In the face of rising fears of war between Iran and the United States, several questions arise. Does the US really want to burn the Middle East down? What does the Iranian leader mean when he says the war will affect the entire region? Shall Russia and China watch the match from the fence? How long can Iran carry the burden of war? And how long can it hold the siege of the Strait of Hormuz? Can the so-called “serious talks” bring a lasting peace between Iran and the US, and, for that matter, with Israel?
I would approach these questions from two positions: oil and hegemony.
Since President Trump took over, he has immediately faced two paramount challenges: the humongous national debt and the world’s increasing jibes that the United States is no longer the superpower, that the world is transitioning from a unipolar to a multipolar order. How does one meet these two challenges? If we look at his moves, which are often unthinkingly termed reckless, reactionary, and unpredictable, they begin to make total sense.
If the world has stopped recognising the US as the sole superpower, then what use is the post-Second World War order which the United States built to maintain its hegemony? Therefore, before another system replaces it, why not tear it down yourself? This began immediately after the Trump administration took over. The first indication was Vice-President J.D. Vance’s speech at the Munich Conference, where he talked down to European NATO partners, telling them to start shouldering the financial and military obligations of the trans-Atlantic alliance.
This was followed by other significant moves signalling the end of an era, including Elon Musk's criticism of the notion of equity, diversity, and equality in the wake of the Los Angeles fires, values associated with the post-war Western order. This was followed by the shutting down of USAID, tasked with promoting democratic values, human rights, women’s movements, free speech, and so on, under the guise of philanthropic projects.
The major challenge the US has faced over the past decade is the rapid rise of the Chinese economy and its advances in modern technologies. QUAD was tasked with the project of containing China, with India as a major player in the region. Since post-9/11, the US has pampered the Indian economy through substantial investment by American companies and by allowing Indian tech workers access to the US job market.
Interestingly, North Korea has now entered the picture, openly supporting Iran. These developments clearly indicate that Russia and China are not merely sitting on the fence, watching the match
However, the lacklustre performance of the Indian military against Pakistan in May 2025 exposed India’s capability — if it cannot handle Pakistan, what use is it in countering China? On the other hand, Pakistan’s use of Chinese weaponry against Western Indian weaponry reinforced perceptions of China’s technological superiority.
Now examine the events that followed.
Trump intensified his tariff war. Indian goods were heavily taxed, with an added punishment for buying Russian oil. Interestingly, China and Europe, the other two major buyers of Russian energy, were not touched. It was just India. It was pressured, humiliated, and complied. It significantly reduced its purchase of Russian oil. Then, a day before President Trump announced that India would now be buying Venezuelan oil, which the United States had taken control of after the Maduro episode earlier this year.
This perhaps answers the questions we raised at the outset about the current developments with Iran.
Sustaining both full-capacity US oil production and a meaningful recovery of Venezuelan output requires global oil prices to remain broadly in the $70–$80 per barrel range over time. Prices below this level discourage new drilling and lead to a gradual output decline. Venezuela faces an even higher threshold: despite relatively low geological lifting costs, its heavy crude requires diluent, upgrading, and extensive infrastructure repairs, all compounded by political and operational risks.
So those who fear that Iran’s siege of the Strait of Hormuz would disrupt 20% of the world’s oil supply make total sense from a US interest perspective. If oil prices go anywhere beyond $90 a barrel, they have already shot up nearly $10 a barrel in the previous month since this conflict started, following the protests in Iran.
It becomes feasible for US oil companies to invest in drilling projects in expensive-to-extract Venezuelan oil, which the US now fully controls. Higher oil prices would also raise the cost of Chinese goods, making it easier for American goods to compete, as the US aims to rebuild its industrial base, with access to Venezuelan oil at an ostensibly lower cost.
And if the US is bent upon dismantling the post-war order and confining its interests to the other side of the Atlantic, signalled by the redefinition of the “West” by Secretary Marco Rubio, and seeks an absolute monopoly over global oil production, then stopping Middle Eastern oil supply and reducing competition for Venezuelan oil, if not eliminating it, begins to make sense.
A likely scenario of the war and its outcome might therefore be as follows.
The US launches a massive attack, which Iran retaliates against with incessant barrages of missile attacks on Israel and other US targets in the Middle East. Reports of sixteen Chinese cargo planes landing in Iran last week, and Iran’s display of a mural depicting the wreckage of the US aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln immediately afterwards, have given rise to speculation that China may have supplied DF-21 anti-aircraft-carrier missiles.
If this is true, or if Iran uses its indigenously built hypersonic missiles to sink an aircraft carrier or other US warships, the likely American response would be a nuclear attack, to which Iran might respond with a nuclear strike on Israel. Remember, Iranian scientists have said they can assemble a bomb in days, not weeks. Think of Israel as part of that post-war project that is now becoming a burden on the US itself. Voices are growing weary of the incessant demands of Netanyahu, and of concerns that Israelis are dictating US policy.
Interestingly, North Korea has now entered the picture, openly supporting Iran. These developments clearly indicate that Russia and China are not merely sitting on the fence, watching the match.
Last but not least, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has recently expressed his desire to acquire nuclear weapons. Iran has certainly not killed more Jews than the Germans — that is history. And that answers the last bit of the post-war narrative on antisemitism.