In the recent Iran-Israel war, Russia, despite its strategic relations with Tehran, limited itself to general condemnations, a mild tone, and a lack of tangible or public actions. This cautious behavior reflects Russia’s absolute priority on the Ukraine war, concerns about damaging relations with the West and Israel, economic benefits from rising oil prices, and Moscow’s doubts about Iran crossing the nuclear threshold. Russia preferred to play the role of a non-committed mediator and did not pay any price for Iran.
After the conflict began, Russia announced its readiness to mediate between Iran, Israel, and the U.S. However, even in this position, a certain diplomatic coldness and non-commitment were evident, as Russian officials explicitly stated they had no intention of imposing any solution and merely offered their proposal to resolve the crisis, leaving the final decision to the political leaders of the involved parties.
Accordingly, Russia’s reaction sparked responses within Iranian society. It was expected that Vladimir Putin and Kremlin officials would take a more aggressive stance, adopt a more threatening tone, and at least tangibly support Iran by providing military aid or advanced weapons.
For many years, Iran’s conservatives and ‘deep state’ have framed relations with Russia as strategic under the ‘Look to the East’ policy.
While reformist factions in Iran are generally critical of relations with Russia and emphasize a “Look to the West” policy over a “Look to the East” policy, even moderate conservatives criticized Moscow’s approach to the 12-day Iran-Israel war.
Meanwhile, radical factions within the conservative camp continue to emphasize expanding relations with Russia even after this war.
The Failure of the ‘Axis’ Idea
When Russia sought help from China, North Korea, and Iran for its war against Ukraine, some American and British officials spoke of the formation of the “Axis of Upheaval.” The reality of this conflict was that Russia and China did not intervene to save Iran, precisely revealing the limitations of the “axis” idea.
This concept was particularly reinforced by joint military exercises among the three countries in the Sea of Oman and in Latin American waters (Venezuela), as well as Iran’s membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and BRICS. Although Russia finds Iran’s cooperation useful in its anti-American policies, its alignment with Iran is limited to where its own interests are pursued. Russia’s view of Iran cannot even be interpreted as Moscow assigning Iran a special place in the emerging global order.
However, in reality, increased interaction between Russia (and China) and Iran does not necessarily mean the emergence or even the likelihood of trilateral coordination.
Iran’s ‘Look to the East’ Policy
For many years, Iran has pursued relations with Russia under its “Look to the East” policy. Its roots can be traced to the nature of Iran’s 1979 Revolution—a revolution that, with its anti-American and anti-imperialist slogans, challenged the Western liberal order and sought to replace it with a non-liberal one.
Iran’s 1979 Revolution brought a fundamental change in foreign policy and its view of the international system by altering the nature of the previous regime and emphasizing political Islam. The revolutionary government, with the slogan “Neither East nor West,” saw the international order as a product of liberalism and not only rejected multilateral mechanisms like international organizations but also emphasized ideological components in bilateral relations. Accordingly, Fred Halliday argues that the Islamic Revolution of Iran had even more transnational ideals than the revolutions of Russia and France, and thus, its ideological goals of challenging the global order held special priority in the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Despite the “Neither East nor West” slogan, geopolitical interests must also be considered in Iran’s interactions with Eastern and Western powers. These interests led the revolutionary regime not to view relations with the Soviet Union as equivalent to relations with the U.S. Although America was called the “Great Satan,” the Soviet Union, initially labeled the “Lesser Satan,” gradually came to be seen as a friend. Iran finally decided to improve its relations with the “lesser evil” by signing a comprehensive economic protocol with Moscow in 1989.
For Iran, the “Look to the East” policy means relying on the two powers of Russia and China to counter the West and America. This policy also empowers conservatives in Iran, allowing them to count on the support of these two countries in crises.
On one hand, Iran believes the future of the international system lies with countries like China and Russia. On the other hand, it knows that Western countries and the U.S. have fundamental issues with the ideology of the Islamic Republic and its behavior in foreign policy, leading to a consistent policy of containment against Iran. Accordingly, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei emphasizes an ideological foreign policy centered on confronting America and leaning towards the East.
One reason for Iranian conservatives’ opposition to relations with the West, particularly the U.S., is the cultural impact of such relations on Iranian society, which subsequently undermines their revolutionary slogans, leading to the delegitimization and loss of credibility of their revolutionary and ideological principles among the Iranian public. Thus, regarding Iran’s foreign policy toward Russia, Iran’s “deep state” must be considered a key variable.
