Are we marching toward World War?

Biswanath Bhattacharya

June 20, 2025

The world stands transfixed, breath caught in the chill air of history’s most precarious hour. It has been a week—seven fateful days—since Israel unleashed its opening strike against Iran, an act that now reverberates across continents. The ensuing air war, a relentless ballet of drones, missiles, and defiance, has transformed the Middle Eastern night into a furnace of iron and fire. The skies above ancient lands now pulse with the thunder of weaponry, each detonation a grim drumbeat in the gathering storm.

Thursday’s dawn brought no respite. Instead, it bore witness to Israel’s renewed barrage upon Iran’s nuclear bastions—an unyielding declaration that Tel Aviv will not abide the shadow of an Iranian bomb. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, a man weathered by the tempests of conflict and statecraft, has articulated with the gravitas of a commander at the gates: Israel’s aim is absolute denial—ensuring its adversary may never possess the fabled sword of nuclear weaponry. Yet, in the same breath, he leaves the door cracked open to a more seismic shift: regime change in Tehran, not the formal objective, but perhaps the unintended harvest of iron-willed resolve.

Tehran, bruised but unbroken, responds not with capitulation but with fire. Missiles and drones arch across borders, a silent armada in the night, delivering their payloads upon Israeli soil. A hospital is struck, and the tragedy of war is etched once more upon the hearts of the innocent. Iran’s resolve—an alloy forged in decades of sanctions, isolation, and ideological fortitude—remains unshaken. Surrender, in this theatre, is not within the lexicon of the Persian state. Instead, the clarion call is one of defiance: to resist, to survive, and to strike back.

Amidst this conflagration, the world’s greatest power hesitates at the crossroads. US President Donald Trump, the architect of “America First” and the avowed scourge of “forever wars,” finds himself ensnared in a dilemma that will echo through the ages. His hand hovers over the lever of intervention, the decision deferred for two weeks—ostensibly in hope of diplomatic overtures that, in the cold calculus of war, may never materialize. Tehran refuses to talk while bombs fall, a stance as unyielding as the Zagros Mountains.

Yet, the President’s own groundswell of support is fracturing at the fault lines of war-weariness. The MAGA vanguard—Steve Bannon, Tucker Carlson, and their legions—have raised the banner of isolation, warning that another entanglement in the Middle East will rend the fabric of American unity. The ghosts of Iraq and Afghanistan haunt the discourse, their lessons sharp and bloody, a chorus of caution against the seduction of righteous intervention.

Diplomatic cables flash across the globe. The UN convenes in emergency session, while NATO allies issue statements cloaked in the ambiguous poetry of international relations. The Muslim world, galvanized by faith and by outrage, rallies behind Tehran. Bangladesh, an unexpected yet unwavering ally, adds its voice to the chorus. Meanwhile, Israel peers into the abyss—friendless, save for the distant, uncertain hand of the United States. India, too, finds itself a solitary actor, its strategic calculations rendered moot by the tides of history.

The question now stalks the corridors of every capital: Are we hurtling toward the abyss of World War 3? The answer, veiled in the mists of unfolding events, is terrifyingly plausible. The alliances are brittle, the grievances ancient, and the weapons apocalyptic. One miscalculation, one spark in the tinderbox, and the world could find itself plunged into a conflagration from which there can be no return.

In this crucible, every diplomatic communique, every sortie, every word uttered from the podiums of power holds the weight of destiny. The world watches, suspended between hope and dread, as the drums of war grow ever louder. Peace, that fragile and battered banner, flutters precariously in the storm. The hour is late, the moment grave, and the specter of Armageddon no longer a distant myth, but a shape forming in the gathering gloom.

Are we marching toward World War III? The answer depends not only on the ambitions of generals and the calculations of statesmen, but on the courage of the world to step back from the precipice and choose, against the terrible gravity of history, another path.

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