{"id":31694,"date":"2026-03-23T04:45:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T04:45:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/31694\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T04:45:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T04:45:06","slug":"the-road-to-beijing-doesnt-run-through-tehran","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/31694\/","title":{"rendered":"The road to Beijing doesn’t run through Tehran"},"content":{"rendered":"

As Operation Epic Fury enters its fourth week, American and Israeli forces can boast of many tactical victories. They have destroyed 75%<\/a> of Iran\u2019s missile and drone launch capacity, sunk<\/a> over thirty naval vessels, hit critical Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and Iranian military centers, and killed the highest ranks of the country\u2019s leadership, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and secretary of the Supreme National Security Council Ali Larijani. <\/p>\n

This joint strike campaign is meant to deliver a twofer: eliminate the brutal Shia theocracy and dismantle its terrorist proxy network. <\/p>\n

Yet the massive kinetic wins have not translated into functional success. Iranian missiles still regularly strike U.S. bases, energy facilities, and civilian areas in our allied Gulf states. Maritime disruption continues in the Strait of Hormuz. The regime has named the deceased supreme leader\u2019s son<\/a>, Mojtaba Khamenei, as his successor. The ayatollah is dead; long live the ayatollah. <\/p>\n

Since coming to power, Iran\u2019s clerical regime has used asymmetric warfare as an instrument of state building. It weaponizes the ideology of eternal rebellion to cement its legitimacy at home and export its influence across the Shia world. <\/p>\n

This system is optimized to inflict disproportionate losses on its enemies while embroiling them in unending conflict. Like the mythical Hydra of Lerna, it grows two new heads for every decapitation. We have been here before. Yet here we are again, a quarter century on, even as Beijing has become a peer adversary. <\/p>\n

Confronting China<\/a> requires an entirely new strategic playbook and unglamorous work like supply-chain decoupling. But most of America\u2019s political class is neither fluent nor interested in this approach, so it retreats to the familiar terrain of regime change in the Middle East<\/a> \u2014 the geopolitical equivalent of rearranging your closet when a deadline is looming.<\/p>\n

Some China analysts have argued<\/a> that this \u201cprocrasticleaning\u201d is in fact a win against Xi Jinping because it knocks off<\/a> his key Mideast ally. But that triumphalism rings hollow when you account for the Iran<\/a> war\u2019s toll on the Indo-Pacific theater. <\/p>\n

However the Iran war unfolds, it will prove to be a strategic self-own in our great-power competition with China. Two structural constraints inform this prediction. <\/p>\n

First, Iran has entangled America in a war of attrition that is straining our finite stockpiles of air-defense interceptors and other critical munitions. Taiwan<\/a> and our other Asian partners are worried that high-value assets, earmarked for the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, will be diverted to the Middle East. <\/p>\n

These fears are already materializing on the Korean Peninsula. The U.S. Forces Korea command has moved<\/a> 20-30% of its Patriot missile batteries to Osan Air Base amid speculation that they will be shipped to the Middle East. President Lee Jae Myung has confirmed<\/a> that Seoul and Washington are discussing the redeployment<\/a> of some U.S. Patriot missile defense systems from the region. South Korea is also scrambling to deliver roughly thirty interceptors to the U.A.E., drawing<\/a> from its own operational reserves. <\/p>\n

At sea, the diversion is even more pronounced. Forty-one percent<\/a> of battle-ready U.S. Navy ships are concentrated in the Middle East, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). This figure is poised to rise as the USS George H.W. Bush carrier strike group prepares<\/a> to deploy to the Eastern Mediterranean. The USS Gerald R. Ford and the USS Abraham Lincoln (pulled<\/a> from its Pacific mission last month) are stationed in the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea respectively. The only U.S. carrier in Asia, the George Washington, is undergoing maintenance<\/a> in Japan. <\/p>\n