Over 45 years, the deep state of security organizations has determined the ‘big game’ of Iran’s foreign policy to the detriment of successive presidential administrations. These are permitted to engage in a “small game” of foreign policy maneuvers, provided that they do not disrupt the overall power structure.
Since national economic development is not a priority for Iran’s leadership, and a significant portion of its energy is spent on domestic and national security, even a complete political and economic shift away from the West would not endanger Iran’s state industries and would have no impact on the private sector, which has already been marginalized and faces shrinking consumer markets. In reality, Western companies and banks have also written off Iran as a potential market due to U.S. and European sanctions.
Although relations with Russia expanded unprecedentedly in the military sphere after the invasion of Ukraine, other motivations existed for consolidating Tehran’s ties with Moscow: Tehran’s need for intelligence on Israeli and American operations against Iran, and the desire to leverage Moscow’s potential political and intelligence support during the transition to Iran’s third leader.
Through the “Look to the East” policy, Iran seeks powerful partners in the international system to escape Western pressure and meet economic needs on one hand and to ideologically counter Western liberalism on the other. This will severely limit Iran’s foreign policy maneuverability in the coming years, tying it closely to relations with China and Russia, while increasing these two countries’ influence in Iran’s domestic and foreign affairs.
The “Look to the East” policy intensified particularly during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency. During this period, the policy took on a more ideological rather than geopolitical dimension. Under Hassan Rouhani, although foreign policy focused on resolving issues, particularly the nuclear issue, with the West, groundwork was laid for signing a long-term cooperation agreement with China. Despite this, the foreign policy approach was oriented toward détente with the West. However, Mohammad Javad Zarif, former foreign minister of Iran, made remarks about Russian obstruction in the nuclear negotiations leading to the JCPOA that drew sharp criticism from Ayatollah Khamenei.
In an interview that was not meant to be public but was leaked, Zarif said that while the U.S. had agreed to Iran’s indigenous enrichment during the JCPOA negotiations, Moscow refused to accept this. Notably, after Israel’s attack on Iran and Iran’s renewed emphasis on its right to indigenous enrichment, Moscow announced that Russia was ready to supply Iran with enriched uranium, implying that Iran does not need indigenous enrichment.
Under Ebrahim Raisi, the policy was pursued more aggressively, with its ideological dimension intensified to the point where America was not even considered a potential country in Raisi’s government’s foreign relations: the government’s public document on foreign relations did not mention the United States at all.
During Raisi’s presidency, the “Look to the East” policy was framed as a strategic response to the power transition in the world and the idea that the West is declining while the East is rising. The conservative faction to which Raisi belongs aligns Iran with emerging Eastern powers, elevating the “Look to the East” from a tactical maneuver to a strategic choice. Deep distrust and pessimism toward the West, exacerbated by the failure of the nuclear deal, reinforce this focus toward the East. While Raisi’s “Look to the East” resembles aspects of Ahmadinejad’s policy, its foundation differs in its geopolitical rather than ideological understanding. Under Raisi, the policy has a more pragmatic and equally anti-Western orientation.
During this period, extensive propaganda promoted relations with China and Russia, while Iran’s hardliners, by supporting Russia in the Ukraine war, contributed to the collapse of nuclear negotiations. In fact, Moscow helped prevent a restoration of the JCPOA during negotiations in 2022 that were interrupted by the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine. At the time, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov raised new demands, insisting that any U.S. sanctions against Russia over Ukraine not affect Russia-Iran economic relations and investment stipulated in the JCPOA. Even Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, after Lavrov’s statement that Russia’s interests must be considered in nuclear talks with Iran, declared that Russia’s interests should be taken into account.
Iran and Russia found alignment in their foreign policies with the onset of Syria’s civil war in 2011, supporting Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Simultaneously, Tehran intensified efforts to procure equipment like Su-35 fighter jets and S-400 air defense systems to prepare for scenarios similar to Israel’s June attacks. In return, Iran provided Moscow with some of its military technology, licensing the production of Shahed suicide drones, which have now become a staple in Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The Ukraine war entangled Russia, affecting its Middle East policy to the extent that it could not effectively support Assad’s government, which ultimately fell. Consequently, most of Iran’s arms requests also went unanswered.
One reason for this was Russia’s increased domestic demand for weapons due to the Ukraine war and its ability to independently produce equipment like drones, which it had previously sourced from Iran.
After the outbreak of the Ukraine war, Iran’s efforts to draw closer to Russia were also driven by the Iranian leadership’s interpretation of the global order. Accordingly, aligning with Russia and China was assessed as being in Iran’s national interest within this order.
