NO WORLD WAR III NO MAJOR ESCALATION ANYWHERE

 As you read this there are about 80 armed conflicts going on in Africa, North Africa and the Middle East. Africa alone (sub-saharan, central, east and west Africa) suffers about 45 armed conflicts. 

Here is a map of all the conflict and war zones in the entire world (2023). As you can see Africa takes the World Cup.

 

Some of these 'conflicts' are actually wars for example between Eritrea and Ethiopia, in Nigeria and Sudan. Yet no one says that World War III has broken out in Africa.

World War 1 was fought over what I dont know. World War 2 was fought over territory. Few of you will know that during World War 2 the French Army was the first to invade Germany. 

"The Saar Offensive was a French ground offensive (attack) into Saarland during World War II from 7 to 16 September 1939. This area of Saarland was defended by the German 1st Army". 

The French Army invaded Germany first with 40 divisions, 78 artillery regiments and   40 tank battalions. That was a huge army. The French retreated (after nine days) when the Germans counter attacked.

One year later in 1940 the French retreated from Paris. 
15 years later in 1954 the French retreated from Indo-China (complete surrender). 
Eight years later in 1962 the French retreated from Algeria and North Africa.  
Now the French are retreating from the rest of Africa.

What exactly is a World War cannot be defined. But World War 2 was indeed a world sized war because there was shooting, bombing and fighting on all the inhabited continents of the world. North and South America saw limited action (minor bombing of the US west coast, minor naval attacks in the US east coast, the Battle of the River Plate in Uruguay). But two of the biggest belligerants in WW2 were the USA and Canada.

The Ukraine War is not a full scale war. There were no large scale division sized movements or battalion sized tank battles anywhere. It is a sometimes intense but still low intensity conflict. Largely artillery and aerial bombing duels, including mini-drone warfare as well as long range missile strikes. 

The two sides are locked in a battle of attrition with Russia wearing down the Ukrainians. Russia has the capacity to overrun Ukraine and end the war but Mr Putin is looking at a much larger picture. A quick battlefield victory for Russia now will mean that the economic sanctions against Russia will remain for years and possibly decades to come. Mr Putin wants to go back to doing business as usual with Europe and the US. He wants to sell oil and gas to Germany again. Mr Putin sees Germany, Denmark and the Nordic (Scandinavian) countries as long term partners in Europe.   The name Rus' (Russia) comes from an Old Nordic word for 'the men who row'. 

So if he can drag the Ukrainian War and force Ukraine, NATO and the EU to the negotiating table he may be able to get a package deal and unwind the other irritants like the economic sanctions against Russia, unfreezing Russian assets frozen by America, getting security assurances (no more NATO expansion), dissolution of the United Kingdom (just kidding), stuff like that. In short 'Please just leave us alone'.

The kerfuffle between Iran and Israel will also not go anywhere. The ayatollahs have no intention of widening the conflict with Israel. 331 Iranian missiles and drones all missed their targets. That one unfortunate seven year old Arab Bedouin child who was hit by falling debris from an Iranian missile has since died. There was little other damage. The attack was a dismal failure.

The Israeli counter attack two days ago has been shrouded in much 'hush-hush' with the Israelis refusing to divulge any details so far of what they did. But the consensus coming out is that the Israeli airforce had complete access into Iranian airspace without being molested at all. They were able to fully penetrate through Iranian air defenses.  They hit all their targets but are not divulging what they hit exactly. And of course neither are the Iranians.  Isfahan is ground zero for the Iranian nuclear program and the Israelis hit this area. They also hit an airbase in Isfahan which houses ALL 24 units of Iran's 1970s era F14 Tomcats. There may be less than 24 F14s left now.

The failure of 331 Iranian missiles and drones versus the Israeli counter attack has exposed huge gaps and weaknesses  in the Iranian military. There will be no escalation coming any time soon from the Iranian side.

Again the Israeli airforce was assisted in mid air refueling by the US Airforce with the Saudis, UAE and the Jordanians all on 'standby'.  This is the new equation in the Middle East.

But there will be no World War 3.  Once the Ukraine War is concluded (and it will be concluded soon - possibly this year) there will be much peace and great prosperity coming for the world. So get ready and start planning (but do not spend any money yet). 

Another new equation will be the collapse of the illegitimate ayatollah regime in Iran. When that happens it will give yet another super-duper boost to peace and prosperity in the Middle East. So the world has much to look out for.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.