The Doomsday Clock: How Close Are We to World War III?

Let’s first briefly analyze the immense danger posed by nuclear war, as frightening summaries already appear in Western media. Annie Jacobsen, an American journalist, interviewed several former CIA agents and officials from the Department of Defense, resulting in a book that concretely shows what would happen in the event of a nuclear war. Her blunt conclusion is that in a few days, 5 billion people would die! These are terrifying figures, indicating a greater potential for destruction than ever before, reminding us of George Orwell, who, in an essay titled “You and the Atomic Bomb” written about 80 years ago, a month after the end of the second World War, already coherently explained the impact of the nuclear weapon on contemporary society:

“It is a commonplace to say that the history of civilization is largely the history of weapons. Particularly, the connection between the discovery of gunpowder and the overthrow of feudalism by the bourgeoisie has been emphasized repeatedly. And, although I have no doubt that exceptions can be invoked, I believe that the following rule would generally prove true: epochs in which the dominant weapon is expensive or difficult to manufacture tend to be epochs of despotism, whereas when the dominant weapon is cheap and simple, ordinary people have a chance. […] If the atomic bomb had proved to be something as cheap and easy to manufacture as a bicycle or an alarm clock, it might have thrown us back into barbarism, but it might also, on the other hand, have meant the end of national sovereignty and the powerful centralized police state. If, as seems to be the case, it is a rare and expensive object, as difficult to produce as a battleship, it is more likely to end large-scale wars at the price of prolonging indefinitely a ‘peace that is not peace.'”

Today’s problem is much bigger because the period of pseudo-peace has ended. Any international news site you browse, the threats of a world war are on the front page, threats made by both the American hegemon and the opposing powers, Russia and China. This pseudo-peace could only be maintained through the fear of “mutually assured destruction,” doubled by the lack of serious threats from important leaders and the observance of international law. However, currently, the threats are increasing, and international law is no longer respected even by the states that contributed to its creation.

The Gaza War

The Gaza war has begun to expand, now being fought on three fronts: in the Gaza Strip, against Hamas, in the north with Hezbollah, and on sea with the Houthi rebels. All three major Israeli ports can be blocked at any time – Haifa by Hezbollah, Ashdod by Hamas, and Eilat by the Houthi rebels – so Israel is surrounded by hostile military forces that can quickly isolate it from the rest of the world, considering that 98% of the country’s exports and imports are conducted by sea. Just the day before yesterday, the Iraqi Islamic Resistance joined these three organizations, attacking the port cities of Ashdod and Haifa alongside the Houthi rebels. Evidently, all these rebel factions are financed and coordinated by Israel’s greatest enemy, Iran, mirroring the fact that Israel receives military support from the US, and the International Atomic Energy Agency recently announced that Iran continues to expand its nuclear program, a clear signal of animosity. Thus, the Gaza war appears as a proxy war between the US and its allies and the Iran-Russia-China axis, the latter being ideologically supported by most of the world, due to the brutal attacks on civilians carried out by the Israeli army.

The main problem with the Gaza war is that there is no coherent battle or resolution plan. This fact is confirmed by the resignation of Minister Benny Gantz from the Israeli government, who cited as a reason for his resignation precisely this lack of strategy. Israel does not want to reach a resolution of the conflict, a fact demonstrated by its repeated rejections of plans approved by the United Nations Security Council. The only goal of the Israeli government seems to be the extension of the war and the drawing in of the US as a direct participant, a fact evidenced by both the attack on the Iranian embassy in Syria and the threats from Israeli ministers that they will invade Lebanon following Hezbollah’s actions that affected the Iron Dome defense system. They have already attacked Lebanon on a small scale several times, and it remains to be seen if these attacks will multiply. Any escalation that will directly involve the US will also draw deeper involvement from Iran, which will be economically supported by Russia and China, resulting in a serious prolongation of the conflict. Direct involvement of the US would be catastrophic for all other American fronts: as the “world’s policemen,” they have over 750 military bases worldwide (the UK, France, and Russia have 30 in total). With the help they need to offer both in Ukraine and Gaza, American resources are already nearly at maximum capacity, and any further redirection of resources could potentially spark dozens of conflicts in the rest of the world. Therefore, if the Americans cannot control the escalation actions of the Israelis, a truly world war could erupt.

Furthermore, the Gaza war has shown that the international order based on rules has become an illusion, with the order not being respected even by its greatest promoter, the US, which has allowed Israel to violate international law countless times. Moreover, the US violates its own internal laws, sending even more armaments to the Israeli army despite it being declared by both the UN and the US State Department as an organization that violates human rights (the Leahy Law prohibits providing military assistance to organizations that violate human rights). These evident and repeated violations of the law demonstrate that even nuclear non-proliferation treaties could be easily violated, but they also give BRICS+ countries, supporters of multipolarity and a new international system, an advantage in the power struggle, a fact highlighted by a recent title from the mainstream American magazine Foreign Affairs: “America is Losing the Arab World, and China is Reaping the Benefits.”

The War in Ukraine

Like Israel in Gaza, the US does not seem to have a plan regarding the war in Ukraine, and under these conditions, the risk of this conflict expanding increases. The US, France, Germany, and Poland have allowed Ukraine to use the weapons sent to strike targets inside Russian territory, a fact that Putin equated with a direct NATO attack against his country, as the long-range missiles are made by NATO, supplied by NATO, operated and launched by NATO contractors, whose targets are selected by NATO experts using reconnaissance data provided by NATO. This led to Putin’s grim threat that, in this case, he could also directly attack NATO countries, even from the territory of the organization’s allies. Although it was mocked by an article in CNN, cynically titled “It’s Time to Prove That Putin Is Bluffing,” this threat must be taken seriously by NATO officials, especially those in small, densely populated European countries that are easy targets for Russia’s advanced arsenal.

