Australia has long treated its alliance with the United States as the cornerstone of its national security. That instinct is understandable. The alliance has delivered intelligence access, strategic reassurance, and advanced defence cooperation, and it remains central to Canberra’s strategic posture. But in the geopolitical environment now taking shape, the more urgent question is no longer whether the alliance matters. It clearly does. The real question is whether alliance management has begun to crowd out strategic judgment.

That matters because the world Australia now faces is not simply more dangerous. It is also more coercive, more fragmented, and more demanding of political loyalty. Great powers increasingly expect alignment not only in military affairs but also across diplomacy, technology, supply chains, and public signalling. In such an environment, a middle power that mistakes obedience for strategy risks becoming not stronger, but narrower. Australia should not be afraid to balance.

Balancing is Not Abandonment

Balancing, in this context, does not mean abandoning the United States. Nor does it mean pursuing artificial equidistance between Washington and Beijing. It means something more practical and more mature: preserving room for manoeuvre, reducing overdependence on any single great power, and investing more seriously in coalitions with other middle powers facing similar pressures. The point is not to weaken the alliance. It is to ensure that the alliance does not become a substitute for judgment.

That conversation is already emerging. During his March 2026 visit to Australia, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney argued that middle powers must work more closely together or risk being sidelined in a world increasingly shaped by dominant superpowers. His trip produced new agreements with Canberra on critical minerals, and Australia joined the G7 critical minerals alliance as part of a broader effort to diversify supply chains and reduce concentration risk in sectors where China holds major leverage. Carney linked this agenda not only to economic resilience, but also to wider cooperation in defence, maritime security, trade, and artificial intelligence.

This is not anti-American. It is strategic insurance. Even close US allies increasingly recognise that the alliance alone is no longer enough. They need another layer of strategy: one rooted in middle-power coordination, economic resilience, and the collective capacity to shape outcomes rather than merely absorb them.

Strategic Agency In An Uncertain Era

A similar logic appeared at the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi, where Finnish President Alexander Stubb argued that the era of a Western-dominated world order is over and called for broader partnerships, strategic autonomy, and the avoidance of harmful dependencies. His message was not about rejecting the West. It was about recognising that in a more plural and unstable world, states need agency to remain resilient.

Australia should hear that message clearly. For too long, balancing has been treated in Australian strategic debate as a synonym for disloyalty. But that framing is analytically weak and politically unhelpful. The problem is not the alliance itself. The problem is the assumption that strategic prudence can be outsourced to alliance solidarity. In fact, history suggests otherwise.

Some scholars, especially Cheng-Chwee Kuik, might describe this posture as a form of hedging. Conceptually, that is understandable. Hedging is best understood as a strategy by which states manage risk under conditions of uncertainty, often by combining cooperative engagement with precautionary measures. But the literature also warns that the concept is often stretched too loosely, especially when the line between hedging and balancing becomes blurred. That distinction matters in an era shaped by Trumpian volatility. When uncertainty comes not only from external rivals but also from the behaviour of one’s principal ally, hedging begins to look less adequate as a mechanism.

Australia’s own historical experience reinforces the point. As shown in the context of the Australia–US Free Trade Agreement, close alignment with Washington did not automatically settle the question of whether Australia would receive proportionate economic gains. Nor has alliance proximity insulated Australia from subsequent US trade pressure.

Even after the AUSFTA, Australian exports have remained vulnerable to American tariff action, including more recent measures affecting broad categories of imports and steel and aluminium. The lesson is crystal clear: strategic alignment does not erase structural asymmetry. Under such conditions, the issue is no longer merely how to hedge risk, but how to preserve strategic agency under asymmetric dependence.

This is why balancing should not be caricatured as betrayal. A country does not strengthen an alliance by behaving like an echo chamber. It strengthens an alliance by contributing independent judgment, regional legitimacy, and the confidence to act on principle when necessary.

That matters especially in Southeast Asia. The region does not reward theatrical declarations of loyalty to distant great powers. It pays closer attention to restraint, consistency, and political judgment. Southeast Asian states have lived for years with the reality of great-power rivalry, yet most continue to prefer diversification and institutional pluralism over bloc discipline.

This is why Michael Wesley’s argument matters. Australia’s problem is not only external pressure, but strategic habit. Southeast Asia is routinely acknowledged as important, yet too often treated as peripheral in practice. As Wesley argues, Australia suffers from a kind of strategic “hyperopia”: focusing on distant great powers while overlooking the region to its north. The result is a widening gap between Australia’s strategic lens and Southeast Asia’s own political logic.

If Australia wants to be taken seriously as a regional actor rather than merely an extension of American power, it must show that it too can act with agency. It must demonstrate that its strategic voice is not exhausted by alliance reflex. This is not simply a matter of style. It is a matter of credibility.

An Australia that coordinates more deeply with Canada, Japan, India, Indonesia, South Korea, and like-minded European partners would ultimately be a more valuable US ally than one that merely echoes Washington in every crisis. Strong allies are not those without independent judgment. Strong allies are those who can contribute capabilities, legitimacy, and regional understanding that Washington itself lacks.

The Courage To Do It

Middle powers should not compete to prove who is most deferential to a superpower. They should be helping one another preserve room for manoeuvre. That is the larger significance of the recent calls for middle-power coordination from figures such as Mark Carney and Alexander Stubb. They point to the same conclusion: the stability of the Indo-Pacific will depend not only on what the great powers do, but also on whether middle powers can coordinate sufficiently to avoid being reduced to spectators in an order shaped by others.

Australia, therefore, should not fear balancing. It should fear the erosion of strategic imagination that comes from assuming loyalty alone is a substitute for judgment. In a harsher world, balancing is not a sign of hesitation. It is a sign of maturity.

The real question for Canberra is no longer whether balancing is compatible with the alliance. It is a question of whether Australia can afford not to rediscover the courage to do it.

Hangga Fathana is a Faculty Member in International Relations at Universitas Islam Indonesia, and a Senior Research Fellow (Australia-Indonesia Relations) at the Perth USAsia Centre.

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.

There is a word in Indonesian – selamat – that resists a single translation. On its own, it means congratulations. Paired with datang, it welcomes you, with the quiet implication of a safe arrival. Paired with belajar, it wishes you well in your studies—one word that does different work depending on what follows it.

This kind of layered richness exists in a language that most Australian students will never learn beyond the early years of secondary school. This is not simply a curriculum issue. It reflects how Australia engages – or fails to engage – with the country next door.

In November 2025, Asialink Education convened a national roundtable – educators, researchers, government representatives, language teachers – to grapple with a stubborn reality: Australia has struggled to sustain meaningful engagement with Indonesia through its school system, not from lack of interest, but from a systemic failure to create and sustain those opportunities. The January 2026 report from that gathering is a serious document, and its conclusions are not entirely novel. But its urgency is.

