Parallel Wars. Converging Conflicts?
No, Ray Dalio, it's not World War Three.
Professor Sarah Paine (US Naval War College) is deeply concerned about the corruption or incompetence of the current President. She fears the various wars or potential wars currently burning may merge together, growing into World War Three. This concern of hers is understandable, prudent, even salutary. World wars can arise out of unexpected convergence of conflicts, as World War One shows. Separate wars can also grow together into one war without however turning into a world-wide conflagration. Yet, wars are not necessarily mutually reinforcing or converging let alone totalizing. Otherwise, we would have had many more global wars. Convergence of wars is not inevitable: for example, Prussia (Germany) under Bismarck waged successful successive wars against Denmark, Austria, and France. Had those three banded together at the start then Prussia would almost certainly have been defeated. But each war did not amalgamate and so Prussia molted and emerged victorious and united as the Second German Reich. Birth, apparently, is a bloody process.
Currently, we see an ongoing war in Ukraine, which at least in its tactics resembles World War One. Trench warfare and attrition are its marking features. However, Ukraine has not turned into a global war or even a general European war, despite Putin’s efforts to spark wars elsewhere to drain away Western arms and munition supply from Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the USA instigated a successful lightning fast invasion of Venezuela, toppling its ruler. That in turn led it to attack Iran, thinking it might topple the Iranian regime thereby, and that in turn has led to conflicts at the Persian Gulf and at the Bab al-Mandeb straits. The US is also warily circling Cuba, wondering whether, how, and when to finally depose Cuba’s communist system. Meanwhile, in the South China Sea and also at Taiwan, even in the Himalayas, China faces several potential flash points that could explode into war. There are plenty of wars which could merge somehow.
So, Professor Paine rightly is concerned about these conflicts growing together. How likely is that?
Happily, it’s not likely at all.
CHINA
Let’s start with China. The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has made quite clear to Putin that it will not tolerate Russia using nuclear weapons. China is, perhaps surprisingly, more cautious and prudent about military affairs than the USA and if anything is a source of stability rather than destabilization.
China has had several chances for war, and has consistently avoided war.
*There was a Chinese border skirmish with India. They were literally fighting each other with clubs. Some people died. And that was the extent of the skirmish. Distant barren mountains are tough to fight in and are generally not worth killing or dying over.
*There has been more than one case of China’s coast guard clashing with Philippines. In such clashes they sometimes literally fight with water cannons or by ramming, but that is all.
These conflicted skirmishes aren’t the actions of a state seeking war.
Later, there was an Indo-Pakistani air war. While both sides discovered each other’s air-war capabilities, this war was quickly ended and did not escalate into a wide-ranging land war between India and Pakistan. This also supports the view that China and the USA are not interested in waging proxy wars against each other.
In fact, the PRC and USA have both actively worked together to avoid proxy wars.
*There was a recent Cambodia-Thailand border clash. This could easily have turned into a China-USA proxy war. It did not. Both the USA and PRC acted responsibly to quell the conflict
*Similarly, the coup d’etat in Myanmar led later to intensified conflicts among various rebel factions in Myanmar/Burma. This too would have been an excellent opportunity for a USA-PRC proxy war. Yet no such proxy war emerged and instead the conflict was stabilized.
Simply put, it looks like the USA and PRC do not wish to engage in proxy war, whether in South East Asia, or the South China Sea.
TAIWAN
What about Taiwan? Frankly, given Russia’s abominable performance in Ukraine it should be obvious the PRC is not about to invade Taiwan. Drones have proven very effective in Ukraine. Taiwan learned thereby and has acquired many drones, making invasion tougher. Then too, there is the fact that China does not wish to murder their compatriots living in Taiwan. China wants reunification, but not at the cost of Chinese blood. This is also prudent: China would prefer to retake Taiwan intact and not in bloody ruins. And all of that is consistent with Chinese strategy as expressed in Sun Tzu’s “Art of War” which Mao Zedong largely copied. “Supreme excellence in the art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” War is very expensive, as Washington seems unable to learn despite 25 years of forever wars.
Prior to Russia’s invasion, most other analysts believed the Ukrainian government would quickly collapse once invaded. Instead, Ukraine has proven remarkably effectively resisting Russia and has destroyed thousands of Russian tanks and literally tens of thousands of Russian vehicles. Given Russia’s abominable performance in Ukraine, marked by logistical failures, poor morale, and the inability to achieve swift, decisive victory, it should be obvious that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is not about to invade Taiwan. Ukraine has not only resisted but demonstrated remarkable resilience, leveraging asymmetric warfare, Western intelligence and military support, and a deeply motivated citizenry. This has forced Russia into a protracted, costly war of attrition, exposing critical vulnerabilities in its military doctrine, command structure, and industrial base.
For the PRC, Taiwan presents an even more daunting challenge than Ukraine does for Russia. The Taiwan Strait, a 100-mile-wide body of water, is a natural moat that would require a complex amphibious assault. China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has never conducted a large-scale amphibious invasion, and its lack of recent combat experience raises serious questions about its capacity to successfully invade Taiwan. Furthermore, Taiwan’s terrain is mountainous and urban, favoring defenders. Taiwan’s military, though smaller, is highly trained and well-equipped with advanced asymmetric capabilities like anti-ship missiles, drones, and mines. Taiwan’s population is also far more unified in its resistance to unification by force than many outsiders assume, with polls consistently showing strong support for maintaining the status quo or even formal independence.
