Indian Strategic Studies

23 March 2026

How Does Saudi Arabia See the War with Iran?

Michael Ratney

For Saudi Arabia, the Iran war in its scale, intensity, and potential impact is as unsettling as it is unprecedented. The Saudi leadership finds itself simultaneously trying to protect and prioritize its own economic and societal transformation, to navigate its relationship with an impulsive and unpredictable U.S. president, and to manage the geographic reality of living a drone’s flight away from a country that is likely to remain its principal antagonist for the foreseeable future. Not surprisingly, Saudi views of this war are complicated.

The question of how Saudi Arabia views this war has drawn considerable speculation, misunderstanding, and wishful thinking. The Saudi government communicates principally through official statements, and to the frustration of international journalists, unauthorized leaks are rare. Media reports citing unnamed and ambiguously defined sources with claims about Saudi intentions or their communications with President Donald Trump should be read cautiously. And so, to understand actual Saudi thinking, the best place to start is with what their government is saying publicly.

The Iran War is Causing Energy Chaos in Asia

Joshua Kurlantzick

The Iran war has clearly upended energy markets around the world. Oil futures closed at $95 yesterday, even as some countries have released reserves in an attempt to prevent the oil price from going even higher. As Agence France Presse (AFP) has reported, strikes on the massive Ras Tanura refinery in Saudi Arabia, Ras Laffan gas processing base in Qatar, and the complex housing the Ruwais refinery in the United Arab Emirates, combined with Iran’s blockage of the Strait of Hormuz, has resulted in a drop of Gulf countries’ oil production by 10 million barrels per day, as compared to March 2025. AFP further reported that the amount of oil passing through the Strait of Hormuz has fallen to less than 10 percent of pre-war levels.

The impact can be felt everywhere, but in Asia – where nearly every country is highly dependent on Middle Eastern oil – the war has caused outright energy panic, with governments scrambling to respond and having few short-term answers. After all, Asia is the most exposed to the effects of the war on oil prices, since it is the region that relies most heavily on oil and gas shipped through the Strait of Hormuz. The level of consumer panic, in particular, is so great in some Asian states that it could soon lead to not only major economic shocks but even violence over limited energy supplies.

How the Iran War Ignited a Geoeconomic Firestorm

Edward Fishman

The economic consequences of the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran are coming into sharper focus as the conflict enters its third week. As the fallout expands beyond the Middle East and ripples through the global economy, markets and supply chains are being increasingly reshaped by the drones and missiles buzzing over the Gulf—and the United States has few options to de-escalate the conflict.

The Strait of Hormuz, which is critical to the oil and gas industry, is at the center of this disruption. But it’s not just energy markets that depend on the strait. Fertilizer and high-tech supply chains are also negatively affected, widening the crisis further. If the war develops into a protracted conflict, these issues could become lasting structural shocks to the world economy.

Defending the skies of the Arab Gulf states

Albert Vidal Ribe

Since the beginning of the current war in Iran on 28 February, the Arab Gulf states have used hundreds of missile interceptors to counter Iranian missiles and one-way attack uninhabited aerial vehicles (OWA UAVs). They have already consumed a significant portion of their stockpiles of long-range interceptors. These air-defence systems have protected the Arab Gulf states while the United States and Israel prioritised the destruction of Iran’s ballistic-missile launchers and effectively eliminated most of Iran’s launch capabilities, which led to a sharp drop in the rate of Iranian ballistic-missile fire after the first few days of hostilities.

Though Iran’s UAV attacks have also decreased in intensity, drones continue to enter the skies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states by the dozen. Compared with ballistic missiles, these are cheaper systems and easier to launch, and Iran possesses a much larger stockpile of them. In the absence of a durable diplomatic settlement to the conflict – which is unlikely, at least in the short term – Iran is likely to rely on UAVs as a major part of its harassment strategy.

Why a weakened Iran is insisting on prolonging the war

Mostafa Salem

Iranians attend a joint funeral held for security chief Ali Larijani, paramilitary commander Gholam Soleimani and 84 sailors from the Iranian Navy frigate IRIS Dena on Wednesday in Tehran. Majid Saeedi/Getty Images

Even as Iran confronts the gravest threat to its regime yet, it is signaling a willingness to prolong its conflict with the United States and Israel in a bid to finally reshape the region in its favor.

