Global Power
The end of the Cold war was a watershed moment for the geopolitical balance of power. For the first in centuries, a single power the United State of America has been powerful enough to exert its influence everywhere in the World. Following the demise of the soviet Union there was no other country capable of rivaling American power. Despite this state like Russia, China and Iran have always opposed America’s growing influence in their respective regions.
As the history speaks about the strategic blunder in Iraq and Afghanistan and failed to exercise a stabilizing influence in war-torn countries like Syria and Libya and therefore it suffered a significant reputational blow.
Countries like Russia,China, and Iran which opposed America`s unipolarity, started becoming more vocal in their criticism of the post-cold war international order. Russia, China and Iran deepen their relations in the past few decades and become a fully fledged alliance akin to NATO or if their cooperation is situational.
we exam the historical relations between these countries in order to understand the historical context. The Russian Empire was among the power exploiting the Imperial China’s decline in the 19th and 20th centuries. The Soviet Union supported Mao in the Chinese civil war and following the communist victory, countries enjoyed a short period of close friendship, however after the Khrushchev’s secret speech the Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated.
After the collapse of Soviet Union relations between the Russia and china have been steadily improving, as their interests have aligned in many spheres.
Russia and Iran have historically been rivals in the South Caucasus and the Caspian sea region however as Iran suffered from internal instability and turmoil, it could not contest the Soviet dominance in the region.
In the aftermath of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Khomeini had no intention of being involved in the cold war, despite the open animosity towards the United States, He saw the Soviet Union as the as a secondary threat but the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Gradual Anti-western turn of Russia brought these two countries closer.
Due to Geographical distance, Iran and China did not have particularly notable ties throughout history and similar to the Sino-Russian and Russo-Iranian relations strengthened in the 21st century.
In 1997, at the time when Russia was gradually abandoning its nascent pro-western course and was growing unhappy with the NATO expansion into its former Eastern European satellites .
These countries signed a joint Declaration on a Multipolar world and the establishment of a new international order. In 2001 Russia and China signed the treaty of Good Neighborliness and friendly cooperation underscoring a strategic partnership between them on a broad array of topics such as economic and trade relations, cooperation in the technology sphere and most importantly the treaty implied military cooperation and conduct of discussions in the case of a threat against one of the state.
Around the same time Russia and China created the Shanghai cooperation organization with central Asian countries.
At its inception, this organization was focused on security-related issues such as context-terrorism, fighting separatism, extremism and drug trafficking.
In 2009, Russia and China signed a deal to build the Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean Oil pipeline which started transporting oil to china in 2011. Furthermore, in 2014 sides signed a 30 years gas deal worth 400 billion dollar, which envisaged the construction of the power of Siberia pipeline .
Russia in 2014 after the unrecognized annexation of Crimea and in 2022 after the full-fledged and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, Russia has tried to avoid using dollars in their trade and in addition the Russia`s removal from SWIFT in 2022 accelerated the space of this endeavour, as Russia and China agreed to trade for Russian gas supplies in Ruble and Yuan.
In 2015 Russia started selling its SU-35 fighters and S-400 defence system to china.
By 2021 Russia,China and Iran had carried out three joint naval military exercises in the Indian Ocean and the gulf of Oman. Russo-Iranian military cooperation took off after the Russian Invasion of Ukraine the Kremlin turned towards Iran to Negotiate weapons supply. Since September 2022, Iran has supplied thousands of Shahed and Mohajer drones to Russia, which have been used in Mass strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure and internal reports have been telling that Iran has been able to get SU-35 fighter aircraft.
The Sino-Iranian relations have also developed in the past few decades. In 2011, it was reported that China purchased exclusive rights to several oil and gas fields in Iran. China`s economic cooperation with Iran only increased following the signing of the Iran nuclear deal in 2015.
In 2021 countries signed the 25-year strategic partnerships treaty. China has identified Iran as an alternative route for the Belt and Road project connecting China and Europe and China have been investing million of dollars in Iran`s infrastructure by funding the construction of Tehran`s Subway systems, dams and factories, while also playing a significant role in extracting Iranian coal,zinc and copper through modernized technology, thus the trade turnover between China and Iran exceeded to 20 billion dollars.
The Question here is that what is bringing them together?
First of all, these are three authoritarian states which share opposition to Western ideas of expansion of democracy and human rights trumping state sovereignty. Russia, China and Iran routinely condemned protests and opposition movements happening in their countries and in regions influenced by them as American and western meddling in internal affairs, as their attempt to instill an alien set of values.
Regimes ruling over these three countries are convinced that the ultimate goal of the USA is to overthrowing there regimes and install a friendly democratic governments
Russia sees a colour revolutions in countries like Georgia and Ukraine as coups organized by the west and its meddling in Russia`s traditional sphere of influence. Iran`s leader Ayatollah Khomeini has accused the US and the west of inciting unrest in Iran in connection with the ongoing protest movement in the country.
China has made similar remarks concerning protest in Hong Kong. They have used similar rhetoric against internal opposition and independent media and support each other internationally.
For instance China and Russia resisted the American attempts to discuss the suppression of protests in Iran in 2018 in the UN security Council. China’s justification of this position informs the theses around which all three countries are aligned globally.
In the current situation when Israeli and west have been involved in genocidal Palestine conflicts Countries like Iran, China, Russia and North Korea have been condemning the west on their negative role in the uprising tension in the Region and blame that the west is completely responsible of the chaos in the Middle East the past and in present. All these countries have warned the Western powers to stop this bloodbath game in Palestine which is very crucial for peace and stability , however if not stopped the West will have to pay a very huge price.
