Even Biden’s foreign policy team is smart enough to know that. I think. I hope. I am pretty sure.

The Pentagon is deploying two carrier strike groups, eleven Burke-class destroyers, a number of Ticonderoga-class cruisers, amphibious assault ships, THAAD and Patriot missile defense systems, multiple squadrons of fighter jets, strategic bombers, and undisclosed assets to the… pic.twitter.com/7j9aIPk9Zf

— KanekoaTheGreat (@KanekoaTheGreat) October 25, 2023

So a war against Iran–at least for the US–would primarily be a naval battle. At least the conventional part of the war would be. Iran is a master at asymmetric warfare, which would mean that terrorism in the West would likely spike dramatically. Not fun. Terrorism in the Middle East would spike too, and who can predict what political ramifications would be in the more “moderate” Islamic countries?

Iran’s “navy,” too, would likely be wiped out, although it would likely get to fire the first shots and do its best to make them count. That likely would include going after civilian shipping–something it has proven to be pretty good at–and escalating from harassment to something more kinetic.

The big question is whether Iran could effectively deny access to the Persian Gulf to Western ships, and close down the Strait of Hormuz. There is no easy way for Iran to make a huge dent in the US Navy, but it doesn’t have to. Denying access to one of the most important trade routes in the world is more than enough to inflict heavy pain on the West and the rest.

New: Iran’s proxy forces are teaming up to attack Americans https://t.co/KdUqzn7wIN by me @PostOpinions

— Josh Rogin (@joshrogin) October 25, 2023

War with Iran would be bad for everybody. But it also could provide a spark for World War III.

The Telegraph has a fascinating article on the naval situation in the Persian Gulf that should make you shudder: China is, right now, the dominant naval power in the Persian Gulf, not the US. As you likely know, China and Iran are aligned, and that complicates matters immensely. Not because the US carrier battle groups, of which there are two in the region (not in the Gulf), could not defeat the Chinese warships. But because the US definitely doesn’t want to have to do so.

Further, and in some ways more importantly, the US is not the guarantor for the free flow of commerce in the region right now. That is, should it choose to, China’s role. Every country in the region that wants to ensure freedom of movement is depending on China to ensure it.

One thing jumps out straight away. The US Navy, for now at least, is not the preeminent naval force in the Gulf. That distinction now belongs to the 44th and 45th naval escort groups of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN). The two groups, one of which has just arrived to take over from the other, have a total of six ships. Two are Type 052D destroyers equipped with YJ-21 hypersonic anti-ship ballistic missiles.

There was some breathless reporting on how this was a takeover move by China: but as with the US movements above, it’s worth looking at what is pre-planned and what is reactive. The handover between the two groups was long planned as part of their established operating pattern in the region. Granted, this handover has now been extended (as in the case of USS Ford) but the total number of ships is not an immediate response to what is happening in Gaza.

That doesn’t mean it’s not important though: for a few reasons.

First, every malign actor who thrives off disruption either is, or is about to, exploit the current situation to maximise this. That includes the Houthis last week in the Red Sea, Hezbollah to Israel’s north, Russia (everywhere) or the Chinese Coast Guard in the South China Sea. The water is warm in Chaosville and everyone is jumping in.

If you take away assets from the Gulf as the US has done, who is left to carry out the more routine tasks that Western navies have been doing there for so many years? In mid August, the Marines of the 26th MEU were tasked to prevent Iranian disruption of commercial shipping in the Gulf, a problem which has been building for some time. This task hasn’t gone away – who is tending to it now? That part isn’t clear.

The US may own the battlespace in the Middle East, but China owns it where it counts the most. And China is Iran’s friend. That gives them leverage we wish they didn’t have, both there and elsewhere. There is nothing like proximity in conditions short of war.

In the wider Middle Eastern region, there are US-allied coalition ships aplenty. France, Spain and Japan have warships in the area. There’s also the Royal Navy’s HMS Lancaster and some US ships. And the Ike is coming. But in the Gulf itself, right now, there is a naval power vacuum – one filled, at the moment, by China.

This leads to the second issue, the ongoing risk of miscalculation there. Historically, when ships and fast boats of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN – the maritime wing of Iran’s fanatical Revolutionary Guards) swarm your ship or generally behave like maritime hooligans in your vicinity you carry out your countermeasures, do everything you can to avoid escalation and then go on your way. You do this knowing that if it does escalate, either by accident or design, Uncle Sam will appear over the horizon momentarily.

