Last month, Beijing hosted the deputy foreign ministers of Iran and Russia to discuss the future of Tehran’s nuclear program. Following the summit, the three countries called on the international community to abandon sanctions as a means for pressuring Iran to give up its nuclear weapons ambitions. This approach marked a departure from Beijing’s and Moscow’s approach to the last round of nuclear negotiations with Iran in 2015, when both countries insisted that Tehran first give up its nuclear weapons program before obtaining sanctions relief.
Unfortunately, the growing adversarial alignment between the People’s Republic of China (PRC), Russia, and Iran goes beyond diplomatic posturing. Several days before their discussion of Iran’s nuclear program, the three countries conducted joint naval drills in the Gulf of Oman, a key shipping route where Iran has been suspected of launching attacks on commercial shipping since 2018.
Beijing’s and Moscow’s participation in these drills, which have been held annually since 2019, is an indicator of whose side they are most likely to take in international negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear weapons ambitions.
In other words, when it comes to ensuring that the Iranian regime never obtains a nuclear weapon, the United States cannot trust the PRC or Russia to act in good faith. For that matter, we cannot trust them to help rein in Tehran’s aggressive and destabilizing behavior, either. With negotiations between the U.S. and Iran on the latter’s nuclear program now underway, these dynamics have only grown more important.
For its part, Moscow has provided Tehran with military support for years, such as by selling it advanced S-300 air defense systems and combat trainer aircraft. In late 2023, Iran announced that it would soon be taking delivery of advanced Russian fighter aircraft and attack helicopters.
Beijing’s support for Iran’s military, however, is potentially even more concerning. The PRC was an early supporter of Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs, proliferating key nuclear and missile technology to Tehran beginning in the 1980s. Although Beijing ended official missile and nuclear assistance to Iran in the late 1990s, according to a bipartisan U.S. congressional report the PRC continued allowing its state-owned enterprises and private individuals “to proliferate technology that Iran has used to improve the accuracy, range, and lethality of its ballistic missiles.”
The deadly consequences of this proliferation were demonstrated recently in Russia’s ballistic missile attacks on Ukraine; Tehran has transferred hundreds of short-range ballistic missiles to Moscow to support its brutal and illegal invasion of Ukraine. Beijing’s proliferation of ballistic missile technology has also directly harmed the United States. In 2020, at least one of the ballistic missile systems Iran used to attack the U.S. al-Asad airbase in Iraq was likely developed using ballistic missile technology from the PRC.
Unfortunately, Beijing has stepped up its military support to Tehran in recent months as Iran has increased its aggression in the region, including by attacking Israel with ballistic missiles and accelerating its production of uranium to levels approaching weapons-grade.
In January, two Iranian vessels sanctioned by the United States were loaded in PRC ports with around 1,000 tons of sodium perchlorate, a crucial chemical precursor used to produce solid propellant for missiles. The first of these ships arrived in Iran in February, and the second ship reportedly left the PRC for Iran in March.
If the contents of both ships are delivered to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, they would be enough to fuel 260 mid-range Iranian missiles, including those Tehran used last year in its ballistic missile attacks on Israel.
After news of these shipments broke, my colleague Joe Courtney and I sent a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency John Ratcliffe requesting a classified briefing on the reports and any actions the Trump administration is considering in response. We will receive the briefing this week.
More broadly, it is essential that the intelligence community report to Congress on its assessment of the PRC’s recent and ongoing transfers to Iran of technology, chemical precursors, and other sensitive materiel that may be supporting Tehran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
In the coming months, the international community, including the PRC and Russia, must work together to ensure that Iran never obtains a nuclear weapon.
While the United States must encourage Beijing and Moscow to play a responsible role in negotiations with Tehran, however, we must remain clear-eyed about the deepening alignment between the three autocracies and their proliferation triangle, which is abetting aggression and instability in both Europe and the Middle East.