Indonesia is our nearest major neighbour and the world’s fourth most populous country. It is a G20 economy on a sustained growth trajectory, with a young population more digitally connected than many Australians might assume, and a government that has shown interest in deepening people-to-people ties with Australia. And yet, as the roundtable report documents, many Australians complete their entire education – school and university combined – without gaining even a basic conversational foothold in Bahasa Indonesia.

This is stranger than it sounds. Indonesian is, by any objective measure, one of the more learnable languages available to English speakers. No tones. No grammatical gender. No case endings. A phonetic spelling system that means you read what you see. The structure is practically an open door. It is, in the truest sense, a gift of a language – sitting at the end of our geographic street, spoken by a nation whose importance to Australia’s future is not seriously in dispute by anyone who has thought carefully about the region.

So why is enrolment declining? As the Asialink roundtable report notes, Indonesian language learning in Australia suffers from fragile pathways, with relatively few students continuing into senior secondary study. The pipeline often begins to thin in the middle years of schooling, where the subject becomes elective and students – and often their parents – quietly decide it isn’t worth the effort, choosing not to continue beyond Year 8 – a decision explored elsewhere in discussions of from sate to sour.

The roundtable identified the key points: teacher shortages, broken pathways, and structural disincentives in Years 11 and 12. All real. All worth fixing. But buried in the report’s recommendations is something quieter and more immediate – a lever capable of improving the experience of Indonesian in classrooms across the system. One of its clearest calls is to update and expand learning materials about Indonesia – to replace the ageing, culturally flat resources that still populate many Indonesian classrooms with something that reflects the country as it exists today: dynamic, digital, young, globally connected.

This is not a small thing. Teaching is relational. A student who watches a video filmed in a market in Java, hears the language in the mouths of people their own age, and sees Indonesia as a place of complexity and colour rather than a stock photograph of a temple – that student is in a different cognitive and emotional relationship with the language. They are not learning a subject. They are encountering a world. But the encounter must be structured. Pitched at the right level, introduced clearly, and scaffolded so that what students see and hear connects to what they can produce. Visual richness earns attention; structure is what makes it stick.

The research is unambiguous on this. Engagement precedes retention. Multiple exposures matter – repetition is how language becomes automatic, how a student stops translating in their head and starts speaking. But drilling without context or meaning cannot produce what keeps a student in the room past Year 8. And curiosity – genuine, culturally grounded, personally felt curiosity – is precisely what the middle years of schooling either build or destroy. Years 7 and 8 are not just a convenient administrative category. They are, as educators working in Indonesia have known for years, the window – or the continuity cliff. Catch a student there with the right teaching and materials, and you may have a future diplomat, a business leader, a researcher, or a person who can sit across a table from an Indonesian counterpart and be present in the conversation. Lose them there, and you lose them.

The Asialink roundtable calls for contemporary narratives reflecting modern Indonesia. It calls for audio-visual materials that carry authentic Indonesian voices. It calls for programs that can scale – that can reach schools across every region of Australia, not just the well-resourced ones. The report is direct: participants described the need for “new, dynamic audio-visual materials featuring authentic Indonesian teenage voices.” They argued that “the current low levels of engagement and declining language learning are not inevitable nor irreversible.” These are not radical recommendations. They are quiet ones. Practical ones. But practical recommendations still need to be acted upon.

That work is underway. A small number of Australian educators, working with Indonesian collaborators, have been producing exactly the kinds of cinematic, curriculum-aligned resources the roundtable is calling for – filmed on location in Indonesia, built for the Australian curriculum, designed not to replace teachers but to give them richer materials to work with. What has been missing is not the recognition of the problem. It is the sustained effort to address it.

Australia has a rare opportunity with a language and a neighbour. Indonesian is often treated as a niche subject. It is often framed as an exotic elective. It should be neither. It is the language of the country that matters most to our regional future – a language whose structure is practically an invitation to learn it, spoken by a people with whom we share geography, history, and an increasingly intertwined economic story. What would it look like to actually accept that invitation? To treat the teaching of Bahasa Indonesia not as an afterthought, but as one of the most strategically significant things we could be doing in our classrooms right now.

Andrew Catton is an Educational Content Specialist and a registered Indonesian, English, and Humanities teacher. He is the founder of Pondok Bahasa, an Australian education initiative producing cinematic, curriculum-aligned Indonesian language resources for schools. He has appeared before the House Standing Committee on Education’s Inquiry into Building Asia Capability and participated in the Asialink Education National Roundtable on Enhancing Australian Schools’ Engagement with Indonesia (2025).

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

In May 2025, we argued in Australian Outlook that Australia needed strategic reconfiguration in the Asia-Pacific to withstand mounting trade volatility and geopolitical pressure. Since then, the situation has escalated beyond what most policymakers anticipated.

On 20 February 2026, the US Supreme Court ruled that the President could not use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose tariffs. Within hours, the administration pivoted to Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, imposing a new 10 per cent global tariff. Estimates vary, but most place the average effective US tariff rate at roughly 10 to 14 per cent, levels not seen since the mid-twentieth century.

Eight days later, the United States and Israel launched coordinated strikes on Iran. The Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a quarter of global seaborne oil transits, was effectively shut—major shipping firms, including Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd, suspended operations. Oil prices surged above $100 a barrel, triggering significant volatility in global markets and raising inflation concerns for central banks.

For Australia, the exposure is immediate and severe. The country imports roughly 90 per cent of its liquid fuel. It holds only about 34 days of diesel reserves, well below the International Energy Agency’s 90-day benchmark, a requirement Australia has not met for over a decade. Petrol prices are already rising sharply, with increases of close to 50 cents per litre reported in some cities following the crisis. Fertiliser supplies from the Gulf, critical ahead of planting season, are under threat. From agriculture to aviation, sectors are already feeling the pressure.

At the same time, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rewriting the competitive logic of entire industries, Quantum Computing is approaching commercial viability, and Space assets are becoming contested strategic terrain. These forces have not arrived one by one. They have arrived together and are interacting.

This convergence may seem unprecedented for policymakers, but it’s familiar territory for Olympic sailors. One of our colleagues competed at the Paris 2024 Games in Marseille and has spent years racing in conditions defined by exactly this kind of simultaneous, unpredictable change.

Before one Olympic race, a critical piece of rigging failed as the crew headed to the course. The boat was still sailable but locked into a single performance mode, unable to adjust to changing conditions. Without fixing it before the start, the race would have been over before it began. The crew repaired what they could and arrived at the start line moments before the gun in the biggest race of their lives.

That experience mirrors what Australia is navigating right now. And two concepts from the sport speak directly to Australia’s strategic posture.

Tacking Through Multiple Crises

In sailing, it’s physically impossible to sail directly upwind. Progress necessitates tacking, a zigzag course where the crew alternates between angles, making lateral moves that ultimately carry the boat forward. From above, it looks inefficient. From the cockpit, it’s the only way to reach your destination.