Critics of this interpretation, however, see this approach as highly dangerous and contrary to Iran’s national interests, arguing that since the current international system is not like the Cold War, Iran’s alignment with Russia and China does not serve its interests and is perilous.
In reality, the evolving Iran-Russia partnership has largely been shaped by systemic pressures, particularly tensions with the West, which have driven the two toward greater military, economic, and political interdependence. Differing revisionist agendas, distinct threat perceptions, economic constraints, and third-party considerations prevent this partnership from becoming a full-fledged, comprehensive alliance.
China, Iran, Russia, and North Korea are far from being an alliance or bloc like the West; they share a convergence of grievances against the West, but have very different ideas about how to reshape global rules to address them.
The core issue is that while Iran and Russia share anti-American views, Iran’s perspective is rooted in Shiite ideology, whereas Russia has a secular view of the international system. In fact, before the Ukraine war, Moscow did not have irreconcilable relations with the West. Moreover, Russia’s international and regional policies, as a major power, differ fundamentally from Iran’s relations with global and regional powers.
Due to sanctions, Iran has become an isolated island in the global system, whereas Russia has not faced the same situation. Only after the annexation of Crimea and the Ukraine war has Russia faced severe sanctions, and there is a possibility it may reintegrate into the international system after the war ends—albeit weakened.
On the other hand, it must be noted that some criticisms of Iran’s relations with Russia and China—both at the societal level and among political and military officials—stem from hardliners’ misinterpretations and exaggerations of these relations, intended as a response to engagement with the West. The aim is to portray relations with the West as not only fruitless for Iran but also as part of a Western desire to destroy the Islamic Republic due to its ideological incompatibility.
No Mutual Defense Clause in Iran-Russia Agreement
Despite Iranian conservatives and hardliners’ exaggerations about the strategic nature of Iran-Russia relations, the long-term agreement between Iran and Russia contains no clause on mutual defense. Russia, aware of regional developments, refused to include a mutual defense clause in its long-term cooperation agreement with Iran to avoid being dragged into Iran’s regional wars. Of course, Russian President Putin has stated that Iran never made such a request to Moscow: he stated after the Iran-Israel war that he had previously offered cooperation on helping Iran’s air defense, but Tehran showed no interest. “We once offered our Iranian friends cooperation in the field of air defense systems, but our partners at the time did not show much interest… Our proposal was to create a complete system, not piecemeal deliveries—a system. In the end, we only discussed it once, but the Iranian side did not show much enthusiasm, and the matter was dropped. But regarding individual deliveries, yes, of course, we have made such deliveries in the past.”
This is despite Russia refusing to deliver S-400 systems and Su-35s to Iran. Hossein Mousavian, Iran’s former ambassador to Germany, notes: Russia has offered India 117 Su-35Ms and joint production of Su-57s with full technology transfer, even though India is a U.S. ally. No one criticizes Moscow because it prioritizes its strategic interests. Thus, if Turkey (a NATO member) or Saudi Arabia (a U.S. ally) requests Su-35s, Su-57s, or S-400s, Moscow will agree.
Balance in Moscow’s Middle East Policy
Russia’s Middle East interests somewhat differ from Iran’s. Accordingly, Moscow has always set clear limits on its support for the Islamic Republic, hesitating to provide the advanced weapons and defense systems Tehran requests—well aware of the red lines in military cooperation with Iran, especially as it seeks to maintain strategic relations with Gulf states. These countries, despite some improvement in ties with Iran, still view Tehran as a serious threat to regional security.
On the other hand, Moscow strives to preserve its relations with Israel—ties that, though occasionally strained, hold special importance for the Kremlin due to historical ties and the roots of many Israeli Jews who migrated from the former Soviet Union to the Palestinian territories.
Around 2 million Russian-speaking Jews live in Israel, whose interests Russia must consider. Additionally, Russian President Vladimir Putin has warm personal relations with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Alongside all these factors, Russia has consistently sought coordination with OPEC to manage and stabilize oil prices, compelling it to exercise caution in supporting Iran to avoid provoking other key Middle Eastern players. Strategically, another point is that while Moscow and Tehran align in opposing the West and resisting U.S. influence, Russia has never been eager for Iran to cross the nuclear threshold or obtain atomic weapons.
Overall, despite criticism of Russia’s response to the 12-day war, due to the imbalance in Iran’s foreign relations, Russia remains Tehran’s primary foreign partner. Part of this stems from the deep state’s approach to relations with Russia, which serves its interests.