Iran’s regime has endured devastating losses over the past few weeks, with near daily US-Israeli strikes eliminating entire tiers of its leadership and military command structure. The Iranian population, already worn down by years of economic hardship, sanctions and mismanagement, now faces the added burdens of wartime shortages, infrastructure damage and an increasingly militarized domestic environment.

The Stunning Failure of Iranian Deterrence

Nicole Grajewski and Ankit Panda

Although it was the United States and Israel that instigated attacks on Iran on February 28, leaders in Tehran deserve some of the blame for failing to effectively deter their adversaries. As the deceased commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Aerospace Force, Amir Ali Hajizadeh, once put it, maintaining deterrence is like riding a bicycle: “You have to keep pedaling all the time, or else the bicycle will fall.” Over the past three years, Iran started to lose its balance; now it has tipped over.

US Air Force special operations seeks kamikaze drones

Michael Peck

The U.S. Air Force wants small one-way attack drones for its special operations forces, according to an Air Force Request for Information. “Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC) and Special Tactics (ST) units currently lack a purpose-built First-Person View (FPV) unmanned capability,” warned the RFI, which is due April 17. “This deficit restricts the force’s ability to employ FPV systems in specialized mission sets and limits the development of standardized Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (TTPs) essential for modern, high-intensity conflict.”

The service is looking for a drone with a range of at least 10 kilometers, and ideally more than 20 kilometers. It would be armed with a fragmentation warhead of 1.5 to 3 kilograms. Flight time should be 15 to 30 minutes. Guidance would be via GPS, and include the ability to function in GPS-denied environments.

Drone Warfare and the Future of Korean Armor

Ju Hyung Kim

In 2025, a NATO exercise in Estonia revealed the structural vulnerability that modern mechanized forces can no longer afford to ignore. During the Hedgehog 2025 exercise, a Ukrainian team of roughly ten people acting as the opposing force, using frontline drone tactics, simulated massive destruction—what exercise participants described as two battalions’ worth of armored vehicles—in a single day. The significance of the result does not rest on the number of simulated kills itself, but on what made such an outcome possible: namely, sustained aerial reconnaissance, swift integration of sensor-to-shooter systems, and the absence of effective countermeasures by maneuvering armored units.

For the Korean Peninsula, such a lesson should not be treated as a European anomaly, but as an immediate planning concern. North Korean personnel who have been sent to Europe in order to either participate in or observe combat are unlikely to return without operational insights. Even limited exposure to drone intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR), AI-assisted targeting cues, loitering munitions, and cloud-enabled battle management systems could accelerate Pyongyang’s adaptation cycle. If these lessons are properly absorbed and applied by North Koreans, South Korea’s tank-centric defense concept could face a level of vulnerability that has not been experienced since the Cold War. In particular, the risk would drastically amplify in a dual contingency scenario that involves Taiwan. These lessons apply not only to the Republic of Korea Army, but also to US Army armored and mechanized formations deployed in South Korea and elsewhere.

Europe Cannot Be a Military Power

Hugo Bromley

Since the end of World War II, the countries of western Europe have relied on the United States for their security. Thus safeguarded, these countries were left free to pursue economic integration while maintaining their democratic systems of government. Responsibility was bifurcated, with Washington handling the continent’s security, and Brussels taking on an ever-greater economic role. This division of responsibility is now uncertain. U.S. President Donald Trump has demanded the purchase of Greenland, attacked European leaders, and interfered in European countries’ domestic politics.

More recently, he has warned that, if NATO allies do not assist in the opening of the Strait of Hormuz, “it will be very bad for the future of NATO.” Trump’s antagonism has spurred leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron to call for “strategic autonomy” from Washington. Analysts writing in Foreign Affairs—including Erik Jones and Matthias Matthijs—have suggested that the European Union must take on a greater role in European security. They argue that this should come as part of a wider push to become a “global power” capable of counterbalancing the Trump administration’s policies.

Deepfakes Are Already Shaping Opinions Around Conflicts

Daniel Byman

The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran is just over 2 weeks old, and already the world is awash in deepfakes. The New York Times reports that a “torrent of fake videos and images generated by artificial intelligence have overrun social networks during the first weeks of the war in Iran.” Deepfakes on X, Facebook, and other platforms, especially TikTok, have garnered millions of views. The fake videos include massive explosions in Tel Aviv, successful missile attacks on U.S. warships, Israelis bemoaning their losses, and other images purporting to show how Iran is delivering pain to its enemies. Many of the videos have a Hollywood feel to them, with massive explosions and sonic booms. Other videos are more muted, such as one showing girls playing just before the U.S. attack that accidentally struck the Shajarah Tayyebeh elementary school, killing at least 175 people, most of them children. The attack was real, but the video was fake.