Australia’s strategic reconfiguration demands a similar approach. Deepening ties with India, Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia, as we argued in our earlier piece, isn’t a straightforward path from vulnerability to resilience. It requires calculated lateral moves. Piloting new trade partnerships before committing fully, diversifying energy sourcing before the next corridor closes, investing in emerging strategic domains like Space technology, where Australia already has cooperative agreements with India, Japan, and South Korea, and building relationships across multiple regions in addition to an existing alliance or trade routes.

The security dimension adds urgency. Australia cannot simply optimise for commercial returns in regions with elevated geopolitical risk. It must strike a balance between commercial opportunity and security exposure, adjusting course as alignments shift and regulatory environments evolve. The current Middle East crisis makes this painfully clear. In the days following the February 28 strikes, Japanese refiners, which source approximately 95 per cent of their crude from Gulf states, requested the government to release strategic oil stockpiles. Australia’s own response options are constrained precisely because earlier choices narrowed the room to manoeuvre.

Policymakers who insist on a straight-line strategy in the current environment will find themselves stalled, much like a sailboat facing directly into the wind.

Australia’s Apparent Wind

There is a concept in sailing that warrants serious attention in Canberra, i.e., apparent wind. The wind a sailor feels on the boat is not the true wind. It is a combination of the actual wind and the boat’s own motion. Two boats in the same water, in the same breeze, can experience fundamentally different conditions based entirely on their own speed and direction.

This explains why Australia’s experience of the Hormuz crisis differs sharply from that of its neighbours. Japan sources roughly 90 per cent of its crude oil from the Gulf and faces an acute, immediate energy risk. The United States, now a net energy exporter, is relatively insulated and may even benefit from higher global prices. Australia sits somewhere in between, heavily import-dependent on liquid fuel but with substantial domestic gas production and policies that help limit prices on the east coast. The implication for Australian policymakers is significant. Benchmarking Australia’s strategic response against others is useful but can be misleading. The environment Australia actually experiences is shaped not only by global forces but by the choices it has already made, or failed to make, about its own momentum and direction. Australia’s 34 days of diesel reserves, its non-compliant strategic fuel stockpile, and its heavy dependence on imported fuel transiting vulnerable maritime corridors are all choices that now define its apparent wind.

The practical question for policymakers is not “what is happening in the global environment?” It is “given our current speed and heading, what environment are we actually experiencing?”

Strategic Agility, Not Policy Prediction

The best Olympic sailors do not succeed by predicting the weather perfectly. They succeed by developing the capability to respond when the forecast proves wrong. Australia needs to adopt the same discipline.

The country’s strategic posture has long been built around planning comprising defence white papers, trade roadmaps, and alliance frameworks. These remain important. But they share a common vulnerability. They assume the environment will hold still long enough to execute the plan. February 2026 proved it won’t. The Supreme Court ruled against presidential tariff authority. The Strait of Hormuz closed over the weekend. And these events collided with technology revolutions already reshaping global competition.

What Australia needs now is not just a better plan, but a greater capacity to act when plans fail, by incorporating the international business and security perspective. That means investing in the capabilities that enable rapid adjustment. Diversified supply chains, energy reserves that meet IEA standards, deeper partnerships across the Indo-Pacific, and institutions that can make decisions at the speed the current environment demands. It means accepting that the path to resilience will look more like tacking than a straight line, and that lateral moves toward India, Japan, South Korea, and Southeast Asia are not detours but the most direct route available.

Olympic sailors understand something that strategic planners often resist: conditions will change, plans may fail, and competitors will not wait. The question is whether Australia has built the strategic agility to respond. Right now, with 34 days of diesel and a single maritime corridor under threat, the honest answer is not yet. But the wind has not stopped blowing, and the race is not over.

Dr Arpit Raswant is an Assistant Professor of International Business at the University of Newcastle in Australia and a Visiting Researcher in Entrepreneurship and Strategy at Lancaster University in the United Kingdom. He is a former Korea Foundation Fellow and a POSCO Asia Fellow at Korea University in South Korea. His research has been published in the Journal of International Business Studies, the Journal of World Business, the Journal of Business Research, and other leading international journals. His research focuses on firm investment from social, economic, and security perspectives and is currently leading a research program on frontier markets, including Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing, and Space.  Contact: arpit.raswant@newcastle.edu.au

Dr Jiye Kim is an Assistant Professor of International Security at the University of Queensland and a researcher affiliated with the University of Sydney in Australia. Her work explores international security issues using multilingual and multi-country approaches. She specialises in international relations, focusing on the Asia-Pacific region and linking international business with security challenges, including climate, health, and Space. She is the author of The Future of the South China Sea, published by the University of Michigan Press. Contact: jiye.kim@uq.edu.au, jiye.kim@sydney.edu.au

Brin Liddell is an elite Australian Olympic sailor competing in the Nacra 17, with campaigns focused on Paris 2024 and Los Angeles 2028. Alongside his sporting career, he is completing a Bachelor of Business (Innovation and Entrepreneurship) at the University of Newcastle. His interests sit at the intersection of high-performance sport, decision-making under uncertainty, and strategic thinking in dynamic environments. Contact: brin.liddell@uon.edu.au

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

EU security partnerships are bilateral arrangements with non-EU Member States that form part of the EU Common Security and Defence Policy. These agreements are tailored to each partner and cover a broad range of security-related issues, including conflict prevention and crisis management, defence initiatives and capabilities, maritime and climate security, and the Women, Peace and Security agenda.

The EU has so far signed ten such partnerships with NATO Member States (UK, Canada, Norway, and Iceland), EU candidates and aspiring members (Albania, Moldova, and North Macedonia), and Indo-Pacific nations (Japan, South Korea, and India).

In March 2026, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Kaja Kallas, announced the conclusion of partnerships with Ghana (signalling expansion of these partnerships to Africa) and Australia.

A Security and Defence Partnership (SDP) would be part of a broader cooperation framework between the EU and Australia, which was formalised in the 2017 Framework Agreement and a much-anticipated free trade agreement, estimated to contribute AUD 10 billion annually to the Australian economy.

Why a Security Partnership Between the EU and Australia?

While security and defence remain primarily the responsibility of individual EU Member States, the EU complements and amplifies these national efforts through its Common Foreign and Security Policy. The EU’s strategy for security and defence is outlined in its Strategic Compass, adopted shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The Strategic Compass treats SDPs as “indispensable” to the EU’s efforts to promote peace and security in Europe and across the world.

The EU’s interests in the Indo-Pacific, centred on its 2021 Indo-Pacific Strategy and Global Gateway initiative, are tied to the region’s importance to EU trade and supply chains, with 40 per cent of EU trade originating from the Indo-Pacific.

Links between security and trade have been amplified amid rising geopolitical tensions and competition, not only through trade spats between major economic powers but also through regional conflicts, most recently seen in the Middle East, where offensives triggered a global energy crisis. In this context, Australia is positioning itself as a reliable and like-minded partner with whom the EU shares both values and an interest in maintaining the international rules-based order.

