Does China really benefit? They import a fuckton of oil/gas through the strait of Hormuz, so they'll face an energy crisis just like the rest of us. Is that worth a drawdown on US munitions and damage to the US's reputation? The former is temporary and the latter is frankly common under Trump. China's main concern is, or at least ought to be, getting their economy ahead of their population crisis (which is key to maintaining their claim to legitimacy).

They'll benefit from the boom in renewables that an oil crisis usually causes (generalising from a dataset of one), maybe that's the assumption?