[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":89},["ShallowReactive",2],{"article-\u002Fwriting\u002Fchina-united-states-middle-east":3},{"id":4,"title":5,"body":6,"date":72,"description":73,"draft":74,"extension":75,"featured":76,"kind":77,"meta":78,"navigation":76,"originalUrl":79,"path":80,"publication":79,"seo":81,"stem":82,"tags":83,"__hash__":88},"articles\u002Fwriting\u002Fchina-united-states-middle-east.md","Why China Has Not Rivalled the United States as the Leading External Power in the Middle East",{"type":7,"value":8,"toc":67},"minimark",[9,13,16,19,22,25,28,31,34,37,42],[10,11,12],"p",{},"Over the past two decades, China has become an increasingly important actor in the Middle East through expanding trade, energy dependence, infrastructure investment, and diplomatic engagement. This growing presence has encouraged claims that Beijing may be emerging as a serious challenger to Washington in a region historically shaped by great-power intervention. Yet the key issue is not whether China has influence in the Middle East, but whether it has rivalled the United States as the leading external power. That requires a distinction between economic importance and strategic primacy. A leading external power is not simply one with extensive commercial ties, but one able to provide security, sustain military reach, shape conflict outcomes, and uphold a regional order. By that standard, the United States remains in a qualitatively different position. As Dannreuther argues, China has expanded its interests in the region dramatically, but it has remained comparatively cautious in political and strategic terms and has not converted geo-economic influence into geostrategic leadership (Dannreuther, 2024). This essay argues that, although China is now a major regional stakeholder, it has not rivalled the United States because Middle Eastern primacy continues to rest above all on security provision, alliance management, military infrastructure, and the willingness to bear the costs of regional order, all of which remain overwhelmingly American. More specifically, China’s rise has been significant but structurally incomplete: it has expanded within a regional order still fundamentally secured by the United States. The essay first establishes why the United States remains the benchmark of external power, then examines China’s economic rise, the structural incentives that discourage it from replacing the US-led security framework, its limited military capacity and strategic prioritisation, and the constraints of its regional diplomacy.",[10,14,15],{},"Any convincing argument about China’s failure to rival the United States must begin by establishing what makes the United States the leading external power in the Middle East. American influence has never rested simply on trade or diplomatic visibility, but on its longstanding ability to provide security and shape the regional order. As Dannreuther shows, the post-Cold War period consolidated a phase of US hegemony in the Middle East, reflected in Washington’s decisive role in the Gulf Wars and in its broader military and diplomatic predominance (Dannreuther, 2024). This matters because it sets the standard against which China must be judged. To rival the United States is not merely to become economically significant, but to challenge its role as the central provider of regional security. Recent claims of American decline do not fundamentally alter this reality. Colley argues that narratives of US retrenchment are frequently overstated, since Washington still maintains an extensive military footprint in the Gulf, including major bases, command structures, and defence commitments that neither China nor Russia can currently replicate (Colley, 2023). Alterman similarly stresses that the United States continues to possess a depth of military access, alliance networks, and coercive leverage far beyond that of its competitors (Alterman, 2019). The United States therefore remains the benchmark of external power because it still underpins the security architecture on which much of the region depends.",[10,17,18],{},"China nevertheless appears to be the most plausible long-term challenger because its regional role has expanded rapidly in economic terms. As Dannreuther explains, China’s growing dependence on Middle Eastern oil and gas, together with widening commercial relations, has made the region far more important to Beijing than in earlier decades (Dannreuther, 2024). China has become a major trade partner for many states in the region, while infrastructure, construction, and energy investments have deepened its place in the political economy of the Middle East. Fulton also shows how the Belt and Road Initiative has given this expansion a broader strategic framework, presenting China as a partner in development and connectivity rather than overt intervention (Fulton, 2019). This rise is politically significant because many regional governments increasingly view Beijing as an indispensable economic actor and, in some cases, as a useful hedge against uncertainty in US policy. Lons et al. argue that China’s expanding footprint has made it an increasingly important factor in the calculations of Middle Eastern states seeking to diversify their external partnerships (Lons et al., 2019). However, the analytical significance of this rise lies not in proving that China has already achieved rivalry, but in showing why that claim can now be entertained at all. What this demonstrates is not the arrival of a new hegemon, but the emergence of a major stakeholder whose influence remains uneven across different dimensions of power. China’s economic expansion has undoubtedly reduced the exclusivity of US influence, yet it has not displaced the foundations of American primacy. Economic centrality may create leverage, but it does not by itself create strategic