Australia’s National Defence Strategy, which acknowledges Australia’s deteriorating strategic environment and the need for collective security in the Indo-Pacific, also emphasises Australia’s strengths as an influential middle power with enduring democratic values and a history of safeguarding international rules.

Australia views partnerships as critical to protecting Australia’s economic connection to the world and for supporting the global rules-based order. As a member of the coalition of the willing, which has been providing significant defence support to Ukraine, Australia has also recognised that European security has implications for the Indo-Pacific region and Australia’s national security.

What Are the Benefits?

The Australia-EU SDP will not be a conventional defence alliance or direct military engagement. Instead, it will support cooperation in the domains of maritime security, foreign information manipulation and interference, cyber protection, counterterrorism, and space security priorities. The EU and Australia are already investing significant efforts in these areas.

The SDP will provide a framework for cooperation in areas such as the defence industry and supply chains, complementing existing arrangements with individual EU member states and NATO.

The partnership will also provide tangible economic benefits through enhanced defence industry procurement. Australian companies will be eligible to participate in common procurements with EU Member States, supported with financial assistance from the EU’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) instrument, in the form of loans worth up to 150 billion EUR.

Will It Be Effective?

As non-legally binding instruments, SDPs do not confer any legal obligations on the parties and can be very difficult to enforce; however, these aspects can also provide advantages.

The EU is increasingly using soft-law arrangements in its external relations with third States to circumvent the complexity of concluding traditional treaties. These shifts from ‘hard’ to ‘soft’ law can be seen in fast-developing areas, such as critical minerals, migration, energy cooperation (etc.), where flexibility and responsiveness are essential.

The relative speed at which the Australia-EU security partnership can be implemented is an obvious advantage in a rapidly changing geopolitical climate. By contrast, it took almost eight years to complete negotiations for the Australia-EU FTA, which now must be approved by qualified majority voting in the Council of Ministers and ratified by the European and Australian Parliaments to enter into force.

While soft law instruments, EU security partnerships are closely linked to hard law, in particular the EU’s SAFE regulation, which is applied in overseeing defence procurement compliance. The Australia-EU SDP could deepen the legally binding commitments outlined in Article 2 and the cooperation dialogue on foreign policy and security matters detailed in Title II of the Framework Agreement, thereby strengthening implementation of this hard-law instrument.

Supporting International Law-Based Order In the Indo-Pacific

Soft law instruments have been on the rise not only in EU external relations but also in international law. The global order in place since the end of World War II, often referred to as the ‘rules-based order’, is fundamentally changing and has been undermined by great power rivalry.

A collapse of the current rules-based order does not necessarily mean the demise of an international law-based order, which can still offer an alternative to the ‘might-is-right’ approach to international relations.

For middle powers such as Australia and many European nations, the merits of upholding an international order based on law are key to securing economic prosperity and political stability. By forming coalitions, these middle powers can effect change in building a ‘better, stronger and more just’ global order, as recently suggested by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

The Australia-EU security partnership can draw on both international relations and international law to implement a timely and flexible cooperative framework that delivers practical benefits to Australia’s and the EU’s defence and security strategies. Additionally, it also presents an opportunity for Australia to strengthen its influence and leadership in bolstering national, regional and global security.

This research is part of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission: Project 101239183 – EUOzWorld – ERASMUS-JMO-2025-HEI-TECH-RSCH at the University of Canberra. The views expressed are solely those of the authors and are independent of sources providing support.

Amanda McCue is a Churchill Trust Fellow completing a Bachelor of Laws at the University of Canberra.

Dr Ivana Damjanovic is Associate Professor of Law at the University of Canberra and Jean Monnet Research Fellow at the ANU Centre for European Studies.

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

It rests on a flattening of the problem, treating the present escalation as a discrete event detached from the broader strategic trajectory that made it conceivable.

Yet the reality is more complex. The present confrontation cannot be meaningfully understood without disentangling two distinct but interrelated dimensions: the cumulative strategic challenge posed by Iran over several decades, and the specific policy choices that have shaped the current escalation. Collapsing these into a single narrative—whether of unprovoked aggression or inevitable reaction—obscures more than it reveals.

In this sense, the debate over whether recent military actions were “justified” is, to a large extent, misframed. Iran was not targeted for a singular action, but for what might be described as the totality of its strategic posture. Since 1979, the Islamic Republic has combined ideological hostility, regional activism, and military innovation into a durable model of influence projection. Its ballistic missile development, its extensive use of non-state proxies across the Levant and the Gulf, and its sustained rhetorical hostility toward Israel have not emerged episodically, but constitute core features of the regime’s identity.

For Israel, this cumulative posture has long represented a permanent strategic dilemma. Iran’s regional network—extending through Lebanon, Syria, Gaza, and beyond—has effectively embedded pressure points along Israel’s immediate periphery. The events of 7 October 2023, and the subsequent destabilisation of the regional security environment, appear to have reinforced a long-standing Israeli assessment: that Iran’s hybrid warfare architecture, while resilient, is not immutable. The so-called “12-day war” marked a first phase in degrading this system. From this perspective, subsequent actions can be interpreted less as opportunistic escalation than as an attempt to consolidate and extend that degradation before Iran could reconstitute its capabilities.

The American calculus, while overlapping, is not identical. For Washington, Iran has represented a persistent strategic challenge since the revolution, but not necessarily one requiring immediate regime change. The objective has been more limited, if no less consequential: to constrain and weaken a long-standing adversary whose regional behaviour, nuclear trajectory, and ideological orientation have consistently undermined U.S. interests. Under Donald Trump, this logic appears to have been coupled with a broader strategic consideration that remains underappreciated in much of the current debate—namely, Iran’s position within an emerging Eurasian alignment.

Iran today is not an isolated actor. Its deepening strategic partnership with China, formalised in the 2021 cooperation agreement and reinforced through expanded technological and military collaboration in 2025, situates it within a wider architecture of influence. Its integration into forums such as BRICS+ and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation reflects a gradual repositioning toward a non-Western strategic bloc. From this vantage point, weakening Iran is not solely about addressing a regional adversary; it is also about disrupting a single node in a broader network through which China projects influence into West Asia, particularly in the energy sector and along critical transit corridors associated with the Belt and Road Initiative.

None of this, however, absolves Western or allied policymakers of responsibility for the dynamics of escalation. The collapse of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), whatever its initial limitations, removed a framework that had at least partially constrained Iran’s nuclear activities. Subsequent policies have oscillated between pressure and ambiguity, often without a clearly articulated end-state. The result has been a pattern of incremental escalation in which signalling, deterrence, and coercion have not always aligned coherently.

