing such self-respect from Iran after decades of sanction.

perhaps simply because Russia has more cards ( like nukes ) in its hands and therefore more self-respect?

tonyget · Feb 13, 2023

China's core principle on energy security is diversification，not to import too much oil from any single supplier. So the argument of which country replace which country in terms of oil supply to China，is a false assumption

tphuang · Feb 13, 2023

Minm said:
It hasn't, this is just the potential. Remember China voted to support American led sanctions on Iran? China has used the Iran card very successfully in negotiations with the Americans. China has always chosen to give the Americans face by supporting their sanctions and distract them from attacking China. Same story as for north Korea. But now that we're in a cold war again, there's no more benefit in supporting American sanctions.

Chinese companies were awarded some infrastructure projects in Iran like HSR and developing gas fields, but progress has been slow. Iranian bureaucracy and Chinese hesitancy to work with Iran are both to blame.

not only that, Iran does not play ball with China. They are not willing to subordinate themselves to China. Given their lack of other options and their geopolitical toxicity, that's a big no no to me.

Minm said:
Iran has some space and missile technology, arms manufacturing, petrochemicals and nuclear energy and I'm sure others related to heavy industry. Obviously China is more advanced in all of these areas, but that's the opportunity. China can provide parts and machines. There's much more value added in high wage Chinese jobs in industrial equipment and components than in cheap energy, which Iran is also providing to China secretly. The opportunity is there, China just needs to dare to take it, even if it's going to offend westerners.

No Iran has nothing to offer China except natural resources. It seems like you are unaware of where China's technology base is to Iran.

China does take Iran's cheap energy, but that's the relationship that China needs to take with Iran. you give me cheap energy and buy more manufacturing products and I will be nice to you. Iran doesn't offer China anything else. Do you not understand? Saudis are the GCC/Arab world leaders. Arab world goes where the Saudis go. So as far as China is concerned, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are important, Iran isn't.

Minm said:
Why do you care so much about "respect" for Chinese products? The main Chinese cars assembled by Iranian companies are Haima SUVs made by Iran khodro and brilliance cars made by saipa. I don't have sales numbers.

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You might want to take a look at how much trade Iran does with China vs Saudi Arabia.
And then take a look at how much weapons and high tech products the Saudis are buying. And same with UAE. Pakistan doesn't have a lot of money, but they spend all their military budget on Chinese weapons. Same with Algeria and Egypt. Those are good partners to have. The Iranians have no option except Russian weapons and yet would still prefer Russian weapons. Why would China want to prioritize that relationship.

Minm said:
No, North Korea won't stick with China no matter what. They were very quick to seek a deal with Trump when offered. Not surprising, since China has supported sanctions on North Korea and before Trump was very reluctant to support Korea.

You obviously don't understand the military/political ties between China and NK.

Minm said:
Iran also wants Chinese technology, but sometimes the sanctions cause problems. Remember Huawei's Iran business? Many Chinese companies are not willing to risk entering the Iranian market. That's something the government could work on. If you can invest in Russia, you can also invest in Iran.

Yet, Chinese companies are making boatloads in Russia and not in Iran. What does that tell you? The Iranians don't respect China. The liberals there were so quick to criticize that 25 year deal with China. Is this reliable partner? I don't think so. Do you see Russian oppositions or GCC country oppositions criticizing their partnership with China?

Minm said:
I think you'll find that all of these countries want both Chinese and Western technology.

You see this is where things are even more annoying. Iran has no Western tech options, but they'd rather pick Russia over China, lol. Saudis have all the choices in the world and they pick Chinese tech.

Minm said:
Southeast Asia is a friend to China? Is your memory this short? Anti Chinese riots in Indonesia? South China sea dispute? American bases? Bangladesh is closer to India than China. Russia and Pakistan are real friends today. Iran probably won't be China's closest ally, but it's willing and able to fight against American hegemony in its region. Imagine a future situation where the GCC flips to China and Iran flips back to the US. With Israel, Turkey and Iran on one side, who will dominate the region?

Why do you think Pakistan is so pro China? It's not just that they have a common enemy. China has fairly selflessly invested huge sums in Pakistan, just like American marshall aid to Europe. If you want others to like China, you have to put in some effort

Lol, if you think China should be better friend with Iran than Pakistan or ASEAN countries, then go ahead. I bet you Chinese leadership is not in the same boat. Iran is "willing" to fight against American hegemony, because America has given it no choice. America picks its enemies. Not the other way around.
If you think Bangladesh is closer to India than China after spending all their money on Chinese military equipment, then you clearly don't know what you are talking about.

Abominable said:
You've not given any reason why China needs to view Iran with hostility. Even if the Saudi and Iranians go to war with each other, there's no reason why China needs to pick a side.

I've discussed in other threads why China needs to be hard on Iran. As long as Iran is willing to buy Chinese goods and sell cheap resources to China, it's fine to keep them around. I don't want China to be associated with Iran for free. Especially when the liberal wing of the country are anti-China.
Whereas with GCC countries, China is now basically viewed the most positively of all major powers by their citizens.

MelianPretext said:
The Iran-China Relationship
It’s important to keep in mind that the heart of contemporary Chinese foreign policy is the promotion of the BRI and the fundamental core impetus of the BRI is not economic development but national security.

lol, it is definitely an economic development and a security development. The fundamental goal of BRI is to have the world's commerce and flow of goods/information/data through Chinese enterprises.

MelianPretext said:
China’s maritime east, its main route of access to the rest of the world, is under perennial threat of blockade from adversarial activation of the first island chain.

Again, very weak understanding of China's threat to so called "blockade". You might want to go read through the westpac thread to see how realistic this threat really is.

MelianPretext said:
This is the background under which the OBOR was uncoincidentally formulated shortly after the announcement of the Obama-era "Pivot to Asia,” because the land route networks that the BRI would establish from Xinjiang and Tibet into Eurasia would ensure China’s immunity from the impact of such a containment scenario. Although there is a “Maritime Silk Road” where the GCC can play a peace-time role through being an intermediary for shipping from the CPEC corridor and acting as crude oil supplier in return, it does not address the security concerns underpinning the BRI project and would only move a maritime blockade from the waters of the SCS and the Strait of Malacca to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.

Again, there is a security component but the key of BRI is to make everything more efficient in world trade to go through China. The real long term security side of things is enhancing China's power through capturing all of world's manufacturing so that everything (including military) can be made a more cheaply and at higher quality in China. BRI works because China has an industrial policy. Without an industrial policy, BRI doesn't work.

Get your mind beyond blockade. It's not a thing anymore unless you think PLA is still the PLA of 10 years ago.

Even in the context of BRI, Iran is a problem, because it doesn't play ball. The presence of Chabahar is a problem for CPEC because it draws some of that north/south traffic that Gwadar needs to succeed. Splitting traffic doesn't help Gwadar or Karachi. It's in China's ultimate interest to have a prosperous Pakistan, who entirely military/political elites are pro-China.

You do not need to go through Iran to get to Europe. the current southern route does not go through Iran. Because again, Iran does not play ball. But guess which country the southern route has to go through? Turkey.

Iran's geographical advantage is its ability to shut off the gulf of Hormuz very easily. But that's not really a positive advantage for China

Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and Global South strategic cooperation

SDtom

New Member

Chevalier

Captain

Overbom

Brigadier

Chevalier

Captain

Abominable

Major

TK3600

Major

Minm

Junior Member

Jono

Junior Member

tonyget

Senior Member

tphuang

Lieutenant General