TEHRAN - The new doctrine of the United States in containing the People’s Republic of China goes beyond trade confrontation and has entered the phase of a “global energy war”.

This multidimensional strategy rests on three main pillars:

1) Cutting off Europe’s access to cheap Russian energy resources and making it dependent on U.S. LNG

2) Eroding Russia’s war machine through sanctions and attacks on its energy infrastructure

3 (Seeking to control strategic energy resources in Latin America (Venezuela) and the Middle East (Iran) in order to block the vital arteries of China’s economy.

The current conflicts, from Ukraine to the Middle East, are not separate incidents but parts of a larger puzzle aimed at securing U.S. hegemony in the 21st century through dominance over global energy. Iran, as one of China’s key oil suppliers, has been placed at the center of this new battlefield.

 1.  The decline of globalization and the rise of power blocs

The post–Cold War global order, which was based on economic globalization and cooperation, has increasingly given way to intense competition among the great powers. At the center of this rivalry is the confrontation between the United States and China. This clash has evolved from a simple tariff war into a structural decoupling in the technological, financial, and military domains. Data show that China’s trade with the U.S. has fallen from 26% to 13%, bilateral investments have come to a halt, and China has reduced its holdings of U.S. Treasury bonds from $1.4 trillion to about $760 billion.

In response to this pressure, an ‘Eastern Axis’ consisting of China, Russia, and Iran is taking shape, aiming to establish a multipolar order and challenge Western-dominated structures, including the SWIFT system and the supremacy of the dollar, through tools such as the digital yuan. Within this framework, the United States has realized that in order to contain China in the long term, it must target its main lifeline: energy.

2. The European scene: Engineering a continental crisis

The first step in America’s energy war strategy was to separate Europe, especially its industrial powerhouse Germany, from cheap Russian energy resources. The Ukraine war served as a catalyst for this goal. The consequences of this rupture have been devastating for Germany’s economy:

• Production collapse: German steel output has fallen by 12%, and automobile production is two million units lower compared to 2017.

• Unbearable energy prices: The explosion of the Nord Stream pipeline deprived Europe of cheap Russian gas and turned it into a major importer of expensive U.S. LNG.

• New dependency: While Europe was previously dependent on Russia, it is now reliant on the United States for energy and on China for its supply chains.

. America seeks two objectives: first, to weaken Europe’s industrial base to prevent it from becoming an independent competitor aligned with China; and second, to secure full control of the continent as a strategic pawn in its confrontation with the Eastern Axis.

3. The Russian front: War of attrition and energy strangulation

Alongside its control over Europe, the United States launched a full-scale war of attrition against Russia, with both military and economic dimensions. In the energy sphere, the following actions stand out:

• Targeting refinery infrastructure: On October 20, two major refineries, MOL’s Danube Refinery, in Hungary and Petrotel in Romania—that operated with Russian crude oil were exploded. This move recalls the Allies’ strategy in World War II of bombing the Ploiesti oil fields in Romania, which crippled Nazi Germany’s war machine by cutting off its fuel supply.

• Crippling sanctions: The United States and the United Kingdom imposed sweeping sanctions on two of Russia’s oil giants to drain the financial lifelines of Putin’s war machine.

• Strikes deep inside Russian territory: By lifting its opposition to Ukraine’s use of Western weapons for attacks inside Russia (such as Tomahawk missiles), Washington paved the way for damaging nearly one-third of Russia’s refining capacity.

These pressures, in the long run, could transform Russia from a major exporter of refined petroleum products into a potential importer of gasoline and diesel—at which point Iran and the transit routes of the Caucasus (Azerbaijan and Armenia) will become crucial.

4. Strategic pivot to Latin America: The Venezuela strategy

The U.S. strategy faces a major challenge: disrupting the global oil supply to strike at China has drastically driven up prices, causing uncontrollable inflation in the United States. The solution to this dilemma lies in Venezuela.

By gaining control over Venezuela's vast heavy oil resources, the U.S. intends to blend it with its own light oil, thereby managing domestic market prices while controlling (and, when necessary, cutting off) the global oil supply to China. Statements by Gustavo Petro, the President of Colombia, confirm this analysis: "A potential U.S. invasion of Venezuela is not under the pretext of the war on drugs, but to seize its oil."

By taking control of Venezuela's oil, the U.S. can maximize oil pressure on China without worrying about domestic inflation.

5. The final showdown: Iran and control of Middle East energy

Assuming success on the fronts of Europe and Latin America, the final and most crucial piece of the puzzle for the United States is to block the flow of energy from the Middle East to China. In this context, Iran plays a key role. With exports of over 1.5 million barrels of oil per day to China, Iran serves as one of the main economic lifelines for the country.

From this perspective, all U.S. pressure on Iran—including the nuclear negotiations (JCPOA)—no longer have an independent character, but rather serve as tools in the broader energy war against China. The ultimate goal is the complete halt of Iranian oil exports to China. Therefore, any analysis that envisions the possibility of agreement or dialogue with the U.S., without understanding this broader framework, will be incomplete and misleading. The region’s future is pregnant with a full-scale “oil war” for which Iran must be prepared.

6. Conclusion: The outlook ahead

The world stands on the brink of a major realignment shaped by energy fault lines. The United States’ strategy to maintain its hegemony is aggressive and high-risk, encompassing all strategic regions of the globe. While this strategy has achieved short-term successes in asserting control over Europe, it has also led to unprecedented cohesion within the Eastern bloc—namely Russia, China, and Iran.

For Iran, this era presents both a threat and an opportunity: the threat of direct confrontation in the energy war, and the opportunity to become a vital player in a new global order where control over energy resources and routes will be paramount. Iran’s internal developments—such as its insistence on implementing financial transparency requirements (FATF)—should not be seen as alignment with the West, but rather as a necessary step toward integration into the Eastern economic bloc. Ultimately, victory in this struggle will not come through military means alone, but through a deep understanding of historical trends, geopolitics, and political economy.