PolicyWatch 3770
August 14, 2023
For the first time in decades, America’s top strategic priority
diverges from that of its key regional partners, but Washington can
close the gap by increasing their understanding of China and
removing the blinders from their threat perceptions.
As U.S. policymakers have focused more on competition with
China in recent years, their concerns over Middle East
relations with Beijing have grown as well. This has
contributed to a vicious cycle—growing Chinese influence
and ambitions around the world result in decreased American
attention to the Middle East, which in turn incentivizes U.S.
regional partners to deepen their ties with Beijing, which in
turn increases tensions with Washington and leads some to
conclude that the Middle East is a lost cause. Underlying this
dynamic are frequent suspicions of bad faith. Washington
worries that its partners are cynically using China ties as
leverage to extract favors from the United States or, worse,
that they share an authoritarian affinity with Beijing; for their
part, regional partners worry that Washington is either
unreliable or so focused on domestic politics that it no longer
ascribes strategic value to its Middle East relationships.
What these assumptions often neglect are two more
fundamental differences. First, the parties differ substantially
in the threat they perceive from Beijing. From the U.S.
perspective, there is no greater threat than China’s growing
economic and military might and revisionist intentions. Yet
Middle Eastern partners perceive only minor threats from
China, if any. They are far more likely to see Beijing as a
valuable trading partner and a benign, even helpful, political
partner and occasional great-power counterweight, especially
when faced with inconvenient U.S. demands. These
differences mean that for the first time in decades,
Washington and its regional partners sharply diverge on what
they consider their primary national security threat.
Second, both sides differ in their capacity to understand
China. In the modern era, Beijing has had little meaningful
engagement in the Middle East, while regional elites have
spent relatively little time there compared to other
international capitals. Compounding this unfamiliarity is the
scarce analytical capacity of most Middle Eastern
governments. Even Israel, the most capable regional
intelligence ally, naturally directs most of its analytical
resources toward what it considers its top threats (e.g., Iran
and terrorism). This gap in understanding only widened over
the past few years as the United States directed more of its
resources toward the Indo-Pacific and China underwent
historic political change, from dramatically concentrating
domestic power to embracing a more ambitious foreign
policy. The speed of these shifts has left Middle Eastern
partners struggling to keep up.
Closing the Gap
Given these differences, America’s numerous warnings about
Chinese technology, military activities, diplomatic initiatives,
and other matters tend to be received skeptically in the
region. In many cases, partners view these messages as
requests for favors to the United States with little connection
to their own interests or priorities; in other cases, they believe
they are being asked to act against their interests and
essentially choose between Washington and Beijing. More
cynically, U.S. requests have created leverage for partners to
play the two great powers off one another in hopes of
extracting maximal benefits from both.
Compounding these difficulties is the fact that American
concerns about China often straddle the boundaries of foreign
policy, economics, and technology in ways that conversations
about Iran, terrorism, and other traditional Middle East topics
do not. This can place U.S. officials at a disadvantage, as they
tend to be more specialized portfolio-wise than their regional
counterparts (especially in the Persian Gulf) and may
therefore know less about broader trade or technology
matters—or even about U.S. policy on these global issues. In
such cases, Middle Eastern officials will not hesitate to draw
on their deeper knowledge to point out hypocrisy or double
standards when rebuffing Washington’s requests.
Attempting to close these analytical and policy gaps is a tall
order and may prove quixotic in some respects. The increase
in Middle East ties with Beijing stems not just from
Washington pursuing the right or wrong policies, but also
from deeper tectonic shifts that are unlikely to abate in the
foreseeable future: namely, China’s growing (and the West’s
declining) demand for oil, Beijing’s determination to play a
diplomatic and security role in the region, and the decreasing
importance of Middle Eastern conflicts in Washington’s
national security strategy. Yet none of this should dissuade
U.S. policymakers from doing what they can to reach a better
mutual understanding with regional partners on the China
challenge.
