The article goes over the massive trade deals that China has between Saudi Arabia and parts of the middle east. The article mentions that China is Saudi Arabia’s largest trading partner, with trade between the two countries reaching $87.3bn. Saudi Arabia is going to host a China-Arab summit, which will be attended by Xi Jinping and Mohamad Bin Salman, President and Deputy Crown Prince of their respective nations. The article lists the potential trade deals as oil, refineries for said oil, financial, power, and military/security trade. Saudi Arabian Aramco has annual contracts with Chinese refineries and has recently invested $10bn into its own refinery in China, the company’s largest overall investment.
US and China relations have been anything but stellar throughout the late 20th to 21st centuries. US and Saudi relations have been nothing friendly but almost purely economical. The US was interested in the middle east almost solely for its oil production. Now the tables have turned with China becoming more interested in having control in the Middle east while the US has slowly begun to withdraw from the middle east. That brings to question the stability of US and Saudi relations, which have never been stellar to begin with, but it was a productive relationship. It seems clear that Saudi prefers China’s trade offers over the US because their own state run oil companies largest investment is based in China. More strategically concerning, however, is the arms trade between the two countries. Most notably, Saudi Arabia’s biggest weapons trade partner is the US. However, this new deal may indicate a shift in the scales more towards China. Saudi Arabia is specifically importing some new generation fighter jets from China, possibly in contestion with American fighters. Because China is reaching further into the middle east, they have the potential to become even more powerful.
To tie to class, the power distribution of the world is slowly becoming multipolar. I would say it’s safe to assume that, at first, it will be bipolar considering China is catching up to the US, however, there are many other countries that have potential to become a world power. I would think the US would be concerned about a multipolar system, considering all multipolar systems eventually annihilate into single or bipolar systems. Defensive realist theory would suggest that the US would be increasing it’s defensive capabilities in an attempt to intimidate China, however, they haven’t done anything aggressive enough to warrant that, nor are they based in the same region. However, their reaching for Taiwan may change that.