At the same time, the Iranian nuclear programme itself remains a central source of strategic concern—not because it has definitively crossed the threshold into weaponisation, but because of its persistent ambiguity. Developed in secrecy until its exposure in 2002, the programme has long occupied a grey zone between civilian and military potential. Iran’s enrichment of uranium to levels exceeding 60 per cent—an unusual practice for a state without declared military nuclear ambitions—has intensified these concerns. Moreover, the involvement of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in overseeing key aspects of the programme raises further questions about intent, particularly given the regime’s simultaneous insistence on its exclusively peaceful nature.

The ambiguity is not incidental; it is structural. It enables Iran to advance its technical capabilities while preserving a degree of deniability, complicating both diplomatic engagement and deterrence strategies. From a regional perspective, this ambiguity generates acute instability: it shortens breakout timelines, raises the risk of miscalculation, and increases incentives for pre-emptive action by concerned actors.

It is within this context that appeals to international law, while important, reveal their own limitations. The absence of explicit United Nations Security Council authorisation or a clearly demonstrable imminent threat complicates any straightforward legal justification for the use of force. Yet the application of legal standards in international practice has rarely been consistent. Interventions in Kosovo or Libya proceeded under similarly ambiguous legal circumstances, and were nonetheless tolerated—if not endorsed—by significant segments of the international community.

More fundamentally, the invocation of legal norms in this case sits uneasily alongside the nature of the regime it seeks to protect. Iran’s record—ranging from systematic human rights violations to support for non-state armed groups and repeated breaches of international commitments—complicates the moral clarity of purely legal critiques. This does not render legal arguments irrelevant, but it does suggest that they cannot, on their own, capture the full strategic and political context in which decisions are made.

The greater analytical risk lies in reductionism. To portray the current conflict as either wholly unjustified or wholly necessary is to obscure the interaction between structure and agency, between long-term strategic realities and short-term policy choices. Both dimensions matter, and both can generate outcomes that are at once understandable and problematic.

For middle powers such as Australia and Canada, this complexity has practical implications. Navigating such crises requires more than alignment with established positions; it demands an ability to hold multiple analytical layers simultaneously. Recognising the legitimacy of underlying security concerns need not entail endorsement of specific military actions. Conversely, critiquing escalation dynamics should not lead to dismissing the structural challenges that give rise to them.

In an international environment increasingly shaped by overlapping rivalries and diffuse threats, the capacity to resist simplistic narratives is itself a strategic asset. The case of Iran illustrates this clearly. It is not a question of choosing between competing moral absolutes, but of understanding how enduring strategic tensions and contingent policy decisions intersect—often in ways that defy easy categorisation.

Restoring nuance to this debate is not an exercise in equivocation. It is a prerequisite for any serious effort to navigate the complexities of contemporary geopolitics.

Dr Pierre Pahlavi is a full professor at the Royal Military College of Canada in the Department of Defence Studies, co-located with the Canadian Forces College, Canada’s Staff and War College. His research focuses on Iran and its asymmetric strategies, public diplomacy, and the use of force in the international system. He has published in various journals in strategic and security studies and has recently published a book in French on the Iranian revolution, Le Marécage des Ayatollahs, prized by the Académie française. He has a PhD in political science from McGill University, Montreal, Canada.

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

Africa has not been a direct theatre of recent major conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East. Nonetheless, the continent has experienced significant indirect repercussions. The Russian invasion of Ukraine, for example, led to a shortage of 30 million tons of grain in Africa, where the continent imports more than 50% of its grain from either Russia or Ukraine.  

Six African countries, including Eritrea, Egypt, Benin, Sudan, Djibouti, and Tanzania, were the worst hit by the conflict, as they rely on the warring parties for over 70% of their wheat supply. These wars have disrupted global supply chains, particularly affecting markets for fuel, food, and fertiliser. For many African economies already burdened by the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, these shocks have compounded existing vulnerabilities. 

The war in Gaza has further intensified these pressures. More recently, the escalation following U.S.–Israel strikes in Iran, which the U.S. administration has called Operation “Epic Fury,” and Iran’s subsequent response, including the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, have added another layer of uncertainty to global markets. The Strait of Hormuz is a vital maritime route through which approximately 20 per cent of the world’s petroleum is transported. But this strait is also vital for the fertiliser trade, on which most African countries rely. Its closure has revealed vulnerabilities in global energy markets, impacting economies well beyond the Middle East, including Australia. However, developing economies, especially in Africa, are likely to face the most severe consequences. 

Could Iran’s responses reach Africa? 

Since the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and several senior Iranian political figures, Tehran’s retaliation has escalated. Iranian strikes are reported to have targeted locations in Israel and multiple Gulf states, including Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain, which host U.S. military installations. While Iran’s response has mainly focused on the Gulf region, the global reach of American military deployments means that other U.S. facilities worldwide could also be targeted, either directly by Iran or indirectly through its proxies. 

Djibouti holds a notably strategic position in this context. The country hosts five foreign military bases in proximity. The U.S. installation, Camp Lemonnier, is situated only a few miles from China’s only overseas military base and is near Djibouti–Ambouli International Airport. France, Japan, and Italy also operate military facilities within the country. 

Although Djibouti is approximately 1,500 miles from Iran, it is not beyond the reach of Iranian military power. Iranian drones have already shown they can reach targets as far as the United Arab Emirates. Additionally, Iran could depend on its proxies, such as the Houthis in Yemen or Hezbollah in Lebanon, although previous Israeli attacks have significantly weakened their capabilities. The Houthis, for example, operate less than 500 miles from Djibouti across the Gulf of Aden. From Yemen, the Houthis could potentially target U.S. facilities in Djibouti with relative ease. 

Iran also has medium-range ballistic missiles capable of reaching such distances. The Khorramshahr missile, for instance, is said to carry a warhead of around 1,800 kilograms and has an operational range of about 2,000km (roughly 1,242 miles). With lighter payloads, this range could extend to nearly 3,000km (about 1,864 miles). Depending on launch site and payload configuration, Djibouti could therefore be within the potential strike range of Iranian missile systems. 

Questions remain about the accuracy and effectiveness of these systems. However, reports indicating possible Russian intelligence support for Iran’s missile programmes suggest that improvements in precision cannot be disregarded. In these circumstances, Camp Lemonnier, which hosts around 4,000 U.S. military and civilian personnel alongside approximately 1,000 local and third-country workers, could feasibly become a legitimate target. Simultaneously, Iran’s missile and drone capabilities have been countered by the advanced air defence systems deployed by Israel, the United States, and their regional allies. Nonetheless, recent developments show that these systems are not invulnerable, with some missiles and drones bypassing defensive networks. The conflict has already caused casualties among U.S. personnel, with several fatalities and additional injuries reported. U.S. President Donald Trump, while he has repeatedly commended the significant achievements in the war thus far, also cautioned about more future deaths. 

What if Djibouti were attacked? 

