China and America in the Persian Gulf } 561
control Persian Gulf oil in order to be able to coerce the countries depen-
dent on that oil. “Why fight a war,” an article in the MFA’s magazine asked?
It answered: “The reason is very simple. The Gulf oil-producing countries
export 90 percent of the crude oil they produce mainly to the United States,
Western Europe, and Japan.”^8 The US aim was “nothing but to establish a
new post-Cold-War world order,” a kind of new imperialism. Another author,
writing in the same issue of the MFA journal, elaborated on this conclu-
sion: Iraq’s occupation of Kuwait “presented ... a favorable opportunity for
the realization of a global strategy by the United States. The vast petroleum
resources of the Gulf are of important strategic significance. Who controls
the oil resources of this region controls the lifeblood of the world.” The Soviet
Union’s decision to abandon its earlier policy of contending with the United
States for control of the Middle East had given Washington an opportunity to
use Iraq’s move against Kuwait as an “opportunity to hit at Iraq.” By control-
ling Persian Gulf oil and oil transport lines, the United States could “keep a
tight rein on ... rapidly rising allies like Germany and Japan.”^9 Though it was
left unstated, China would similarly be on the tight rein.
In Beijing’s view, the 1991 Gulf war was a struggle between global and
regional hegemony—US and Iraqi respectively.^10 Both countries sought to con-
trol the oil of Kuwait in order to further their hegemonistic schemes. Iraq, like
the United States, was motivated by hegemonic desires, Beijing concluded. Its
motives were no purer than those of the United States. The overall situation
regarding the Gulf confrontation, according to a document produced by the
State Council and the General Office of the Central Committee in January
1991, was a struggle between global hegemony (the United States) and regional
hegemony (Iraq). The old world order had been destroyed, but a new order had
not yet been established. This confrontation was over that future order. The US
objective was “first to teach Saddam Hussein a lesson and then to dominate
t he world.”^11
Left unstated in Chinese analyses, but clearly discernable between the
lines, was the proposition that the success of US schemes to control Gulf oil
would render China more vulnerable to US pressure. China in 1991 was not
yet a net oil importer, but the trend lines were clear; China’s continued devel-
opment would require it to import ever more oil. The United States could
keep China as well as Europe and Japan “under its thumb” if it controlled
the Gulf ’s oil. The imperative of escaping its post-6-4 isolation led China to
cooperate with the United States on the Gulf Crisis. But Beijing saw US moves
as deeply threatening to China’s global position, although it could not say this
d i rec t ly.
In the conflict between what Beijing viewed as regional and global hege-
monism, China’s interests would not be injured by Iraqi control of Kuwaiti
oil. PRC relations with both Iraq and Kuwait had been cordial. Kuwait had
been generous to China, being the only Third World country to provide