Additionally, the US is arming for the first time the Azov Brigade, one of the most notorious units of the Ukrainian army, indicated by Western media as being involved in torture, abuse of civilians, neo-Nazism, and excessive brutality since its inception. Therefore, exactly the type of brigade Putin wants to eliminate and that the US is not allowed to arm because of the Leahy Law! Moreover, Ukraine’s EU membership negotiations have been accelerated, and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban warned that “Europe is preparing to start a war with Russia.” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated that the US is withdrawing from Ukraine but is not against a “small nuclear war in Europe,” and that the US is confident that if it provokes a third world war, only Europe will suffer, and they will benefit. Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić also stated that “No one in the West talks about peace anymore – only about more war. The West thinks it can win and eliminate Russia. I think the West is wrong. Both sides now believe it is existential for them, so I don’t think they will find a solution other than war and everything… everything is at stake. In Europe, leaders act as great heroes, but they are not sincere and do not tell their citizens that everyone will pay a high price if war comes.” It is quite clear that the US wants to threaten Russia with the expansion of the war and eventually obtain a withdrawal from Russia, but this consequence is very unlikely. But regardless of whether the expansion of the war is actually desired or not, these threats have brought other consequences.

For example, Putin began the second stage of nuclear military exercises and sent nuclear ships and submarines to Cuba, in a “remake” that reminds us of the Cold War and the Cuban Missile Crisis, another recent moment in history that brought us very close to nuclear war (the “Doomsday Clock” was set at 7 minutes during the Cuban Missile Crisis, so no matter how dangerous that moment was, now it is at least 5 times more dangerous!). Currently, the conditions specifying the possibility of using nuclear weapons by the Russian Federation include any “attack by an adversary against critical government or military sites of the Russian Federation, whose disruption would undermine the response actions of the nuclear forces,” and Ukraine has declared that it has already carried out such an attack, although this fact has not been confirmed by the Kremlin. Russian Senator Dmitry Rogozin said that Russia will hold the US directly responsible for a Ukrainian attack on a key element of Russia’s nuclear umbrella. Moreover, high-ranking Russian diplomat Sergey Ryabkov recently stated that Russia is in the process of discussing changes to the nuclear doctrine to include less severe military actions by enemies on Russian territory, an extremely serious fact considering that Russia has the most nuclear weapons in the world, 640 more than the US, the runner-up.

The Potential War in Taiwan

By far the most dangerous current context that could spark a world war is the situation in Taiwan, where, although the US declared that it does not support the island’s independence during Xi Jinping’s visit last year, the Americans continue to support the Taiwanese army militarily. Although it does not seem as dangerous as the other two since there is no active conflict there, any escalation would directly involve the US and China, as well as their allies, in a devastating war. It would also require the reallocation of most American resources to the South China Sea, potentially leading to spectacular defeats for the US in Ukraine and for Israel in Gaza.

After China increased the number of raids in the Taiwanese air and maritime space, and President Xi Jinping declared that the Chinese army must be ready to recapture Taiwan militarily by 2027, the US approved the sale of $300 million worth of F-16 parts to Taiwan, a decision Beijing vehemently opposed, saying it undermines China’s sovereignty, but to no avail. Consequently, Chinese military planes enter Taiwanese airspace more and more often, and American Admiral Samuel Caparo began publicly presenting the American army’s battle strategy in the event of a Chinese attack, a plan called “hellscape.” This plan includes the deployment of thoUSnds of unmanned ships in the Taiwan Strait to stop a possible Chinese invasion and has already received $1 billion in funding from the US Department of Defense. Although this plan officially aims to deter a possible Chinese attack, in reality, it may achieve the exact opposite, provoking a hasty attack from China. Let’s also note that the number of Chinese nuclear weapons has increased the most in recent years, 5 times more than Russia’s, who is second regarding the number of new nuclear warheads.

The conflict between the US and China is well described by the term “Thucydides Trap,” which refers to the natural and inevitable disturbance that occurs when a rising power threatens to replace a dominant power, making violent conflict the rule, not the exception. The US and China, the Athens and Sparta of our days, have been in a cold war for more than a decade, a war declared by the US, constantly provoking China instead of calming the waters. Theoretically, the problem with this seemingly inevitable war is that the US must provoke it as soon as possible while it still has a chance to win. China’s future advantages not only stem from its much larger population, but China is the country making technological discoveries at the fastest rate, which is not surprising considering that 1.2 million Chinese engineers graduate from college every year, more than the rest of the world combined. Therefore, the quality of Chinese technology will only become better relative to that of the US, and if the US wants to maintain its hegemonic position, a conflict is inevitable and preferably (for Americans) should take place as soon as possible. However, from a realistic point of view, the US could not win this war even if it were to happen now, considering not only the other two fronts it has to support but also China’s successful strategic alliance system in recent years, with Russia at the forefront.

Renowned American economist Jeffrey Sachs recently wrote that “Washington seems to have only one goal today: more funds for the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, more weapons for Taiwan. We are getting closer and closer to Armageddon.” Disproportionate military responses, violation of international law, but especially the lack of a clear strategy for resolving conflicts, greatly amplify the possibility of a catastrophe. I hope I have succeeded in presenting a clear synthesis of the current global situation, which imminently involves the risk of triggering a nuclear war. Global peace and stability have become secondary priorities for a Washington that does not accept that American hegemony is already a thing of the past, with the Iran-Russia-China axis holding Americans in check (with the imminent risk of checkmate), today appearing to be the clear winners of the wars encouraged by the US & Co, so the “Doomsday Clock” will soon announce that we must prepare for disaster.

By Daria Gușă