An attack on Camp Lemonnier would present a uniquely complex security scenario. The proximity of multiple foreign military bases means that even a minor targeting error could have significant international repercussions.  

A miscalculated strike could potentially affect installations belonging to China, France, Japan, or Italy, thereby spreading the conflict. The presence of China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) base in Djibouti adds a strategic dimension. While there is no evidence of Chinese involvement in Iranian military operations, questions could arise regarding indirect or technical forms of support, particularly given the growing strategic competition between Beijing and Washington. Some of China’s defence technologies, including components of the HQ-9B air defence system, have been sold to Iran, although some analysts have questioned their operational performance. Just before the recent invasion of Iran, it was reported that they were looking to acquire China’s CM-302 Supersonic Missiles.   

The United States and China have previously experienced tensions related to their military presence in Djibouti. In 2018, for instance, U.S. officials accused Chinese personnel of using laser devices against American aircraft operating near the base, reportedly causing eye injuries to pilots.  

Even if Camp Lemonnier itself were able to withstand or mitigate the impact of a potential strike, Djibouti’s national defence capabilities remain relatively limited. Any miscalculation in an attack could therefore have severe consequences for the host country. Furthermore, if Iranian strikes were to affect facilities belonging to U.S. allies such as France, Japan, or Italy, this could potentially drag such countries into the conflict. 

The economic implications would also be significant. Djibouti’s strategic location at the junction of the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden makes it a critical logistical hub for global trade. Ethiopia, for instance, relies on Djibouti for approximately 90 per cent of its imports. A security crisis in Djibouti would therefore disrupt regional trade flows and generate economic shocks that could ripple across the wider African continent. 

These risks help explain why many African states have historically been reluctant to host major foreign military commands. The U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), despite focusing exclusively on African security affairs, remains headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany, after most African governments declined to host it. Djibouti represents a notable exception, having chosen to host multiple foreign military bases as part of its economic and military strategy. Rental agreements with these powers generate substantial revenue for Djibouti. For instance, China reportedly pays Djibouti approximately US$20 million annually for its base. 

Although Africa largely remains outside the immediate battlefield of current geopolitical conflicts, it is not immune to spillover effects. Djibouti’s distinctive concentration of foreign military bases positions it at the crossroads of great power rivalry and Middle Eastern security issues. If Iran extends its retaliation beyond the Gulf region, U.S. facilities in Djibouti could potentially come within its operational range. 

Even if the direct impact on U.S. military assets was limited, the wider consequences for Djibouti and the African continent could be substantial. Potential disruptions to security, trade, and regional stability would affect not only the Horn of Africa but also global supply chains more generally. China’s role in this remains vital. Although Beijing continues to assert the “non-interference” policy, its expanding global security presence is significant.  

Joel Odota is a PhD student of International Relations at the Centre for Australia-Africa Relations at Curtin University. He holds a Master’s in International Relations from the Australian National University and a Master’s in Politics and International Relations from Peking University. Joel’s work focuses on China-Africa relations, Great Power rivalry, and the agency of African countries in global politics. 

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

Fifteen years after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, structural remains of Okawa Elementary School still stand. With the building’s walls and windows gone, chalkboards and chairs can be seen as you walk through the site. What remains of the school is a physical reminder of the 74 children and 10 teachers who passed away from the tsunami that destroyed Ishinomaki. The decision to preserve the ruins, however, was controversial.

Understandably, some affected families wanted the remains demolished, feeling that the site carries painful memories. The area surrounding Okawa Elementary School is quiet and sombre, as residents are no longer allowed to live there due to its vulnerability to natural disasters.

As a 2026 Indo-Pacific Cooperation Network (IPCN) Fellow, I had the opportunity to travel to Japan to learn about the country’s natural disaster preparedness strategies, explore areas impacted, and meet with communities directly affected. Now in its third year, the IPCN is organised by the Japan Foundation and the Australian Institute of International Affairs, and brings scholars from the Indo-Pacific together to research regional disaster resilience issues. This year’s program included study tours to Japan, Fiji, New Zealand, and Australia to engage with experts, communities, policymakers, and practitioners working at the intersection of resilience, regional governance, and cross-border cooperation.

During the first part of the Japan study tour, we travelled to Ishinomaki, a town of around 140,000 that was affected by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. It is commonly referred to as “3/11” as it struck on March 11th of that year, taking the lives of more than 18,000. While in Ishinomaki, we visited the ruins of Okawa Elementary School and met with those affected by 3/11. A lesson I have taken from this trip is that storytelling is an important part of disaster resilience as it prevents complacency, helps survivors process trauma, and transmits lessons across generations.

Why Memory Matters

Following natural disasters, communities rebuild homes, roads, and schools. While recovery is essential, the physical evidence of destruction disappears. Over time, it becomes more difficult to remember what happened and easier to forget the remaining risk. As new buildings replace those that were destroyed and daily life returns to normal, the disaster can begin to feel like a distant event rather than an ongoing possibility. This fading memory can lead to complacency, particularly for younger generations or new residents who did not experience the disaster themselves.

Stories of past disasters help prevent complacency. When survivors recount their experiences and how events unfolded, they keep the memory of the disaster alive long after the landscape has changed. These stories often carry details that statistics and reports cannot fully capture, such as how quickly events developed, what decisions people made in moments of uncertainty, and how communities responded to the crisis. By sharing these experiences, survivors help others understand both the reality of the disaster and the importance of remaining prepared for future risks.

Lived Experience and Emotional Resilience

During our time in Ishinomaki, we were joined by Japanese college students, including one who was from there and directly impacted by 3/11. In between meetings, the students shared their experiences during and after the earthquake and tsunami with me. They noted that despite Japanese society expecting people to keep their feelings inside and not share them with others, talking about their experiences has helped them cope. In addition to my conversation with the student, the other fellows and I met with other residents of Ishinomaki, including the president of a local business and a member of the local government at the time of 3/11. It was very powerful to hear from those who survived and listen to diverse perspectives on the horrific event.

As a result of these discussions, I have realised that while I am not a survivor myself, being able to cope with these experiences is also an important part of resilience. Survivors often carry grief, trauma, and losses long after the physical rebuilding has begun. Sharing their stories can help individuals process these experiences and make sense of what happened. In doing so, storytelling supports emotional recovery alongside physical recovery. When survivors can talk about their experiences, they can also share lessons learned. These personal accounts can inform preparedness efforts and ensure that knowledge gained through tragedy is not lost. Sharing stories also creates space for collective reflection and connection. When survivors talk about their experiences, they remind others that the disaster was not faced alone, which can strengthen community bonds.

From Memory to Preparedness

Physical infrastructure, such as the ruins of Okawa Elementary School, acts as a reminder of 3/11 for future generations. Storytelling can be a non-physical infrastructure that also serves as a knowledge-transfer mechanism, passing on what happened, what failed, and what helped people survive. Unlike physical infrastructure, it does not decay in the same way if it is actively told and retold. With natural disasters potentially occurring decades apart, entire generations may grow up without personally experiencing a major event. At the same time, many of those responsible for making critical decisions related to 3/11 are ageing, making the transmission of their stories and lessons learned even more urgent.