According to a recent report by Cyabra, a company that tracks influence campaigns, Iran is behind the deepfake effort. Iran’s efforts are designed to sway audiences at home and abroad, convincing those populations that Iran is striking back while undermining the legitimacy of the U.S. and Israeli operations. The best response involves a coordinated effort between governments and private companies, working together to detect, debunk, and remove deepfakes. Even then, however, deepfakes are likely to spread widely and shape broader perceptions of the war.

Choppy waters in the Strait of Hormuz

Nick Childs

President Donald Trump is not hiding his frustration that some of the United States’ European allies have been reluctant to heed his call for them to send ships and other forces to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He reserved particular criticism for the United Kingdom. European leaders in turn have made it clear they do not want to be drawn directly into the current conflict. The UK prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, has said that allies are seeking ‘a viable plan’. But what that would look like is far from clear. And recent experiences of trying to put together maritime-security operations in this region, notably to counter the Ansarullah (Houthi) anti-shipping campaign in and around the Bab el-Mandeb Strait and the Red Sea, have highlighted the difficulties involved.

A chokepoint like no other

The latest events have been a salutary reminder that not all strategic maritime chokepoints are equal. The Strait of Hormuz may be one of the most critical.

When the Houthis threatened shipping in the Bab el-Mandeb Strait from November 2023, the dire economic consequences that were forecast did not materialise, in part because shippers could reroute around the Cape of Good Hope. There was also sufficient shipping capacity to cope, and markets adapted. The Strait of Hormuz is different. It accounts for 20% of all internationally traded oil, 34% of seaborne oil-trade flows and 30% of liquefied natural gas exports. It is also the only maritime route in and out of the Gulf.

Telegram Outages Spike in Kremlin’s Push for Digital Control

Kassie Corelli

The Russian government widened restrictions on Telegram in February and March, beginning with slowed speeds. By mid-March, widespread Telegram outages have left the platform intermittently inaccessible across much of the country, suggesting a phased move toward a potential full block.

Over the past year and a half, the Russian government has steadily sought to gain control over the internet, restricting foreign messaging apps and turning off the mobile internet to shut down or restrict internet use in the event of public unrest, as occurred during recent protests in Iran.

The Kremlin’s restrictions on Telegram met with unexpected opposition from Russian war correspondents, deputies, and other government officials. This pushback demonstrates that the security services’ attempts to cut the population off from communications can also damage regime interests.

and Israel aligned on Iran war? Deciphering Trump's post after gas field attacks

Paul Adams

US President Donald Trump has issued a typically strongly worded statement in the wake of attacks on a major gas field shared by Iran and Qatar on Wednesday. Israel hit Iran's South Pars - part of the world's largest natural gas field – and Tehran retaliated by striking an energy complex in Qatar. The attacks led to a spike in energy prices, and fuelled Trump's wrath.

On his Truth Social media platform, Trump threatened Iran again and said he didn't know about Israel's plans for the attack. So what does the language used by the US president tell us about the course of the war and the extent to which the US and Israel are aligned on its strategy and goals?

With the Pentagon’s FY27 budget request forthcoming, it’s unclear if it will hit $1.5 trillion

Ashley Roque and Valerie Insinna

WASHINGTON — It’s “pencils down” on options for a $1.5 trillion defense spending request for fiscal 2027, but the Trump administration is still fleshing out just what vehicles it will use to ask for those dollars, according to Jules Hurst who is performing the duties of the Pentagon’s comptroller.

“We’re in the final stages” of cementing the budget, Hurst told Breaking Defense at the McAleese Defense Programs conference Tuesday. “We’ll keep the FY27 budget intact, and then if there’s a supplemental, it would be separate from the budget.”

The budget’s “going to procure many more aircraft during the FYDP [Future Years Defense Program], more ships, tens of thousands of critical munitions,” he added. “It’s going to make sure that we stay dominant in space … and allow us to make the big investments needed in drone dominance,” he said earlier on stage.

Department Leader Says Nuclear Triad Must Be Upgraded to Meet Dual Threat

C. Todd Lopez

"U.S. strategy is at a critical inflection point," said Robert Kadlec, assistant secretary of war for nuclear deterrence, chemical and biological defense policy and programs, while testifying before the House Armed Services Committee's strategic forces subcommittee.