Policy Recommendations
In light of all these factors, the U.S. government should take the following steps:
Doctor, heal thyself. First and foremost, the State Department
should reconsider its recent “China watcher” model at U.S.
embassies in the Middle East, under which officers with
specialized training are designated to handle issues related to
great power competition. This program was based on the
“Iran watcher” program of the early 2000s, but unlike that
relatively narrow portfolio, China competition has come to
dominate U.S. national security strategy and should be
treated accordingly. All American diplomats overseas need to
understand the key tenets of U.S. policy toward Beijing and
have at least a basic grounding in Washington’s concerns
about trade, technology, and related matters—particularly the
steps that have been taken to restrict Chinese trade and
investment. Some of this training is already taking place, but
it must be accelerated and greatly expanded.
Creating a China knowledge network. The U.S. intelligence
community should partner with allies in the Indo-Pacific (e.g.,
Japan and Australia) to train their Middle Eastern
counterparts—especially in the Gulf—on China analysis.
This training should not focus specifically on Beijing’s policy
in the region, but rather on broader issues such as China’s
civil-military fusion, recent domestic changes, and
problematic activities worldwide (e.g., espionage,
cyberattacks, influence operations, technology transfer). The
ultimate purpose should be to cultivate a network of China
experts in Middle Eastern governments and provide them
with the tools and data to vet China-related risks to their
national interests, while keeping relevant channels open so
they can turn to their U.S. counterparts when needed. To
make this initiative less provocative to Beijing—and, by
extension, more likely to elicit regional participation—the
training should also focus on other global challenges such as
Russia and Iran.
Replicate the U.S.-Israel Strategic Technology Dialogue. In
September 2022, Washington and Jerusalem launched a
bilateral “Strategic High-Level Dialogue on Technology.” Led
by two countries’ national security advisors, the interagency
group’s mandate covers clean energy technology, pandemic
preparedness, artificial intelligence, and other tech issues.
Although China was not mentioned in statements
announcing the group’s initial meeting or latest talks, it was
undoubtedly what spurred the dialogue’s creation, as U.S.
concerns over Israeli tech cooperation with Beijing had
become a significant irritant in the relationship. The United
States should consider replicating this model with the United
Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and perhaps Qatar. Although
their tech sectors are not as well-developed as Israel’s, all
three are investing heavily on this front and have partnered
extensively with Beijing in ways concerning to Washington. If
the bilateral dialogues prove viable and successful,
Washington should consider combining them into a
multilateral framework.
Reframe threat perceptions. Despite demarche after
demarche, even America’s closest partners in the Middle East
simply do not see China as a threat to their interests (apart
from the friction that their Chinese ties are creating with
Washington, perhaps). This is not to say they are blindly
trusting of Beijing’s intentions, merely that they do not view
its actions as threatening. In fact, they see China’s desire to be
more active in the Middle East as an opportunity, whether in
terms of attracting trade and investment or balancing their
dependence on the United States.
Yet this threat perception is deeply mistaken. For example, if
China attempts to take Taiwan by force or other methods, the
resulting crisis would likely entail enormous disruptions in
global trade that wreak severe economic damage in the
Middle East. Even short of that drastic scenario, Beijing could
weaponize its economic leverage over the region at any time
for political purposes, as it has already attempted to do
against Australia, Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, and
others. Chinese cooperation with Iran remains deeply
problematic as well—despite Beijing’s efforts to frame it in
positive terms (e.g., the recent Iran-Saudi rapprochement),
such activity has helped shield Tehran from economic and
diplomatic isolation while enhancing the threat it poses to
neighbors.
U.S. officials should emphasize these threats rather than
rehashing messages about democracy vs. autocracy or risks to
the international order, which do not resonate among most
U.S. partners in the Middle East. Much like China, the
majority of these partners see themselves as rising powers
who have not been accorded their fair share of global
influence.
In addition to pointing out threats, U.S. officials should work
with regional partners on initiatives that appeal to them while
still tacitly countering Beijing. For example, Saudi Arabia and
the UAE have the capital to rival Chinese investments in
infrastructure and mineral extraction in the developing world
and could benefit from Western partnership in this regard.
Failing that, they may wind up facilitating Beijing’s strategy
by pursuing such opportunities with Chinese partners, which
are proffered more readily at present.
Michael Singh is the managing director and Lane-Swig Senior
Fellow at The Washington Institute and interim director of its
Diane and Guilford Glazer Foundation Program on Great Power
Competition and the Middle East.
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