The stories I heard in Ishinomaki came from survivors across generations, ranging from their early twenties to their mid-seventies. Each generation holds a different relationship to 3/11, shaped by their age and experiences at the time of the disaster. Yet all of them convey emotions, lessons, and warnings that can help future generations better understand and prepare for similar events. In this way, disaster resilience is carried forward not only through archives or monuments but also through the continued sharing of lived experiences.

Disaster resilience is often understood in terms of physical measures such as seawalls, evacuation routes, and reinforced buildings. Yet storytelling plays a critical role in preserving lived experience, helping communities remain aware of risks even as landscapes and generations change. The stories shared by survivors in Ishinomaki demonstrate how disaster knowledge is carried forward through conversation and personal testimony. These narratives complement physical memorials, such as the remains of Okawa Elementary School, by ensuring that what happened is not lost over time. Listening to and sharing these stories is therefore not just a matter of remembrance; it is an active component of disaster preparedness and resilience.

John Augé is a member of the 2026 Indo-Pacific Cooperation Network. His research focuses on geopolitics, security, and climate change in the Indo-Pacific. He previously worked at the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the U.S.–Pacific Institute for Rising Leaders at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and the Tuvalu Climate Action Network. He has participated in climate conferences across the Pacific and internationally, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Conference of the Parties. He has been published in The Diplomat, writing on issues related to the Pacific Islands. He holds a Master of Arts in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and a Bachelor of Arts in International Business and Finance from North Central College.

The authors of this article is a participant of the Indo-Pacific Cooperation Network, a study-tour research programme generously funded by the Japan Foundation. You can read more about the programme here.

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.

The global race for rare earth elements (REEs) has shifted from the margins of industrial policy to the centre of geopolitics. These seventeen elements, vital for electric vehicles, wind turbines, advanced electronics, and defence technologies, form the backbone of the energy transition and the digital economy. China currently accounts for roughly 70% of global rare earth mining, 90% of rare earth separation and processing, and 93% of magnet manufacturing, which offers Beijing significant leverage over critical technologies and industrial production. This near‑monopoly has enabled China to use rare earth exports as a strategic leverage. The most cited examples include the 2010 and January 2026 restrictions on shipments to Japan during maritime disputes in the East China Sea, as well as more recent export controls used in negotiations with the United States. As geopolitical tensions deepen, governments and industries are urgently seeking alternative sources of supply.

India, which holds the world’s fifth‑largest rare earth reserves – estimated by the U.S. Geological Survey at 7 million tonnes, including cerium, dysprosium, lanthanum, neodymium, praseodymium, and terbium – remains heavily dependent on China for 80-90% of its magnets and related materials. This vulnerability became clear when China tightened exports during a trade dispute, resuming supply only after India provided end‑user guarantees that the materials would not be re‑exported to the United States. The episode served as a strategic wake‑up call for New Delhi.

Despite its sizeable reserves, India’s rare earth sector has long been underdeveloped. Production has been limited and dominated by state‑owned enterprises such as Indian Rare Earths Limited, whose regulatory framework historically discouraged private investment. This, in turn, constrained refining capacity and prevented India from fully capitalising on its resource base.

To adapt to ground realities, India launched the National Critical Minerals Mission in January 2025 to expand domestic exploration, processing, and value addition. The government has begun opening critical mineral exploration to private firms while strengthening cooperation with international partners through frameworks such as the Minerals Security Partnership (MSP), which includes the United States, Japan, Australia, and several European countries. If sustained, these reforms could position India as a key player in diversifying global rare earth supply chains. Achieving this, however, requires moving beyond mining to develop robust refining and processing capabilities, areas where China still maintains overwhelming dominance.

Within South Asia, India occupies a distinctive geostrategic position that is increasingly shaped by competing connectivity initiatives. China’s Belt and Road Initiative continue to expand infrastructure and economic linkages, while U.S.‑led Indo‑Pacific frameworks seek to build alternative supply chains. In a sense, infrastructure investments, energy corridors, and connectivity projects have become a hallmark of strategic competition in South Asia and the Indian Ocean region. Rare earth resources are increasingly becoming part of broader strategic competition, linking resource security with infrastructure development and regional influence.

India’s regional initiatives, beginning with the Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) doctrine and recently expanded into the Mutual and Holistic Advancement for Security and Growth Across Regions (MAHASAGAR), reflect a cooperative approach to regional development. These frameworks emphasise maritime cooperation, disaster relief, sustainable development, and economic connectivity across the Indian Ocean and South Asia. Integrating rare earth supply chains into this framework could open new avenues for collaboration with several regional states possessing deposits of critical minerals: Afghanistan (lanthanum, cerium, neodymium), Bangladesh (monazite, zircon), Myanmar (dysprosium, terbium), Nepal (tantalum, niobium), Bhutan (tungsten, lithium), and Sri Lanka (monazite, zircon). Yet these resources remain largely unexploited due to technological, regulatory, and financial constraints.

According to the International Energy Agency, global demand for rare earth elements is expected to increase three to sevenfold by 2040. As demand accelerates and geopolitical conflicts reshape supply networks, countries capable of providing stable and diversified sources of REEs will gain strategic influence. Collaborative exploration projects, joint processing facilities, technical training programmes, and industrial partnerships could help South Asian states leverage their mineral endowments while strengthening regional economic integration. India’s combination of resource availability, technological capacity, and geopolitical positioning uniquely positions it to lead the development of regional value chains for rare earth extraction and processing. By doing so, New Delhi could enable South Asian states to participate more actively in global supply networks while reducing excessive reliance on external powers.

India has also expanded international cooperation through the MSP framework, complementing broader efforts by partners such as Australia’s Lynas Corporation, the United States’ Mountain Pass mine, Japan’s diversification through overseas partnerships and recycling technologies, and the European Union’s Critical Raw Materials Act. Within this evolving architecture, India’s contribution – particularly through collaboration with South Asian states – could significantly enhance global supply chain resilience. By linking regional production with global demand, India can help establish a more stable and diversified long‑term developmental trajectory that transcends regional rivalries.

By strengthening domestic capacity, partnering with international producers, and fostering regional cooperation across South Asia, New Delhi can reinforce its broader role as a stabilising force in the region. A cooperative approach to critical minerals, one that connects resource development with regional connectivity and economic integration, offers the potential to transform RRE competition from a source of geopolitical tension into an opportunity for shared growth and stability.

Dr Dalbir Ahlawat is a Senior Lecturer in Security Studies in the School of International Studies at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. Dalbir.ahlawat@mq.edu.au

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.