China's strategic nuclear "breakout," Kadlec said — an unprecedented, major increase in bolstering their nuclear capability — means that the U.S. nuclear arsenal must deter both China and Russia.

Compounding that problem, he said, are the budgetary, industrial and programmatic strains of modernizing all three legs of the nuclear triad at once — land, sea and air. An additional factor is that the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia expired in February. That treaty limited the number of strategic warheads for both the U.S. and Russia.

Drones over base where Rubio, Hegseth live raise security concerns

Isaac Arnsdorf

Unidentified drones over Fort McNair, where Secretary Rubio and Secretary Hegseth live, triggered heightened security and White House discussions over possible relocation. The incidents come amid broader alerts tied to possible Iranian retaliation, including lockdowns at other U.S. bases and a global warning for American diplomatic posts and personnel.

Fort McNair houses the National Defense University and some of the Pentagon’s most senior military officials. The base has not traditionally housed political leaders, but a growing number of Trump officials, including outgoing Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem, have moved onto area bases, citing security concerns.

How America’s War on Iran Backfired

Nate Swanson

Seventeen years ago, while serving as an Iran desk officer in the U.S. State Department, I asked a more veteran colleague about the latest inflammatory statement by Mahmood Ahmadinejad, then the Iranian president. My colleague responded: “Stop paying attention to Ahmadinejad. Only focus on Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. He makes the important decisions.” He added: “But don’t worry. Change is coming. Khamenei”—who was then 69 and widely believed to have cancer—“could die at any moment.”

Khamenei did not die. Not until two weeks ago, when U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did what nature had not and ended the supreme leader’s 36-year stewardship of the Islamic Republic. Khamenei left a damning legacy. Since his ascension in 1989, the Iranian rial has lost almost all of its value against the dollar. Although rich in natural resources, Iran consistently experiences electricity and water shortages. Over the past year, food prices surged more than 70 percent.

As Putin’s War Comes Home, Russians Ever Less Prepared to Support It

Paul Goble

Russian President Vladimir Putin has sought to restrict the greatest impact of his war against Ukraine to marginal groups who could make money by serving in the military. The Kremlin realized early on that most Russians were not prepared to sacrifice for its war against Ukraine.

This approach is now failing because combat losses are mounting and the war coming home in the form of drone attacks and government cutbacks to key services to finance Russia’s armies in the field. Polls suggest that these developments are reducing the willingness of Russians to give the war more than lip-service support. Putin is increasingly using repression to prevent protests, an approach costing him support, which could trigger a crisis.

Quantum statecraft: the US, China and Europe

Dongyoun Cho

Quantum competition is entering an infrastructure phase of technological rivalry. For much of the past decade, discussion centred on laboratory breakthroughs such as qubit counts, coherence times and demonstrations of quantum advantage – but as quantum technologies move closer to operational use in communications, sensing, optimisation and cryptographic resilience, the focus of competition is shifting accordingly.

The key question is no longer simply who invents first, but who can build, govern and scale the infrastructures through which quantum systems will operate. In this new phase, advantage will accrue less to the fastest innovator than to the actor that embeds governance choices into supply chains, standards, procurement systems and security controls.

Why Iran Was Always a Threat to the US

Ahmed Charai

Today’s Senate Intelligence Committee’s Worldwide Threats demonstrated that in an age of deep polarization and mounting international disorder, the public questioning of intelligence leaders before elected representatives is one of democracy’s highest disciplines. Those in power must explain their actions before the nation.

Specifically, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard testified before the Senate committee on the Trump administration’s decision to launch strikes on Iran on February 28. Their testimonies mattered not because they satisfied partisan ritual, but because they defined to the public how they assess the threats gathering against the United States, its allies, and the strategic order America sustains.

Impact of Artificial Intelligence on Defence Planning: Case of Japan

Ryo HINATA-YAMAGUCHI

Ryo Hinata-Yamaguchi examines how AI is shaping Japan’s defence planning and operational risk management, focusing on the strategic operationalisation within the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) and its broader regional implications. While AI serves as an essential enabler of defence readiness, it must not become its primary driver. A purely technology-centric approach—lacking integration with structural, procedural, and infrastructural reforms—risks creating a dangerous disconnect in military capabilities. Furthermore, the proliferation of AI-enabled systems across Asia-Pacific countries could exacerbate existing regional tensions. Given that full transparency is unlikely in such sensitive domains, the path forward requires a collaborative framework among regional stakeholders. By establishing shared norms for accountability, oversight, and responsible use, the region can mitigate the risks of inadvertent escalation and pave the way for long-term strategic stability.

