Middle East Strategy at Harvard

From Jacqueline Newmyer

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Islamic Republic of Iran are two of the trickiest countries with which the United States now has to deal. I’ll begin by covering two commonly discussed points of comparison and then turn to what I think are as important, the differences, before concluding with a brief look at Sino-Iranian relations and a question for U.S. policy makers. As a preview, I will argue that Iran and China, notwithstanding their distinctive strategic approaches and very different levels of power, have overlapping interests and are likely increasingly to cooperate in ways that create challenges for the United States. This is because China is seeking to expand its “international mobilization capacity” and Iran is disposed to work with external actors to enhance its perceived strength.

Perhaps the most obvious point of comparison between China and Iran is that both are revolutionary regimes, although one is Shi’ite and the other began as Maoist and remains nominally Communist. A classical political science approach would suggest that we examine the two from a generational perspective. Iran, therefore, would be in the same category of “revolutionary regime” as China, but just behind the PRC, or, if you will, younger in terms of its stage in a revolutionary regime cycle, only having emerged or been born in 1979. In China’s case, there was huge tumult, from the end of the Civil War in 1949 through the Korean War and Great Leap Forward to the Cultural Revolution, before Deng initiated the Reform and Opening period and welcomed trade and investment from the West. If the revolutionary regime perspective were illuminating, then, we could expect a kind of “calming down” effect, as a young Iranian revolutionary regime transitions into a more bureaucratized adolescence or even middle age.

This is connected with another common line of comparison that argues that in both the case of China and the case of Iran, engagement is the wisest course for the United States. Through engagement, it is argued, we can hasten the day when both powers act as “responsible stakeholders,” socializing the regimes through our interactions with them.

Would it be best for us to engage? Is Iran’s period of “calming down” just around the corner? Both perspectives are problematic. At the very least, proceeding on either basis should be done with an understanding of the very real, important differences between the Iranian and Chinese strategic traditions, and between the current geopolitical positions of Iran and China.

The differences between the Chinese and Iranian strategic traditions flow from the internal logics of their respective regimes—internal logics that seem to have staying power. To be sure, the leaders of both states share an overriding concern with domestic stability and the maintenance of their own authority. Both traditions also feature classic texts—the Sunzi Bingfa and other texts dating back to the Warring States period in China’s case, and medieval mirrors for princes in the Iranian case—that prescribe indirect approaches to conflict. These texts and the strategic traditions they reflect place a common emphasis on information, managing perceptions, and deception. Finally, both the Chinese and Iranian regimes may be characterized as legitimacy-deficient by comparison with Western liberal representative governments.

Nonetheless, important differences should not be overlooked. China’s strategic tradition is based on the perspectives of Daoism, bureaucratic Confucianism, the Mandate of Heaven, and Marxism, all of which point to a need to monitor global trends and try to be in synch with them. What stage of history are we in? or what is the trend of the time? The tradition teaches that when a regime appears to be out of step, seizing the initiative and acting boldly at such a decisive moment can not only head off disaster but guarantee victory. Therefore, China has often seen fit to initiate war, typically through surprise attacks. The Harvard political scientist Iain Johnston has pointed out that given China’s place in the international system, the PRC was especially likely to be involved in militarized interstate disputes in the latter half of the twentieth century. So there is an element of insecurity that leads China to be war-prone from our point of view. But, at the same time, compared with Iran, China has more ingrained institutions or trust among elites. A set of families qualified by wealth or scholarship or local status in a particular region form a fairly stable class of power-brokers invested in the maintenance of the current regime.

By comparison, the Iranian strategic outlook looks at once more mistrustful and more superstitious, and this inclines Tehran to rely on third-party actors or proxy forces to implement its strategic agenda. Like China’s, this agenda is founded on the need for regime survival, but what is interesting is what is considered necessary to ensure the regime and the measures that are deemed appropriate to take to that end.

Reflect briefly on recent Iranian history. Regimes came and went with some alacrity in the last century, and outside powers had a hand in their rise and fall. For instance, Reza Khan, the Shah’s father, ascended quickly but was then pushed aside by the British, who backed his son, the Shah, before he was overthrown by his own prime minister, Mossadegh. And then we played a role in ousting Mossadegh, only for our choice to be overthrown by Khomeini, in part, it was argued, because we failed to show enough support for him.

Iran’s salient historical experiences center on intervention by other powers and the upheaval that this has provoked—not only in recent decades but also longer ago, from the conquests by Arab and Turkic tribes to wars with Europeans and Russians in the 18th and 19th centuries. Of course, other countries have suffered external intervention in their internal affairs (as the Chinese would say), and been subject to Western colonialism. But in Iran’s case, these experiences proved especially resonant because they overlay much deeper, older Zoroastrian Persian and Shiite traditions of crediting unseen forces with agency and efficacy in earthly political matters.

Iran has its own history of not only blaming outside powers but also of entrusting proxies, or third-party forces, and working through them to achieve strategic aims. The regime can take credit, and benefit from plausible deniability in the event of failure, if enemies are attacked by third-party groups. And operating this way makes sense in light of the generally paranoid state of the leadership. Why are the leaders chronically concerned? It’s not just because some unseen celestial force could act to eliminate them. But, to modify the old saying, even paranoids have earthly enemies. In all the above cases of regime change with foreign involvement, local actors conspired or cooperated with the external powers. There is a chronic domestic loyalty problem in Iran.

Why might this be the case? As the economist Homa Katouzian has pointed out, Iran does not have a tradition of the rule of law or of any other stable institutional infrastructure within which stable classes are formed and individuals can engage in repeated interactions that create reputations, which require maintenance, so that honesty is rewarded. Therefore, alliances and power are fragile. Infighting prevails, as was demonstrated in the wake of the Iranian Revolution, and it is no accident that in Iranian literature, one’s closest relatives can cause the most damage through their betrayals. Accordingly, the tradition prescribes deception, the magnification of capabilities to create an appearance of strength, while preempting conspiracies and operating through third parties wherever possible. The expectation that others will deceive and conspire, meanwhile, reinforces the belief that political ascendancy is very fragile.

Given the relative fragility and insecurity of the Iranian regime, perhaps the most important China-Iran question for American policy makers to consider is how Iran figures in China’s calculus. Beijing, as a measurer of trends and an aspirant to superpower status, would like to improve what it calls its “international mobilization capacity,” according to the writings of senior Chinese Communist Party intellectuals. Given energy considerations, the Middle East is a region in which China has been seeking increased influence. The PRC has a history of supplying arms (missiles) and other kinds of technology to both Saudi Arabia and Iran, a way of improving ties, even rendering these states dependent on relations with China, which, in turn, depends on their energy supplies. The logic of my argument is that China might also aid Iran with its internal security. All of which suggests a final question for consideration: If we already speculate that nuclear weapons will embolden Iran and increase its coercive power, what ought we to expect from a nuclear Iran in receipt of Chinese aid and support?

Jacqueline Newmyer delivered these remarks at a symposium on “Iran: Threat, Challenge, or Opportunity?” convened by MESH at Harvard University on April 30.