leadership.",[10,20,21],{},"The first reason China has not rivalled the United States is that its influence in the Middle East remains primarily geo-economic rather than strategic. Dannreuther makes this distinction clearly: although China has significantly expanded its economic presence in the region, it has maintained a low-key political and diplomatic approach and has avoided making any direct challenge to US dominance (Dannreuther, 2024). The crucial issue is therefore not whether China matters, but what kind of power it exercises. In the Middle East, commercial embeddedness does not by itself confer primacy, because regional order is still structured above all by security dependence. A state may become central to trade, energy flows, and infrastructure and still remain secondary in strategic terms if it does not provide security guarantees or shape conflict outcomes. China’s own mode of engagement reinforces this limit. Fulton describes Beijing’s regional approach as development-focused and apolitical, built on strategic partnerships rather than alliances (Fulton, 2019). This has increased China’s attractiveness across a fragmented region because it enables Beijing to work with multiple rival states simultaneously. Yet that same flexibility also reveals the limits of Chinese power. A state that seeks access to all sides, rather than assuming responsibility for order, is not acting as a hegemonic power. Alterman similarly argues that China’s appeal in the Middle East lies partly in its ability to expand commercially without accepting the military and political burdens historically associated with regional leadership (Alterman, 2019). China therefore has influence, but it is the wrong kind of influence to rival the United States: it is a powerful geo-economic actor in the region, not the principal architect of its security order.",[10,23,24],{},"The second reason China has not rivalled the United States is more structural: Beijing has often benefited from the US-led security framework rather than seeking to replace it. Dannreuther argues that the public good of Persian Gulf security, long underwritten by American naval and military power, directly benefits China by protecting the flow of energy on which its economy depends (Dannreuther, 2024). This point is crucial because it shows that China’s limited challenge to American primacy is not only a matter of weakness, but also of incentive. China’s restraint is thus partly strategic choice, not merely strategic deficiency. As long as the United States secures the Gulf and the maritime routes connected to it, China can expand its economic role without bearing the immense financial, political, and military costs of regional order-building. Fulton similarly notes that the relatively low-cost nature of China’s rise in the Middle East has depended significantly on the existing US security architecture, which has provided a stable environment for Chinese citizens, assets, and trade (Fulton, 2019). Alterman likewise suggests that China has been content to derive economic benefit from a system in which Washington continues to shoulder the principal strategic burden (Alterman, 2019). Even Ghiselli’s discussion of how Chinese observers view Russia’s opportunism in the Middle East reinforces this wider point: from a Chinese perspective, external activism in the region can yield tactical gains, but it also exposes powers to instability, overextension, and costly entanglement, all of which Beijing has generally preferred to avoid (Ghiselli, 2023). This suggests that the limits of China’s role are not simply accidental or temporary, but rooted in a strategic preference for influence without responsibility. In other words, China’s rise has not developed against American order so much as partially within it. A genuinely leading external power cannot simply prosper under an order maintained by another state; it must be willing to uphold that order itself. China has so far shown little strategic incentive to assume that burden.",[10,26,27],{},"A third reason is that China still lacks the military reach, regional infrastructure, and strategic commitment required to match the United States. As Dannreuther notes, distance creates real constraints on China’s ability to project power into the Middle East, while Beijing’s most serious strategic concerns remain concentrated in East Asia, especially around Taiwan and the South China Sea (Dannreuther, 2024). This means that the Middle East, although important, remains secondary in China’s broader military outlook. By contrast, the United States has spent decades building bases, command structures, logistics, and defence partnerships across the region. Colley shows that this presence has not disappeared; the evidence instead points to a substantial and continuing American footprint in the Gulf (Colley, 2023). The difference here is not only one of resources, but of strategic prioritisation. Regional primacy requires not only assets, but the prioritisation of those assets toward sustained order-building. Fulton argues that few regional actors seriously expect China to replace the United States in military terms, because Beijing lacks not only the power-projection capacity but also the political interest required for such a role (Fulton, 2019). China’s growing naval capabilities and port investments may signal longer-term ambitions, but Dannreuther is clear that these developments have not yet been translated into a direct challenge to US regional primacy (Dannreuther, 2024). Leadership in the Middle East remains inseparable from the willingness and ability to assume security burdens, and China has expanded its stakes without developing the regional military architecture needed to act as the principal external guarantor of order.",[10,29,30],{},"A final reason China has not rivalled the United States lies in the nature