INITIAL expectation by this column of China’s reaction to the sudden attacks by the United States and Israel on Iran was one of condemnation.
Graphics and narratives filled social media of the ravaging of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and the near-decimation of the country’s top leadership, all seven of them, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Al Khamenei and several immediate members of his family.
Coming as it did just a month after the shameless surprise Donald Trump abduction of Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro, the Iran attacks definitely betrayed a pattern of the US effort to control world oil.
In fact, Trump’s assertion once Maduro was secure in his hands was full authority over Venezuela’s oil.
Venezuela reputedly has the world’s largest oil reserves; Iran is third, next to Saudi Arabia, which is second.
Spontaneous social media accounts on the US atrocities in Iran sat well with this writer, whose stand in the geopolitical divide has always been on China.
But comes this account recalling a press briefing by the Chinese foreign ministry two days after Feb. 28, 2026 — when the US and Israel “rained ruin” on Iran.
The Chinese officials conducting the event acted as if the US-Israeli attacks had not taken place at all. According to the report, only when an Iranian journalist called attention to the matter that the foreign ministry spokesman Mao Ning “reluctantly condemned the US-Israeli assault,” summing up such condemnation in the phrase, “Might is not right.”
The report said that Mao Ning was taking care that the US and Israel were not named as the aggressors of Iran, which was, again said the report, protocol in diplomacy.
In the realm of propaganda, the US would certainly gain big in its world competition with China had the Chinese foreign ministry press briefing been an out-and-out damning of the US.
China-US relations are not at such a bad stage. Perceptions are that the more urgent concern between the two countries is the issue of Taiwan. It is said that China intends to dissuade the US from proceeding with negotiations for its arms supply to Taiwan. This is the main agenda of a reported Trump visit to Beijing next month. Evidently, there is a tit-for-tat situation between China and the US heavily hinging on how the Chinese stand on the Iran conflict would go. It cannot be strong condemnation already. Moreover, China reportedly expects the hostilities to last for four months at the most. No room for any long-term animosity.
Notice how China has kept its cool in this regard, advising a ceasefire and resorting to diplomacy.
From the standpoint of one analyst, such a posture is dictated by the realities of China’s stakes in the Gulf. The region is the largest supplier of China’s oil imports, totaling 5.4 billion barrels per day as of latest 2026 count. But while Iran supplies 1.4 million barrels per day of this figure, 1.5-1.8 million barrels per day is supplied by Saudi Arabia, a strong ally of the US. In 1974, the US concluded a deal with Saudi Arabia providing that exports of Saudi oil would be paid for in US dollars; all the other members of the Organization of Oil Exporting Countries followed suit.
Thus was born the petro dollar, until now the lifeline of the US economy.
In the case of China now, as a consequence of the Iran conflict, transit of oil through the Strait of Hormuz, as per Iran’s mandate, must be paid for in Chinese yuan.
Not only does China maintain its virtual monopoly of Middle East oil but has now begun effecting effective downturn of the US economy.
Such are the real stakes in the Iran conflict: the sustenance of Chinese economic dominance over the US.
Total war would bring about a thorough disturbance of this status quo.
Why would China allow such disturbance?
The status quo is heavily in China’s favor.
It has been written that China is working together with Pakistan to effect a peaceful solution to the Iran conflict.
That is why Trump keeps parroting that Iran is asking for negotiations, but those peace overtures coming as they do from China and Pakistan, Iran has been consistently denying them.
In any case, that’s how highly secretive diplomacy works.
China perseveres in reaching a peaceful settlement of the Iran conflict even as Iran itself forges on in the war path.
Viewed from their respective perspectives, both moves are correct. What Iran continues to unleash are acts of self-defense.
China’s own national concern for ending the Iran war soonest is bolstered even more by its being a permanent member of the Security Council of the United Nations, together with the US in fact, Russia, the United Kingdom and France.
So, in the outbreak of hostilities between Iran and China’s co-Security Council member United States, all the more must China act with utmost circumspection.
In my previous columns, I have been very vocal about China pursuing the war in Iran to the finish of the US. The Philippines hosts nine US military bases by virtue of the 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA). The agreement is a blatant circumvention of the Philippine constitutional ban on foreign military bases. Those sites — awarded to America gratis et amore — are now reputed to be equipped with the ultra-modern Typhon medium-range missile launch system capable of hitting China with nuclear warheads from all sides, whether from Northern Luzon or from the West Philippine Sea.
Certainly, in this instance, China will have to reverse itself, and this time around proclaim, “Might is right.”
Pity the Philippines in that event.
Suffering punishment not of its own making.
That is why it has been a private hope of this column for a total defeat of the US in Iran. That would prevent the spread of the conflict to the Asia-Pacific.
Otherwise, God forbid, China would certainly be unleashing its full military might against the EDCA sites scattered all over the archipelago.
This is reality.
No fond memories.
Not a bit of nostalgia.
War protagonists go by their respective native instincts.
Asian Century Philippines Strategic Studies Institute president Herman Tiu Laurel quite coolly worded it in an interview with The Manila Times, “Too late in the day.”
The fellow was referring to the proposed resumption of joint oil exploration by China and the Philippines in the South China Sea.
If because of the continuing spat over Taiwan, America ultimately chooses to come to grips with China, it will find out to its horror that its opponent has been well-equipped.
For hosting the American EDCA bases, the Philippines immediately becomes Chinese targets — for whatever is in store from China’s deep nuclear arsenal.
