Why China does not delight in any U.S. failures in the Mideast

ARTICLE: "Energy Prices Put China In a Jam: Inflation Limits Options on Controls," by Andrew Batson, Wall Street Journal, 21 September 2007, p. D8.

Much of the current high prices in energy are rising demand-driven, but clearly any security issues put a short-term premium on price, so no, China takes no delight in U.S. failures in Iraq, nor would it relish military strikes against Iran.

So long as energy prices rise, you got a key inflation driver fueling Beijing's fears of civil unrest.

China desperately needs a Middle East that's opening up to globalization and especially its FDI flows, because those flows will determine the region's future ability to meet China's skyrocketing energy demands, with Iran as an obviously key player.

Comments

[D Blair]

Can someone check that link? It goes to the Krauthammer " Middle East Volcano" story.

[Anonymous]

my mistake, D. but it's not going to help you much. WSJ article. pay to play.

thanks for the heads up

[farhad]

quite the conterary,china does not want US strong hold on middleeast,exacatly because of the energy demand it has.it don't want US be in a position to patrol the oil & gas coming out of middle-east,niether does europe.in fact the whole middleeast wars is all about control of oil as greenspan also mentioned.

[William R. Cumming]

Always think Chinese leadership thinks in the long-run. After all they have been a leading power for a long time with occasional timeouts. I don't think they really worry about the US in the long run. Reading Robert Dallek's newbook on "Nixon-Kissinger" they played those two beautifully and now play Bush and Paulson just as easily. They do worry resources for the future but perhaps that is why 500,000 Han Chinese a year slide into Mongolia, Tibet, and Siberia. Long term the Chinese need a supply base for weapons and commodities, what better than the good old reliable arsenal of the world (no longer democracy) that appears to be so stupid in its energy policies that for the next 100 years it can worry about almost nothing else than oil. The oil has to go somewhere. Also with what is it -$600B in dollar reserves- they don't want a EURO/RUBLE oil bourse either. Watch the financial markets and the Chinese operate. That is the central front for the next decade.

[stuart abrams]

Interesting possible unintended consequences of the neo-cons blustering on Iran. Threats from the US strengthen ties of Iran to China, India, and Russia. Connectivity in Iran grows not because of connections to the US, but because of connections to the New Core. The neo-cons are a threat to globalization, and as long as they hold power in the US government, the US is not going to be acting in the interests of globalization. But globalization advances anyway because of the growing importance of the New Core.

[Bill C.]

Stuart, et al.

Notice how, as Kaplans point out (Lost at Sea), the "ground has shifted beneath our feet."

Now it appears that the driving force in international affairs has become -- not globalization -- but, instead, the rise of the East (the Asian Century).

Accordingly, globalization, as a focus for strategic thought, may be passe.