For China, the easiest and most politically convenient response to the current Middle East crisis lies not in joining the US but blaming it. Beijing’s position of a two-state solution as a precondition to solving the Gaza crisis is unlikely to be realised but achieves the goal of undermining Washington.
Where Beijing sees grey-zone activity and psychological warfare as peaceful means to push unification with Taiwan, for the US, coercion is clearly stipulated in the Taiwan Relations Act as something it opposes and must act against.
China has embarked upon a policy of regional and multilateral engagement with the Afghan Taliban government. But as long as Uygur militants shelter in Afghanistan and the country’s future remains unstable, Beijing will remain cautious.
China assumes the US is ‘hollowing out’ its China policy and will eventually seek to prevent Taiwan unification. Meanwhile, Washington believes Beijing will use force to achieve unification despite preferring a peaceful solution.
Time will tell what the real impact is of Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan. Importantly, Beijing’s military exercises set a precedent to counterbalance Taiwan’s pursuit of foreign support and will be repeated in the years to come.
It is inconceivable that Beijing would have supported a coup; in fact it worked well with democratic icon Aung San Suu Kyi. Now, two factors will haunt China’s calculations as it navigates Myanmar’s political minefields.