of its diplomacy. China’s diplomatic role in the Middle East has undeniably expanded, but it remains cautious and limited in impact. Dannreuther argues that Beijing has generally avoided direct confrontation with Washington and has shown little readiness to take the lead in resolving the region’s most dangerous conflicts (Dannreuther, 2024). Karakır’s description of China’s role as “involvement without impact” is especially useful here. China has become more active in regional diplomacy, yet that activism has remained modest, cautious, and largely ineffective in producing decisive outcomes (Karakır, 2022). The problem is not that China is absent, but that it rarely converts presence into authority. Diplomatic breadth, in this case, has not translated into diplomatic authority. This diplomatic style reflects Beijing’s broader priorities. By maintaining relations with rival states simultaneously and avoiding deep entanglement, China preserves flexibility and access. Yet that same strategy limits its political weight. As Karakır notes, China tends to participate rather than lead, to support de-escalation rather than impose settlements, and to avoid investing the material resources necessary for effective crisis management (Karakır, 2022). Lons et al. make a similar point: China’s regional diplomacy has grown, but it has not meaningfully reduced geopolitical tensions or replaced the security role of the United States (Lons et al., 2019). China’s diplomacy therefore broadens its regional profile, but it does not establish it as the dominant external power.",[10,32,33],{},"It could nevertheless be argued that China is moving gradually towards rivalry with the United States. Its economic importance is undeniable, many Middle Eastern governments now regard it as indispensable, and hedging behaviour across the region suggests that American exclusivity has weakened (Dannreuther, 2024; Fulton, 2019). A stronger version of this argument would hold that China’s rise reflects not only economic diversification, but also a gradual erosion of US political authority, as regional states increasingly seek alternatives to Washington’s preferences and conditionality. In this sense, China’s rise has clearly altered the regional balance and reduced the singularity of US influence. Yet this argument is only persuasive if rivalry is defined loosely. Reduced exclusivity is not the same as displacement. If the question is whether China has become more important, the answer is unquestionably yes. If the question is whether it has rivalled the United States as the leading external power, the answer remains no. That is because the core functions of primacy are still security-based rather than purely economic. Even today, China’s regional gains are often made within an order whose stability depends heavily on American military power. Colley is therefore right to argue that talk of a “post-American Middle East” exaggerates the capacity of China or Russia to replace the functions historically performed by the United States (Colley, 2023). China may be the most important rising stakeholder in the region, but it is not yet the state that defines, secures, and manages the regional order.",[10,35,36],{},"In conclusion, China has become an increasingly important actor in the Middle East, but it has not rivalled the United States as the leading external power. Its rise has been most visible in trade, energy, infrastructure, and diplomatic outreach, yet these forms of influence have not translated into the strategic and security leadership that defines regional primacy. The United States remains the principal external power because it continues to provide the region’s core security framework, backed by military reach, alliance depth, and the willingness to bear the burdens of order-building. China, by contrast, has preferred partnerships over alliances, access over entanglement, and economic gain over strategic responsibility. China’s rise in the Middle East has therefore been significant but structurally incomplete: it has expanded within a regional order still fundamentally secured by the United States.",[38,39,41],"h2",{"id":40},"references","References",[43,44,45,49,52,55,58,61,64],"ul",{},[46,47,48],"li",{},"Alterman, J.B. (2019) ‘Chinese and Russian influence in the Middle East’, Middle East Policy, 26(2), pp. 129-136",[46,50,51],{},"Colley, C.K. (2023) ‘A post-American Middle East? US realities vs. Chinese and Russian alternatives’, Middle East Policy, 30(1), pp. 62-82.",[46,53,54],{},"Dannreuther, R. (2024) ‘Russia, China, and the Middle East’, in Fawcett, L. (ed.) International Relations of the Middle East. 6th edn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.",[46,56,57],{},"Fulton, J. (2019) China’s Changing Role in the Middle East. Washington, DC: Atlantic Council.",[46,59,60],{},"Ghiselli, A. (2023) ‘An opportunistic Russia in the Middle East, a view from China’, Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 26(1), pp. 163-181.",[46,62,63],{},"Karakır, İ.A. (2022) ‘China’s conflict management in the Middle East: Involvement without impact?’, Contemporary Review of the Middle East, 9(2), pp. 240-257.",[46,65,66],{},"Lons, C., Fulton, J., Sun, D. and Al-Tamimi, N. (2019) China’s Great Game in the Middle East. London: European Council on Foreign Relations.",{"title":68,"searchDepth":69,"depth":69,"links":70},"",2,[71],{"id":40,"depth":69,"text":41},"2026-11-04","Why China’s economic rise in the Middle East has not translated into the security leadership that still makes the United States the region’s leading external power.",false,"md",true,"Essay",{},null,"\u002Fwriting\u002Fchina-united-states-middle-east",{"title":5,"description":73},"writing\u002Fchina-united-states-middle-east",[84,85,86,87],"middle-east","china","united-states","security","1H-_i6xH2L50mdjGA6xfB6FbdR4oA0afzrHHlp8maxk",1793833784471]