About the Author

Ryo HINATA-YAMAGUCHI is an Associate Professor at the Institute for International Strategy, Tokyo International University; Senior Non-Resident Fellow at the Atlantic Council Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security Indo-Pacific Security Initiative; and Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Pacific Forum. Ryo has presented, published, and consulted on a variety of topics relating to defence and security, and transport governance in the Indo-Pacific. Ryo previously served as a non-commissioned officer in the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (reserve) and also held positions at the University of Tokyo, Pusan National University, and Universitas Muhammadiyah Malang. Ryo received his PhD from the University of New South Wales, MA in Strategic and Defence Studies and BA in Security Analysis from the Australian National University and was also a Korea Foundation Language Training Fellow.

22 March 2026

Herof-2 Highlights Digital and Drone Advances in Baloch Insurgency

Rahim Nasar

The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) launched operation Herof-2 (“Storm-2”), conducting coordinated attacks across several districts of Balochistan on January 31, demonstrating the group’s advancing capabilities and operational reach. The BLA media agency, Hakkal, further exploits state restrictions on mainstream media—such as censorship, firewalls, controlled reporting, internet shutdown issues, and threats to journalists—to propagate narratives and shape public perceptions of the insurgency.

In the weeks following Herof-2, the BLA announced the formation of a specialized drone unit, the Qazi Aero Hive Rangers (QAHR), further demonstrating the group’s designs to transform the conflict into a technology-driven insurgency.

Growing Role of Women in Baloch Militancy

Naureen Salim

The Baloch Liberation Army’s (BLA) Operation Herof-2 attacks on January 31 marked a strategic shift, as the elite suicide unit, the Majeed Brigade, increasingly deployed female operatives. Women’s growing participation in Baloch militancy may reflect either genuine political agency or a deeper expansion of radicalization driven by organizational adaptation and strategic necessity.

Female involvement reflects a dual dynamic in which grievance, trauma, and identity intersect with insurgent strategy, illustrating how gender is instrumentalized in asymmetric warfare and underscoring the need for gender-sensitive security responses.

Iran’s Escalation Strategy Won’t Work

Raphael S. Cohen

The Iranian regime’s military strategy has always involved an underlying bet that it could control escalation. For the better part of half a century, this gamble mostly paid off. Whether it was taking hostages at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, bombing U.S. Marines barracks in Beirut and Air Force housing in Saudi Arabia, or funding proxies from Afghanistan to Gaza to Iraq, Iran’s actions have, until very recently, never triggered serious blowback.

This month, Iran placed its biggest bet yet on its ability to control escalation. But this time, it appears headed toward calamity.

In recent bouts with the United States, Iran sought to control escalation spirals and pursued a rather restrained tit-for-tat use of violence. After the United States killed Quds Force leader Qassem Suleimani in 2020, Iran launched a missile strike on two U.S. military bases in Iraq, which notably did not kill any Americans. Similarly, after Operation Midnight Hammer last June, in which the United States struck Iranian nuclear sites, Tehran responded with another missile strike—this time at a U.S. air base in Qatar, again choreographed to make a point but not prompt a wider conflict. During these previous iterations, Iran seemingly cared more about the public statement made by its missiles rather than any actual military effect.

Saudi Arabia’s Outreach to Central Asia Grows

Emil Avdaliani

On February 18, Kazakh Foreign Minister Yermek Kosherbayev paid an official visit to Saudi Arabia, where he met with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud to discuss developing political dialogue, expanding trade, economic cooperation, and cultural and humanitarian ties.

The visit is illustrative of the growing ties between Saudi Arabia and Central Asia, in which Riyadh is particularly interested in tapping into shifting connectivity in the heart of Eurasia, especially with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Burgeoning Saudi Arabia–Central Asia ties illustrate how middle powers increasingly shape regional order, operating through flexible partnerships rather than rigid blocs and challenging the assumption that great powers will dominate post-Soviet Central Asian geopolitics.

