https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/01/13/iran-china-biden-gulf-security-military/
Biden Can No Longer Ignore Growing Iran-China Ties
Washington may be tired of the Middle East, but Beijing is just getting started.
It’s no coincidence that the precise details of Sino-Iranian security cooperation remain opaque. Beijing has good reason to downplay the growing cooperation with Tehran. The Chinese Communist Party is eager to build relations with Gulf Arab governments, and helping the Iranian military is unlikely to win Beijing any fans in Riyadh or Abu Dhabi.
This balancing act likely explains why the foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain—joined by the Gulf Cooperation Council’s secretary-general—are in China this week as well. Beijing is trying to cultivate relations with both Tehran and Gulf states simultaneously. That makes it necessary for China to frame its growing bilateral security cooperation with Iran in a way that will not agitate leaders on the other side of the Gulf.
That will be a challenge for Beijing, and Washington should seek to make that challenge even more difficult.