The Chinese Foreign Ministry on Wednesday denied a report that Iran used a Chinese-built spy satellite to target American military bases for missile and drone attacks during Operation Epic Fury.
The Financial Times (FT) published the results of an investigation on Wednesday that found Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a designated terrorist organization, was given control of a Chinese spy satellite known as TEE-01B in late 2024.
The FT report is very difficult for China to refute, as it was based on leaked Iranian military documents that clearly showed the IRGC was in control of the satellite, tasking it to maintain surveillance on American military sites in the Middle East, both before and after Iran launched attacks on those locations in March.
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The leaked Iranian documents included “time-stamped coordinate lists, satellite imagery and orbital analysis,” which showed the Chinese satellite spying on the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, the Muwaffaq Salti Air Base in Jordan, and locations near the U.S. Fifth Fleet Naval Base in Bahrain and Erbil airport in Iraq.
The IRGC claimed attacks on all of those locations after the Chinese satellite conducted surveillance upon them, and President Donald Trump confirmed that five U.S. refueling planes at the Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia were damaged by the attack.
The Chinese satellite also allegedly gathered intelligence for Iran on two U.S. airbases in Kuwait, America’s Camp Lemonnier military base in Djibouti, and an airport in Oman.
Surveillance data was also compiled on civilian infrastructure in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain. The IRGC launched constant unprovoked attacks against infrastructure targets in neighboring states throughout Operation Epic Fury, and even after the current ceasefire was declared.
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FT noted that the satellite was constructed and launched by a Chinese company called Earth Eye that specializes in selling control of its satellites to foreign customers after China launches them into orbit.
“Earth Eye Co says on its website that it has carried out one ‘in-orbit’ transfer to an unnamed country that was part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Iran joined Belt and Road in 2021,” the report noted.
The unidentified buyer on Earth Eye’s website supposedly intended to use the Chinese satellite for “agriculture, ocean monitoring, emergency management, natural resource supervision, and municipal transportation.”
FT said the deal included “access to commercial ground stations operated by Emposat, a Beijing-based provider of satellite control and data services with a global network spanning Asia, Latin America and other regions.”
Whoever the original buyer might have been, leaked Iranian documents showed the IRGC Aerospace Force paid about $36 million to take control of the satellite in September 2024, an amount paid in China’s renminbi currency. The documents were signed by an IRGC Aerospace Force general.
Former CIA analyst Jim Lamson told FT the deal was attractive to the IRGC because Iran’s own satellite ground stations “can be hit very easily by missiles from a thousand miles away,” but the U.S. and Israel would be very reluctant to attack a Chinese ground station.
Iran is known to have cooperated with Russia on satellite launches, but the discovery of a secret deal to use Chinese satellites for attacks against American targets will be deeply embarrassing for China, which constantly postures as a responsible and benevolent member of the international community.
FT noted that Beijing is still reeling from the discovery that a company linked to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China was helping Iran’s Houthi proxies in Yemen conduct terrorist attacks against international shipping in the Red Sea.
China made no immediate attempt to refute the details of the FT story, instead posting a blustery statement that vaguely denied the investigative report without challenging the facts it presented.
“Recently, some forces have been keen on fabricating rumors and maliciously associating them to China. China firmly opposes this kind of practice driven by ulterior motives,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry sputtered in a statement to Reuters on Wednesday.
Reuters was unable to obtain a comment from the White House, CIA, or Pentagon on the report, so the wheels of international diplomacy may be slowly turning in the background of the story – although a White House spokesperson reminded FT that President Donald Trump has threatened consequences for China if it supplies Iran with weapons.
Trump told reporters on Saturday that if China attempts to provide Iran with more sophisticated air defense systems, “China is gonna have big problems.”
On Sunday, Trump clarified that he was prepared to impose a 50-percent punitive tariff on China, if it supplies Iran with advanced shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles.
“I doubt they would do that,” Trump said, “but if we catch them doing that, they get a 50% tariff, which is a staggering amount.”
Another awkward detail for China is that the accuracy of Iran’s missile attacks increased significantly in the later weeks of Operation Epic Fury, to the puzzlement of observers at the time. If that improvement is directly attributable to Iran using Chinese satellite technology, tensions between the U.S. and China could increase significantly – and the Gulf Arab states Iran has been attacking may have some hard questions for Beijing as well.
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