Bashar al-Assad’s stunning fall from power has deprived China of a valued partner in the Middle East, exposing the limits of its broader strategy to damage the United States’ regional standing via cooperation with Russia, Iran, and their clients.
China maintained warm relations with the Assad regime, having heavily invested in the country’s energy and telecommunications sector while declining to criticize the pervasive atrocities that were integral to Assad’s suppression of both peaceful protest and armed insurgency.
China Welcomed Assad, Signed ‘Strategic Partnership’ Last Year
Assad’s visit to China in September 2023 — following Syria’s reinstatement in the Arab League in May of that year — marked the end of the regime’s diplomatic isolation within the broader international community. Meeting in Hangzhou, Assad and Chinese President Xi Jinping signed a strategic partnership that Xi described as being “in the interests of friendly cooperation and safeguarding international fairness and justice.” Beijing also pledged financial support for Syria’s reconstruction, which would be delivered under the auspices of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). China earmarked its funds for port infrastructure in both Tartus and Latakia, key Syrian ports with linkages to other BRI projects.
Beijing has long supported the Assad regime at the United Nations, having joined Russia in vetoing multiple Security Council sanctions resolutions condemning the regime’s human rights violations and other offenses.
China Seeks to Position Itself as Regional Diplomatic Broker at the Expense of the U.S.
China’s policy toward Syria is indicative of its broader Middle East strategy of utilizing its economic leverage and anti-Western rhetoric to promote itself at the expense of the United States. During the war in Gaza, Beijing has routinely criticized the U.S. support for Israel at the UN. Meanwhile, it has been working to achieve reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah, a bid to appeal to the international community and upend the traditionally U.S.-dominated peace process.
Rather than deploy military assets or conclude formal alliances, China often depends on its economic leverage to promote its regional goals, a tactic it used to pressure Tehran and Riyadh to embrace a partial rapprochement. Combined, these efforts help China to position itself as an alternative to Washington as a regional mediator while maintaining a light footprint.
U.S. Has an Opportunity to Undermine China’s Regional Aspirations
However, the collapse of the regime has signaled the limits of China’s aspirations for a concert of American adversaries to predominate in the Middle East. More broadly, the events in Syria highlighted the underlying weakness of China’s major global partners, Russia and Iran, both of which had sought to maintain the Assad regime’s hold on power via military interventions that facilitated Assad’s atrocities over the past 13 years.
Pursuing a strategy underpinned by enhanced trade ties and anti-Western rhetoric, Beijing has once more found itself unable to effectively shape events in the region. If it can encourage a peaceful and lasting settlement of the Syrian issue while upholding its commitment to democracy and pluralism, Washington can further undermine China’s cultivated self-image as a key power player within the region.
Jack Burnham is a research analyst in the China Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). For more analysis from Jack and FDD, please subscribeHERE. Follow Jack on X@JackBurnham802. Follow FDD on X@FDD. FDD is a Washington, DC-based, nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.