The Iran conflict edges the world closer to a new drone arms race

Dominika Kunertova

On the last day of February, the United States and Israel launched nearly 1,000 joint strikes on Iran to decapitate its regime. Even after US-Israeli military action blunted Tehran’s retaliatory capacity, Iran launched sweeping drone salvos across almost every country in the Persian Gulf. Iranian drones targeted not only US embassies and military facilities abroad––from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to Kuwait, Lebanon, and Iraq––but also key energy infrastructure, commercial airports, and luxury hotels. Even Azerbaijan and Turkey intercepted drones from Iran. After an Iranian drone struck Akrotiri, the British military air base on Cyprus, several European nations sent naval vessels to defend the island from further strikes.

By March 5, Iranian drone attacks had fallen by 83 percent, but the scale of the campaign is staggering. In total, more than 2,000 low-cost, one-way-attack Shahed-136 drones have entered the Gulf region since the war began. Out of these, nearly half targeted the UAE in the first few days. This number is slightly higher than the 810 Shahed-136-type drones that Russia launched at Ukraine in a single strike during the peak attacks of late 2025. These days, Russian strikes on civil infrastructure in Ukraine average 143 attack drones per day.

What the Iran Crisis Means for Middle Powers

EKREM İMAMOĞLU

SILIVRI PRISON, TURKEY – As I mark the first year of my confinement in Silivri Prison, events unfolding beyond these walls suggest that we are witnessing not merely a shift in policies, but the crumbling of the international order. The headlines are dominated by escalating violence in Iran and across the Middle East, offering a stark reminder that power politics is once again setting the terms of global affairs.

The Iran conflict epitomizes the “rupture” that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney described so eloquently in his address at Davos. The comfortable assumptions that shaped the past three decades – that economic interdependence would prevent conflict, that global governance would deepen over time, and that technological progress would expand freedom – are rapidly losing credibility.

Iran Gets a Vote in This War The administration doesn’t seem to have planned for that.

Mark Hertling

THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION APPEARS to have gone to war against Iran with two assumptions: First, they assumed they could adjust their objectives as the war went on based on how much they thought they would accomplish; and second, they assumed that because the United States and Israel are, together, militarily superior to Iran, they would have complete control over the timing, intensity, domains, repercussions, and outcomes of the conflict, and they could determine the end of the conflict when they decided.

Those are dangerous assumptions. Just a few weeks into the war, they are being tested. While it’s common for war aims to shift over the course of a conflict, doing so is a complicated and delicate process that requires military leaders and politicians to balance political desires against military realities. This administration, which has repeatedly proven to be improvisatory in its approach to policy and rhetoric, has so far in this conflict not been able to manage that balance between political desires and military actions.

The Iran war is causing a global energy crisis - can China withstand it?

Osmond Chia

China has long braced for a Gulf oil supply shock - but the Iran war's disruption of a key global shipping route is now putting its resilience to the test. Energy shipments from the Middle East have been at a standstill following Iran's threats to attack vessels that pass through a critical trade waterway as retaliation against US-Israeli strikes.

The blockade has led to a global oil shortage which has rocked Gulf-reliant Asian countries hard - with the Philippines mandating four-day work weeks to save fuel, and Indonesia seeking ways to avoid burning through reserves that will last just weeks. China, the world's largest buyer of oil, is also feeling the strain. But the country sits in a better position than its neighbours, after years of statecraft that have prepared it for a global energy crisis.

'It Takes Money to Kill Bad Guys': Trump's Iran War Set to Boost Profits For These Defense Contractors

Brian Bennett

In November, the Pentagon released what it called its “Acquisition Transformation Strategy.” The 46-page document opens with the picture of a flapping American flag above images of missiles, torpedoes, and drones and lays out a blueprint for putting American weapons manufacturing “on a wartime footing.”

Now an actual war is accelerating that transformation, providing a boon to U.S. weapons manufacturers.

President Trump’s attacks against Iran have depleted stocks of key weapons amid concerns that the conflict could drag on for weeks or months. But the state of those stockpiles have been a source of alarm for federal officials for years, as Ukraine and other conflicts have sapped supplies. But expanding production lines of complex weapons takes time, years in some cases. The Pentagon’s November strategy memo calls for awarding weapons makers “bigger, longer deals, so they’ll be willing to invest more to grow the industrial base that supplies our weapons.”

