At this point, if Russia or China step in, I think it's on.
this post was submitted on 03 Mar 2026
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I'd argue that what characterized the world wars was direct conflict between major industrial powers. They all have nukes now, so we wouldn't get World War 3, we'd get Nuclear Armageddon 1.
What we've got instead is conflicts between proxies and allies of major industrial powers - Cold War 2. And not only are we already there, it's already scarier than the first one, since it's not just proxy vs proxy, but nuclear powers vs proxies.
It's not a war, it's a World Special Military Combat Operation.
Not really. Is anyone even backing Iran? People are mad at the US for being absolutely shit. But no one is really running to Iran's defense, as most of their neighbors don't care for them either.
Russia's busy running out of people throwing them at Ukraine. China's not going to get involved in this.
Russia and China are both providing Intel and there's speculation that they may have provided anti-air equipment as well. I don't think it's likely that either will escalate their involvement, though.
What would heat things up is probably a Pakistan/India conflict, or China making moves toward a hard reunification with Taiwan. I don't think these are likely either, but the chances increase if the Gulf conflict results in the imperial hegemony of the US diminishing.
there is no ww3 without china and they arent interested in it rn
If things become what is recognized as a world war later, it will be dated as having begun before now (and whether it is dated to the US-Israel attack or Russia's invasion may depend on things we don't know yet).
I’d say that one of the days about midway through the Syrian civil war was the first day of Cold War 2
This is about as global a war as you could possibly get. We are in the thick of it
When world wars started is determined after the fact, and I think there’s a good chance that future historians are going to land on a date that we’ve already passed.
They'll probably pick Russia invading Ukraine (that's when history started)
unless america loses (i really hope it does but without a nuclear holocaust or me personally dying)
There's not really any hard rule that says it has to be named World War 3 either. Although the third installment have been highly anticipated for a long time now, they could start a whole new franchise.
Yeah I mean the Thirty Years War and the Seven Years War were both unequivocally World Wars but aren't named that at all. Hell, stuff like the Mongol conquests could be though of as a world war.
it's not a world war unless it's happening in france among european powers. just sparkling armed conflict
France is currently completely ignoring Germany re-arming so we could be there shortly
They did announce expanding their nuclear arsenal and keeping it secret. People keep on joking about Germany attacking France but France is the only sovereign nuclear power with their own nukes in a triad (so even if new German blitzkrieg overran all land launchers immediately they could wipe Germany off the map and leave those German boys nothing but ashes back home) and if Germany did attack them they could just vaporize them.
Just the fact that they have them and are offering to share them as the US does gives France a lot of power.
It's not a world war unless France is Vichy
World War 3? No, this is Super War 1
Epic war 1*
Epic war X
The Michael Bay reboot re-release Origin story with extra nukes!
If they reboot it they should go with the original War to End all Wars
In
Fair chance we are already in it imo but whether or not that is true will be determined decades from now.