If this happens right now you would be more likely to find a Chinese hypersonic armed warship offering to ‘help’. If the IRGCN want to ratchet up their bad behaviour in the Strait of Hormuz, and it generally doesn’t take much encouragement, now would be the perfect time.

China is in a position to increase the risk dramatically, should armed conflict or its potential arise. The US has already had an armed confrontation with Iranian proxies, intercepting cruise missiles and drones aimed at Israel. What happens if things escalate? Would the US want to have ordnance flying anywhere near Chinese ships?

One might think this would reduce, not increase the chance of conflict, but it may do the opposite by changing the risk calculus of Iran. Its two greatest allies–Russia and China–would be very happy to see some chaos blowing back on the US, although neither would want direct conflict with the US. Encouraging Iran to take some risks as a proxy is not out of the question.

✍️ "Washington must stand firm if it is to avoid direct conflict with Iran and China," writes @RobertClark87.

Read more here ⬇️https://t.co/w7IYVuXsP1 pic.twitter.com/9vWflVhmv2

— Telegraph US (@TelegraphUS) October 23, 2023

It is difficult to overstate how precarious the situation is right now. The US is deeply involved in a war against Russia; China keeps making noises about Taiwan, and Biden has extended a security guarantee to that island (I agree with him there, as Taiwan is a key supplier of microprocessors for almost everybody in the world), and now Iran is directing a war in the Middle East.

Biden has really screwed the pooch, and he is the guy in charge of preventing a world war.

In the Mediterranean sea, a US carrier strike group stands watch, hoping to deter other regional actors from attempting to intervene in the war between Israel and Hamas. A second group is headed to the Persian Gulf, alongside missile defence systems. Artillery shells which were previously headed to Ukraine have instead been reserved for Israel.

On Israel’s northern border, meanwhile, exchanges of fire with the Iranian-funded terror group Hezbollah are growing in intensity. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has warned that direct conflict would bring “unimaginable devastation” to Lebanon and Hezbollah.

The world is mustering for war. Conflict is already raging in Europe, with Russian and Ukrainian forces locked in offensive and counteroffensive. The aftermath of the Hamas terror attack upon Israel could now see the Middle East ignited.

Whether or not it does rests in part with Iran, the funder and political master of both Hamas and Hezbollah, which is now moments away from potentially plunging the world into a third world war.

The Iranian foreign minister has warned Israel that if the war is not stopped “immediately”, then “anything is possible at any moment, and the region will go out of control”. US defence secretary Lloyd Austin has warned of a very real risk of “significant escalation” of attacks on American forces and civilians.

He has good reason to be concerned. Tehran is not confining its hostility to words; its regional proxies seem determined to entangle the US further, attacking American forces with drones and missiles at the Ain Al-Asad airbase in Iraq and al-Tanf in Syria.

All eyes are on Gaza, with good reason, but a war between Hamas and Israel by itself has little short-term impact on international security. I support Israel’s right to utterly annihilate Hamas and wish them well, but Biden’s primary responsibility is to ensure that the conflict there doesn’t spark a global war.

If so, the first shots will likely be fired in the Persian Gulf, not in the Gaza Strip. Gaza would instantly become a sideshow in a much larger conflict.

With American attention divided, Iran may decide to further provoke the US in its attempts to assert regional dominance, attempting to drive the Americans to disengage and leave Israel to stand on its own.

It is not hard to see how an ill-judged act of hostility could trigger a military response and see the situation in the Middle East begin to spiral out of the control of any individual leader, draw in Washington, and give China the window to attempt a killing blow in Taiwan – one which would almost inevitably draw an American response.

Within months, the US could be directly involved in two devastating wars on two continents, and bankrolling a third in Ukraine.

World Wars have started for smaller reasons than what is happening today. 1914 comes to mind.

Otto von Bismarck predicted World War I 25 years before it happened because he understood that from smaller things great things may come. He famously said, “One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans.” It did. Generations of Germans, Frenchmen, and Brits died–for nothing.

We may be seeing history repeat itself, although I wouldn’t call the massacre of innocents that took place on 10/7 a small thing. But in itself, it pales in comparison to the beginning of a world war.

Had Bismarck been in power in 1914 chances are that the war would not have broken out then, but the world was led by 2nd raters in 1914, and the consequences were dire.

I think we can all agree that we are being led by second-raters now, so pray.