The only thing worse than going to war is going to war too late.
This is, after all, the fundamental criticism of Chamberlain, and the USA before Pearl Harbour: they were too late to go to war - and not just with the benefit of hindsight, but on the information available to them at the time.
If that criticism is valid, how does it apply today?
There is a new Axis (Russia/Iran/North Korea). Each is run by a brutal dictator. Each threatens and destabilises its neighbours. Russia and Iran are known to fund/arm terrorists and are fighting proxy wars (Syrian civil war - Russia and Iran; Yemen civil war - Iran). Russia launched a self confessed genocidal war of conquest of Ukraine in 2022, having previously invaded in 2014 and invading Georgia in 2008. North Korea and Iran both provide military aid to Russia in its war on Ukraine. The Hamas attack on Israel was funded and supported by Iran and Russia.
Iran is not yet a nuclear power, nor, in any meaningful sense, is North Korea, but Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and NATO appeasement in the face thereof, has demonstrated to everyone the supremacy of nukes, and the idiocy of ever giving up one's nuclear protection as Ukraine famously did in return for worthless security guarantees.
It is therefore inevitable that Iran and North Korea will accelerate their nuclear programme, and likely that an increasingly desperate Putin will trade nuclear tech/materials or warheads with them in return for ammo/weapons as the Russian army bleeds to death in Ukraine.
The most vulnerable of the triad right now is Iran. Its regime is unpopular with a pro-Western urban youth. Surgical long range strikes on Iranian strategic military assets and key installations of the regime might be enough to trigger a successful pro-Western revolution without the need for "boots on the ground".
Is this, therefore, a Sudetenland moment where a longer war could be avoided by an earlier intervention?
How likely is it, really, that direct military confrontation between Iran and Israel/US can be avoided in the medium term?
These are difficult questions, and I am glad that I do not have to take them and live with the consequences either way.
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Any reason you didn't include China in your new axis?
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I thought the modern thinking was Chamberlain's delays allowed the UK to build up and get ready for the war?
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Hotblack you've left out China. If War begins with Iran and west engaged- Israel in a 3 front war, fifth columnists in London and heart of the GOP could see China invading Taiwan.
If that happens really WW3- decent chance west could lose?
Plus if trump wins NATO is dead duck and Europe top weak so Ukraine falls.
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China not quite in same league, yet. No proxy wars. No terrorist funding. Does not vote with Russia at UN, but abstains.
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US military still more than capable of seeing off all comers in conventional warfare. If it gets nukey then we are all done for anyway.
China have massively upgraded their military but it is untested. They would be the biggest unknown, but a lot of their kit is russian designed. They have the industrial capacity to stay in the fight for a long time.
Russia are being dominated by generations old western kit so they wouldn't last long. Taken out by NATO in Europe.
North Korea lolololol, but rip Seoul.
Iran wouldn't have a navy on day two.
I am not overly concerned about war now, but Trump in power changes everything.
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You don't need to go to war, you need to prepare for it.
We've learned a lot from Russia invading Ukraine, mostly that the Russian military isn't what we thought it was. Iran and North Korea, even with nuclear power, could be eliminated very quickly as they rely on old Soviet technology.
The entire Iranian nuclear programme was disrupted with a simple virus (Stuxnet).
North Korea will never be able to build enough warheads to match the reaction they'd get if they launched one.
The problem with successive British governments is lack of investment in the military. We're at a fraction of the defensive capabilities we had in 1914 and that was considered a small army.
WW3 will be a conventional war with the threat of nuclear, we need better equipment, a bigger navy and more personnel.
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Plus if trump wins NATO is dead duck and Europe top weak so Ukraine falls.
First part yes. Second part no. US military aid increasingly less important for Ukraine (ATACMS aside). By November 2024, Russia will have reverted to an essentially WW1 army due to equipment attrition. Russian conquest of Ukraine is already militarily impossible due to existing losses and supremacy of drones - see other thread.
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Which other thread Hotblack?
Re Russian equipment attrition won't China, N Korea and Iran make it up?
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The US army in 1939 was about 100,000 strong. They still used British ww1 Tommy helmets and Lee Enfield rifles. They didn't even have jackets.
Today the US has 11 supercarrier battle groups, each one of which could dispose of the combined navies and airforces of the rest of the world.
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The US military budget is $800 Billion per year. That dwarfs everyone, even when the Pentagon can't account for where half of it goes.
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Re Russian equipment attrition won't China, N Korea and Iran make it up?
With what, exactly?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_equipment_of_the_Iranian_Army#Art…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_equipment_of_the_Iranian_Army#Com…
Much Iranian equipment is (a) even older and shitter than the shit Russia is getting out storage and (b) NATO in origin meaning no spare parts availability/no platform familiarity/incompatible ammo
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_equipment_of_the_Korean_People%27…
Most of the stuff on this list was supplied in the 1950s, and won't even drive/fire, or if it did, it would breakdown. Almost none of it is used by the Russians save for BMP1s.
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People panic about nukes because of films and games. Given that Russia's vaunted hypersonics are being shot down in ukraine with kit from the 1980s you'd have to be an incredibly brave dictator to launch a nuclear attack on the west, the last thing you want to prove is that nato has spent 5 years figuring out how to shoot everything down and now you're defencless
of course, said dictator only has minutes to consider that before the run fire, that your janky russian based kit promptly fails to notice, from the US, UK and French subs sitting off your coast incinerates you
it's unlikely that Putin will give nukes to anyone because he knows that those "friends" today might not be friends tomorrow.
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ICBMs are faster than hypersonic Khinzal, but perhaps PAC-3 can even shoot them down.
It does seem like subsonic, but stealthy cruise missiles that can manouevre, like Storm Shadow and JASSMs are going to be more useful.
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Without wishing to tempt fate I would have said WW3 is looking less likely now than 18 months ago. Russia has so far resisted doing what was looking vaguely possible 18 months ago. Yes Iran could be drawn into a war but while hugely disturbing, that isn’t going to lead to WW3. The US will crush Iran if it ever came to it (which it won’t) and no one is going to leap in on Iran’s side. I do agree it makes a China takeover of Taiwan likely but I can’t see the US making that their fight in the end.
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what would Iran realistically do? give all the angry young men who hate the iranian government guns and tell them "the bad guys are over there"?
they'd have a coup in a week and a saudi/iraqi "peacekeeping" force running around the country 2 days after that.
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