Long Road, Sudden Turn

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Eastern Promises

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What does it mean that former enem= ies Iran and Saudi Arabia are now cooperating—thanks to China? Steven Cook on appearances and reality in a changing Middle= East.

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Ivy Gould / The Signal

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After decades of insults, = threats, and proxy conflicts around the Middle East, Iran and= Saudi Arabia announced an agreement on March 10 to restore diplomatic rela= tions. The announcement was surprising, not least because the agreement was= brokered by China—and with no involvement from the United States, th= e pre-eminent power in the region since the end of the Cold War. Saudi Arab= ia and Iran themselves have been enemies since 1979, when Iran’s Isla= mic Revolution toppled the shah—a staunch U.S. ally—and the Rev= olution’s supporters started chanting Death to America = and threatening Washington’s partners in the region, including the Sa= udis. Meanwhile, China has been developing its ties in the Middle East for = years now. But openly mediating a new diplomatic pact between two of the re= gion’s biggest powers—a pact that will see them reopen embassie= s, revive a security agreement, and reestablish economic and cultural ties&= mdash;would seem a major turning point. What’s going on here?
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Steven Cook = is a senior fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies based in Washington w= ith the Council on Foreign Relations. To Cook, the new agreement isn’= t as surprising, or shocking to the constellation of power in the Middle Ea= st, as it might seem. Behind all their conflict, the Iranians and the Saudi= s have been finding gradually more and stronger incentives to put their dif= ferences aside; they needed help settling them; and China was at hand and h= appy to give it. The development shows how radically the position of the Un= ited States in the Middle East has changed over the past 30 years—but= , Cook says, the Chinese aren’t simply replacing the Americans in the= region; something altogether new is taking shape.

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Sean Nangle: What= ’s just happened in the Middle East?
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Steven Cook: The = global perception of what’s happened is interesting to start with. Th= ere’s been a tendency to see the Iranian-Saudi deal as the mark of a = sudden and dramatic shift in the region. After all, Washington has been hig= hly focused on the global challenge from China; the media—U.S. and in= ternational—has been highly focused on Washington being highly focuse= d on the global challenge from China; and then, all of a sudden, it comes o= ut that China has brokered a grand bargain between, of all countries, Iran = and Saudi Arabia.
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09Yet if you look at the substan= ce of the deal, it’s an agreement to reestablish diplomatic relations= between Tehran and Riyadh. The substance isn’t unprecedented. In the= current environment, it may have been a little too easy for commentators i= n the media to lose sight of the fact that Iran and Saudi Arabia have maint= ained diplomatic relations before—through some very frosty and tensio= n-filled years, at that.
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Okay, not in the last six years, s= o something important has happened here. And okay, the deal was brokered by= the Chinese. That’s new—and undoubtedly something important to= o, because it shows that Beijing is now a real factor in the Middle East. B= ut we have to remember, if anyone was going to broker this deal, it wasn&rs= quo;t going to be the United States—because the United States doesn&r= squo;t talk to Iran.

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So I’m not sure we can say a= ny of this reflects a sudden change in the Middle East. What it does reflec= t, though, is a striking moment in an ongoing evolution of the region&rsquo= ;s geopolitics. Which is to say, in a waning of the time when America was t= ruly predominant, when it had no real peer competitor—no near-peer competitor—in more or less the 20-years between 1991 and 2011.= What the new deal reflects is that this time is well over. And now there a= re options for countries in the region looking for diplomatic brokers other= than Washington.
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Nangle: Iran and = Saudi Arabia have had, as you say, a frosty and tension-filled relationship= , going back more than 40 years—to Iran’s Islamic Revolution in= 1979. Iran has since staked a lot of its regional and international reputa= tion on resistance to the U.S. and its allies, with the Saudis being one of= the most prominent among them. Why would Iran want to reestablish diplomat= ic relations now?
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Cook: In the days= after the deal, the Iranian media was very chirpy about the whole thing&md= ash;making a lot of the meetings that would now take place on the road to r= eestablishing diplomatic relations, the Iranian delegations that would now = be going to the United Arab Emirates, and so on.
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09It was clear to me, listening,= that this wasn’t just propaganda or posturing. You could see an emer= ging sense that establishing diplomatic relations with the Saudis now is a = powerful way to drive a wedge between them and the Americans—Saudi Ar= abia being the big dog in the Gulf; being such close allies with the U.S. o= ver the years; and now being closer than ever to Israel, as Israel continue= s to normalize relations with its Ar= ab neighbors all around. Of course, the Iranians know there were a= lready divisions between the Saudis and the Americans, but you can see in t= he Iranian response a view that the deal could help them exploit these divi= sions—in ways that will redound to Iran’s benefit.
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09At the same time, the Iranians= have been long on the ropes economically and with their population domesti= cally—and the potential for Saudi and Emirati investment is very allu= ring. It also creates the opportunity to explore new deals with the Chinese= , who’ve been bailing the Iranians out with investment, supporting Ch= ina’s further prominence in the region—to the further disadvant= age of the United States.
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Ivy Gould / The Signal

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More from Steven Cook at The S= ignal:
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09“More than anyth= ing, the Saudis really, really want to get themselves out of = the civil war in Yemen, where they and the Iranians have been supporting op= posing sides as proxies since 2014. If relations with the Iranians improve,= and there’s dialogue, it raises the chances of being able to withdra= w. The Saudis know now what a mistake it was to get involved in Yemen; they= know the Iranians and the Houthis—the ethnic group leading one side = of the civil war, backed by the Iranians—have shared an interest in k= eeping them pinned down there; and they know the United States hasn’t= been able to extricate them. The Saudis don’t know, yet, if the Iran= ians are going to cooperate on account of the new deal. But they do know th= e odds have now gone up.”
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09“The Chinese hav= e their own incentives. What’s really in it for them is= that they’re very serious about their neutrality in the Middle East,= and they very much want the region to be stable, so they can pursue their = mercantilist policies—meaning state support for Chinese firms, Chines= e exports, and China’s currency. They don’t want two of their b= iggest oil suppliers to be at odds, undermining the stability of the region= , and potentially disrupting the flow of oil to China. If all of this comes= at the expense of the United States, that may be an added benefit for Beij= ing. But they’re much more interested in ensuring that the region rem= ains stable and that they continue to get oil they want from it.”
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=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09=09“It seems to me,= the picture taking shape here isn’t going to be s= o much about the ups and downs of the United States and the Chinese. It&rsq= uo;s going to be about how the partners of the U.S. and the Chinese in the = region are becoming more adept at playing both sides. I’ve heard repr= esentatives of Middle Eastern countries say as much in the region, myself: = This isn’t our grandfather’s Middle East. We have agency. W= e’re going to order this region on our own. And we’re going to = pursue our interests as we see fit; we’re not going to let outsiders = do it for us.”

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