The Chokepoint We Missed: Sulfur, Hormuz, and the Threats to Military Readiness

Morgan Bazilian, Macdonald Amoah and Jahara Matisek

The cascading effects of disrupted maritime chokepoints are no longer the subject of simulations; they are an active crisis. As the US-Israeli military operation against Iran and Tehran’s regional military response continue, missile attacks, drone swarms, airstrikes, and maritime threats complicate commercial shipping across the region. The ongoing disruption in the Strait of Hormuz affects about 20 percent of global petroleum and 20 percent of liquid natural gas transits. It is also the subject of decades of wargaming for just this occurrence. But a lesser-known chemical also is being halted: 41 percent of global sulfur is exported. While the United States produces significant sulfur domestically, the near-total disruption of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, which accounts for approximately 50 percent of global seaborne sulfur trade flows, has compounded an already tight market. US sulfur prices have increased 165 percent year-over-year to over $650 per metric ton; and now the price has surged by 25 percent just since the Iran war began. This makes domestic procurement fiercely competitive, while also threatening the import of specific ultra-high-purity grades required for advanced manufacturing. It is squeezing one of the most consequential inputs to modern industrial power.

Supply disruptions matter because the United States consumes about 90 percent of sulfur as sulfuric acid, and sulfuric acid enables production that sustains not only economic function, but also modern warfighting. This is because it is needed for everything from the copper in the American electrical grid to the semiconductors in precision-guided munitions. The effects of the current disruption at Hormuz, therefore, do not stop at the gas pump.

Trump May Not Be Able to End This War

Pegah Banihashemi and Paul Poast

President Trump appears to careen between two opposing visions for victory in Iran: He has demanded Tehran’s “unconditional surrender” and also has signaled that he might abruptly declare victory and leave. Neither scenario is likely to end this war, because neither reflects any real understanding of the adversary.

Washington appears to have begun the conflict on the assumption that sustained military pressure would either collapse the Iranian regime or force its leadership to concede to fundamental political and strategic demands. But the Islamic Republic has demonstrated a remarkable capacity to survive crises. In fact, past crises have strengthened rather than weakened the regime’s internal cohesion.

Putin: The real winner of the US-Iran war?

Ian Bremmer

Three weeks into the US-Israeli war against Iran, the list of losers is unusually long. Iran is getting devastated. The United States is trapped in an asymmetric conflict it can't exit. Gulf states are absorbing infrastructure damage they never signed up for. The developing world is facing food and energy crises. I could keep going.

Washington and Tehran may yet declare victory, but the biggest geopolitical winner is sitting in Moscow, and he didn’t have to do anything but watch.

President Vladimir Putin couldn’t have timed this better. Russia's budget was in crisis heading into March. Oil and gas revenues had collapsed by roughly 50% year-on-year by February due to US sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil, declining purchases from India and China, and depressed energy prices. The Kremlin blew through nearly its entire full-year budget deficit target in just the first two months of 2026 and was preparing 10% cuts to non-essential spending – everything but military and social outlays. Sustaining the Ukraine war meant making tough choices.

How Europe sleepwalked into yet another energy crisis

Katya Adler

The knock-on eﬀects of the conflict now whipping through the Middle East are awakening ghosts of crises past that shook the European Union. Seven months into Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, launched in February 2022, the President of the European Commission stood at her podium in the European Parliament and accused Russia of manipulating the EU's energy market. "They prefer to flare the gas than to deliver it," proclaimed Ursula von der Leyen, as spiralling energy prices hit consumers across the continent. "This market is not functioning anymore."

"This is a war on our energy, a war on our economy, a war on our values and a war on our future," she declared, insisting that Europe was already pivoting away from Russian gas and toward more dependable partners such as the US and Norway. But fast forward four years and you find deep energy-linked frustration in the heart of Europe once again. "We swore we'd learn. We promised things would change but here we are," a highly frustrated European diplomat told me. He asked for anonymity so as to be able to speak openly.

US and Israel’s strategy to kill Iran’s top figures may prove counterproductive

Israel’s decision to authorise its military to kill any senior Iranian official on its assassination list has raised significant new questions about its so-called decapitation strategy and what it is intended to achieve.

Privately, Israeli officials have briefed their US counterparts that in the event of an uprising, Iran’s opposition would be “slaughtered”. That appears to be at odds with Benjamin Netanyahu’s strategy to pursue regime change by targeting senior figures in Iran’s political and security apparatus. Even before the outbreak of full-scale war, however, Iran experts and analysts – and some former Israeli officials – were sceptical that Iran’s clerical regime could be toppled by such strikes.

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