The Pentagon is now <\/a>deploying<\/a> the Japan-based<\/a> Marine Expeditionary Unit of roughly 2,500 Marines and sailors, along with the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli, to the Middle East. As Captain (Ret.) James JB Park of the Republic of Korea Army told RS, these developments preview a future where American resources are stretched thin across multiple theaters at the expense of Indo-Pacific deterrence. If Iran is the opening gambit of a grand strategy to weaken China, then we are starting on the back foot. <\/p>\n

Compounding that vulnerability, the war does far less damage to Beijing than its advocates claim. Iran, albeit an important pillar, is not foundational to Xi\u2019s ambitions in the Middle East. China buys more than 80%<\/a> of Iran\u2019s crude oil at discounted prices, but these barrels account for only 13% of its overall imports. Its energy security is guaranteed by the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, which supply 42%<\/a> of China\u2019s crude oil and 31% of its liquefied natural gas. <\/p>\n

The China\u2013Iran \u201cComprehensive Strategic Partnership,\u201d although hyped as $400 billion<\/a> in potential investment over twenty-five years, has scarcely materialized. The total Chinese investment since 2007 falls just under $5 billion<\/a>. In contrast, by 2020, Beijing had poured $70 billion<\/a> into GCC countries across energy, real estate, and infrastructure development. <\/p>\n

China sells more missiles<\/a> to Iran than its neighbors, but it provides<\/a> Saudi Arabia<\/a> with access to more advanced weapon systems such as DF-21<\/a> intermediate-range ballistic missiles. Its actual Middle East posture, therefore, is to maintain deep ties with the Arab monarchies alongside an opportunistic stance toward Iran, exploiting the latter as a cheap gas station and captive market for Chinese telecom and surveillance products. <\/p>\n

If the American offensive against Iran unsettles one of China\u2019s regional interests, it will do so at the cost of cannibalizing our military readiness in the Indo-Pacific. All the while, Beijing is building anti-carrier hypersonic missiles, a nuclear-powered submarine fleet, militarized artificial islands, and an extensive network of deep-water ports<\/a> and naval bases<\/a> from Pakistan to Djibouti (\u201cString of Pearls\u201d).<\/p>\n

This brings us to the Iran war\u2019s second structural constraint. Short of catastrophic escalation, no military campaign will overthrow the Islamic Republic. Airpower alone cannot compel the regime\u2019s unconditional surrender. The population will not topple the Islamic Republic and install a new pro-U.S. government.<\/p>\n

The fantasy chain reaction on which the Trump administration<\/a> is betting rests on a fallacy about the mechanics of popular uprisings. The people \u2014 divided, distracted, and disorganized \u2014 have little to no political agency. Only when a counter-elite<\/a> successfully mobilizes against and replaces the ruling elite does a revolution occur. <\/p>\n

Would an invasion by U.S. ground troops incite regime defections and an internal collapse that the air campaign could not? History suggests otherwise. When Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein invaded Iran\u2019s border province of Khuzestan in 1980, he expected to annex oil and water resources and destabilize the revolutionary government of Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Instead, the ensuing eight-year conflict consolidated the Islamic regime (even the local Arab population sided<\/a> with it), while exhausting Iraq\u2019s military and economy.<\/p>\n

We have already suffered an irreversible human tragedy: thirteen<\/a> U.S. troops have been killed and 200 wounded. Civilian losses across the region are also mounting, with reports<\/a> indicating 1,351 deaths in Iran, at least 912 people killed in Lebanon, and additional fatalities in Israel<\/a> and the Gulf states. The material losses also carry a steep price, as replacing expended munitions and damaged equipment requires critical minerals and supply chains dominated by China.<\/p>\n

The war will redound to Xi\u2019s advantage. In effect, China is approximating the \u201coffshore balancing<\/a>\u201d strategy long advocated by U.S. foreign policy realists. By avoiding military involvement and letting regional actors check one another, it incurs none of the costs in blood, treasure, or political capital that America will now have to shoulder.<\/p>\n

From Your Site Articles<\/p>\n

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