Iran as a Strategic Variable, Not an Independent Actor
Esmaeil Boshri, a former researcher at Iran's Strategic Research Center, argues that Iran has never truly operated as an autonomous power in global affairs. "Even before the revolution, Iran was largely shaped by major-power dynamics," he noted. Today, he contends, Washington's pressure campaign on Tehran — encompassing nuclear, missile, and regional influence files — is best understood as preparation for the main contest: containing China. Trump, according to Boshri, wants to resolve the Iran file quickly — whether through a coerced agreement or limited military pressure — to free up political and diplomatic bandwidth for the final two years of his presidency (2027–2028), which he intends to dedicate to confronting Beijing.
China Will Not Go to War for Cheap Iranian Oil
Both analysts agree that Beijing will not intervene militarily to defend Iran — under any scenario. Boshri is categorical: "China buys discounted Iranian oil precisely because sanctions limit Tehran's options. But China has alternative suppliers — Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar — and will simply pay slightly more rather than risk a military confrontation with the United States." The economics of cheap oil, he stressed, cannot justify the geopolitical costs of a war with America.
China's absence from a recent trilateral naval exercise between Iran and Russia was, for both experts, a revealing signal. While Russia — anxious to use the Iran card as leverage in the Ukraine settlement — sent a helicopter carrier, Beijing declined to participate. Hamed Vafaei, Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Tehran, explains this as a deliberate strategic posture: "China does not want the Iran file to become a second front that disperses its diplomatic, military, and economic resources. It is saving its energy for the direct confrontation with Washington that it anticipates in 2027–2028, primarily over Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific."
Will Tehran Become a Second Caracas?
The question looming over both interviews is whether Iran's fate mirrors Venezuela's — a country that once served as a major oil source for China but was ultimately sacrificed in Washington's geopolitical maneuvers. Vafaei resists the term "sold out" but is clear that China's priority is preserving its own strategic resources for the Indo-Pacific theatre. "Beijing does not want Iran to become a second front," he said. "It prefers tactical silence." Notably, Chinese media frames the Iran-U.S. tension not as a bilateral dispute but as part of the larger U.S.-China structural rivalry — treating Iran as a variable in that equation, not a protagonist.
Arms Transfers and Symbolic Signals
Reports of Chinese cargo flights delivering missile fuel and discussions around fighter jet and radar system sales to Iran have drawn attention. Both analysts caution against over-interpretation. Military-technical cooperation between the two countries dates back to the Iran-Iraq War, and what appears new may simply be the continuation of longstanding commercial-defense ties under sanctions. Vafaei, however, notes one significant symbolic moment: a Chinese military attaché publicly presented an Iranian Air Force commander with a scale model of China's J-20 stealth fighter — interpreted in Chinese analytical circles as an indirect message to Washington that Beijing is not passive.
Iran's "Look East" Policy Remains Strategically Incoherent
Both analysts are critical of Iran's own strategic positioning. Vafaei argues that Tehran's "Look East" doctrine has never matured beyond a slogan. The 25-year Iran-China cooperation agreement has yielded little tangible progress satisfying either side. More paradoxically, Iran granted India — China's principal strategic rival — operational rights at Chabahar port, just miles from China's port at Gwadar, Pakistan. "Neither East nor West understands Iran's position," Vafaei concluded. Boshri adds that within the SCO and BRICS frameworks, a state without a clear strategic identity risk becoming a playing field for others — or, in the starkest formulation, "scorched earth" in inter-superpower competition.
Trump's Negotiating Posture: Maximum Ask, Minimum War
On the immediate Iran-U.S. track, Boshri believes Trump has opened with a maximalist position — full denuclearization, missile constraints, and regional rollback — precisely to bargain downward toward a face-saving deal. Reports suggesting Trump may accept symbolic uranium enrichment in Iran align with this reading. "Trump wants a deal he can sell domestically ahead of the 2026 midterms," Boshri said. On missiles, however, both analysts agree there is no room for concessions: Iran's ballistic and cruise missile arsenal, demonstrated during the 12-day war, is the core of its deterrence posture. Regional influence, by contrast, may offer some negotiating flexibility.
The Path Forward: Strategic Balance or Scorched Earth
The analysts converge on a single conclusion: Iran's ability to avoid becoming collateral damage in the U.S.-China rivalry depends on decisions that must be made rapidly and with strategic clarity. Vafaei points to China's own Cold War experience — triangulating between the Soviet Union and the United States to transform geopolitical constraint into developmental momentum — as a model. Iran, he argues, has the geographic, economic, and strategic assets to find such a balance. But it requires what Tehran has so far failed to produce: a coherent, precisely defined foreign policy framework that is neither reflexive alignment with the East nor capitulation to the West.
Artwork: Manus AI