The PRC’s leadership, while publicly committed to reunification, is painfully aware of these challenges. The economic and political costs of a failed invasion would be catastrophic in terms of military losses and consequent crippling sanctions, the collapse of foreign trade and investment, and the risk of domestic unrest. China’s legitimacy rests on its ability to deliver prosperity and stability. A botched invasion of Taiwan could jeopardize both. Moreover, the U.S. and its allies have demonstrated an unwavering commitment to deterring invasion, through freedom of navigation operations and arms sales to Taiwan as well as by economic measures like export controls on advanced semiconductors. The lessons from Ukraine are not lost on Beijing.
Moreover, the PRC’s strategy has long favored a patient, multi-pronged approach: economic coercion, diplomatic isolation, cyber warfare, and gray-zone tactics (e.g., airspace incursions, disinformation campaigns) to wear down Taiwan’s defenses and erode international support. Why risk a high-stakes gamble when time will work in China’s favor? The PRC’s leadership is studying Russia’s mistakes and addressing its own shortcomings.
The PRC’s military build-up, part of Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power and the CCP’s emphasis on “national rejuvenation”, suggest that the Chinese Communist Party sees Taiwan as an existential issue that must be resolved, but only on terms that guarantee success.
The lessons of Ukraine show that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is not imminent. The costs are too high, the risks too great, and the alternatives are less risky and more effective. China prefers winning without fighting, and prefers patient proven long term strategy to risky gambles.
CONVERGING CONFLICTS: IRAN AND UKRAINE
The real risk of escalating conflicts is in the war with Iran. Frankly, Iran is giving all its neighbors every reason to close ranks with the USA in opposition to Tehran. Iran has already attacked the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, and Jordan, effectively driving them into the arms of the USA and Saudi Arabia, Iran’s rival for regional hegemony. Hezbollah and Hamas have also undertaken land-based attacks and missile-and-drone warfare. Hezbollah has operated mainly in Lebanon and Syria. Hamas has mainly done so in Gaza and Israel. Iran’s attacks on Persian Gulf shipping and its Houthi ally’s attacks in the Bab al-Mandeb straits also make it easy for Washington to generate a coalition opposing Iran, despite Washington’s ham-handed failings at diplomacy.
The conflict between Ukraine, Russia, and Iran is becoming increasingly interconnected. Iran has supplied Russia with Shahed drones and related technology for use in Ukraine. The greatest chance to escalate the conflict is in the fact that Iran has been regularly supplying Russia with weapons, notably drones, to fight in Ukraine. Consequently, Ukraine recently struck an Iranian ship in the Caspian sea which was bringing weapons to Russia. A direct war between Iran and Ukraine would mean at least an indirect war between the USA and Russia, though Russia has long claimed to be really in a war with NATO. Such a conflict would pit Ukraine against Russia and Iran and the United States against Iran. These developments do not mean a direct U.S.-Russia war is inevitable, but they do raise the risk of wider escalation and deeper indirect involvement by outside powers, especially the United States.
However, escalation usually depends on alliance commitments, miscalculation, domestic politics, and whether major powers directly attack one another rather than merely fighting in parallel. Wars tend to fuse when a great power enters a theater directly, when treaty allies are pulled in, or when one side decides it must preempt a growing coalition. That is the pattern people worry about in cases like Europe, the Middle East, and the Taiwan Strait: the danger is less “all wars become one” than “one new trigger links existing wars into a larger bloc confrontation.”
Russia, Iran, and North Korea clearly cooperate, but they do not form a NATO-style alliance with mutual defense guaranties. Unlike World War I, we are not confronted by competing alliances, let alone secret ones, that are deeply committed to mutual support in the event of war. Russia has not massively intervened to help Iran. Korea has already curtailed its military support for Russia in the form of soldiers because of the grave heavy losses in battle Koreans suffered. Korea has shifted from supplying cannon fodder to be thrown away to providing guest-workers for Russian factories. Korean munitions have repeatedly proven to be unreliable, badly made and old. Their mutual aid is limited, transactional, and of questionable value.
Even if Ukraine and Iran started attacking each other with drones and missiles it is still unlikely that the USA or Russia would end up in direct conflict in Iran. Iran is far from Russia. Deploying Russian forces there would be impossible given Russia’s war in Ukraine as well as the great distances and mountainous desert terrain.
All that makes a World War I-style chain reaction leading to great power conflict unlikely. Conflicts will run in parallel but are unlikely to converge, though a convergence of the Iran and Ukraine wars simply means Putin loses even faster.
The real wild card? Neither China nor the USA need Iranian oil. A closed Persian gulf will inflict serious economic damage on Iran itself, because Iran depends heavily on oil revenues and on trade routes that pass through the Strait of Hormuz. A sustained disruption of oil sales will strain Tehran’s finances and eliminate one of its most important sources of foreign currency. The consequent ever greater impoverishment of Iran will increasingly intensify domestic hardship, leading to public frustration, unrest, and ultimately rebellion. Rebellions the CIA, Special Operations Forces, and U.S. allies will foster and stoke. Iran doesn’t have an oil Trump card, even though it thinks it does. Starved of funds, the Iranian regime will eventually be broken by domestic dissent.
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