I am always hesitant to remark on ongoing confrontations in real time. It can sometimes feel like an armchair quarterback exercise analysis conducted without complete facts. However, as the current crisis with Iran evolves, many analysts are attempting to make sense of what might happen next. When asked about the conflict, I usually frame it as a tool to consider the variables that influence occurrences rather than a prediction exercise.  

Historically, Western forces have demonstrated significant overmatch when attacking conventional infrastructure or command nodes. However, the most difficult aspect of modern conflict is the asymmetric arena in which enemies compensate for technological deficiencies through adaptability, proxies, and low-cost technology.  

That is when wars transition from linear planning to what military strategists refer to as branch plans rather than sequels.  

Several aspects stand out as being particularly significant in determining how this dispute develops. 

The Drone and Missile Equation 

One of the most crucial operational aspects to monitor in the fight with Iran is the competition between offensive missile and drone systems and defensive networks aiming to intercept them.  

Iran has invested years developing a diverse range of unmanned aircraft systems, including the Shahed-series loitering weapons. These systems rose to prominence during Russian invasion of Ukraine, when Russian forces employed Iranian-designed Shahed drones to attack Ukrainian energy infrastructure and urban targets. Their attraction is straightforward: they are reasonably priced, have a broad operational range, and can be deployed in huge numbers. 

The economic asymmetry they generate is critical to their strategic significance. A drone that costs tens of thousands of dollars can force defences to spend hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars per shot on interceptions. Even if interceptions are tactically successful, this imbalance can put a drain on defensive resources over time. 

A colleague in the United Kingdom once referred to these drones as “flying IEDs.” The parallel is simplistic, but increasingly accurate: simple, scalable weapons that impose disproportionate defensive costs.  

What’s noteworthy is how swiftly this technology has spread beyond state actors. 

The Houthis in Yemen have consistently shown this. Since late 2023, they have launched drones and anti-ship missiles against commercial vessels passing through the Red Sea, disrupting one of the world’s most crucial commerce routes. These attacks prompted international reactions, including the US-led Naval Security Initiative known as Operation Prosperity Guardian, which intended to secure shipping waterways. 

Similarly, Hezbollah has expanded its drone capabilities along the Israel border. The group has deployed reconnaissance drones and loitering weapons to investigate Israeli air defences and gather intelligence. Many of these systems have been successfully intercepted by Israeli systems such as Iron Dome and David’s Sling, but the frequency of launches illustrates how drones are increasingly being utilised for more than just strikes, such as continual surveillance and psychological pressure.  

Perhaps most striking is the degree to which drone technology has spread even among groups with limited industrial capacity. 
 
Militant groups operating in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region are increasingly using commercially adapted drones for reconnaissance and attack. According to reports from Pakistan security officials, terrorists affiliated with Taliban factions and related groups have employed drone-based explosives and surveillance platforms to attack security checkpoints and military positions, mainly in Baluchistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. 

These achievements point to a bigger trend: the democratisation of airpower.  
For the most of modern military history, powers with powerful aircraft and expensive infrastructure dominated the air domain. Today, relatively inexpensive unmanned technologies enable both state and non-state players to compete in that sector.  

The essential question going ahead is not whether drones will remain central to modern conflict, they undoubtedly will. The challenge is whether defensive technologies can evolve quickly enough to deal with their growing scale, cost asymmetry, and increased autonomy.  

In wars ranging from Ukraine to the Middle East, the battlefield has already begun to provide answers. 

Energy Flows and the Strait of Hormuz 

The second component, the flow of energy via the Gulf, is both economic and military in nature.  

The Strait of Hormuz remains one of the world’s most strategic maritime chokepoints. Approximately a fifth of global oil consumption passes via this small channel that connects the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea.  

Disruptions in this region have far-reaching consequences.  

Historically, the strait has suffered harassment and occasional attacks, although it has never been completely closed. Even during the 1980s tanker assaults during the Iran–Iraq War, shipping remained at high danger.  

If marine traffic were severely impeded today, the following repercussions would be immediate: 

• Volatility in global energy markets.  

• International naval forces face pressure to protect commercial shipping.  

• Risk of escalation among regional and global marine coalitions.  

If the United States Navy and ally ships are required to defend commerce channels, the conflict could quickly escalate from a regional conflict to a larger maritime security issue. 

Kurdish Dynamics 

Another factor that demands careful consideration is the role of Kurdish actors.  

The Kurds live in various countries, including Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and Iran. Kurdish forces have played critical roles in regional wars, particularly in the fight against ISIS.  

Kurdish factions do not form a monolith, and their political calculations frequently reflect intricate local dynamics.  

If Kurdish actors adjust their positions, whether through cooperation with external allies or internal political realignments, operational conditions on the ground may change. Such changes could have an impact on border security, regional alliances, and overall stability in northern Iraq and eastern Syria.  

In many conflicts, local actors’ actions can have as much influence on events as state decisions. 

Information and Religious Influence 

Wars are waged not simply with weapons, but also through tales.  

Statements made by major religious leaders in the region have the potential to significantly affect popular perception. One such individual is Ali al-Sistani, the Grand Ayatollah of Najaf.  

Sistani’s message holds tremendous weight throughout the Shi’a world. While he has condemned violence in the region, he has not published a religious decree specifically calling for attacks on foreign service personnel.  

That’s an important distinction.  

Religious leaders in the region may rally public sentiment, shape militia behaviour, and influence political narratives. As a result, information campaigns and communication strategies will have a considerable impact on how the conflict is perceived across the Middle East.  

In modern warfare, the information domain is as important as the actual battlefield. 

Casualties and Political Sustainability 

Another important element to monitor is casualty figures.  

Casualties influence domestic political mood, coalition cohesion, and governments’ desire to continue military operations. Even minor wars might alter quickly if casualty numbers climb unexpectedly.  

Historically, the political viability of military campaigns has been closely linked to their human cost. 

Proxy Networks and Regional Escalation 

Finally, Iran’s regional network of associated groups adds an extra element of intricacy. 

Organisations like Hezbollah and the Houthis provide Tehran with strategic depth, allowing pressure to be delivered across numerous fronts without involving direct state-to-state conflict.  

The proxy design makes escalation difficult to foresee. A localised conflict can easily spread across borders, involving more participants.  

Regional countries like Israel and Saudi Arabia have their own security assessments and red lines.  

This means that if certain thresholds are crossed, the conflict’s geographical scope may extend. 

The Real Challenge: The Aftermath 

As complex as the current phase of the conflict is, the most difficult period is expected to follow.  

Military operations can degrade capacities and damage infrastructure, but they rarely address the underlying political causes of war.  

What follows will necessitate ongoing diplomacy, reconstruction initiatives, and prudent statecraft.  

In many respects, the real test will be how well the conflict is managed after it has ended. 

A Framework for Thinking 

Finally, these factors aren’t forecasts. They are simply organising principles for comprehending a dynamic and changing conflict.  

Wars create uncertainty. Alliances alter, new parties emerge, and operational plans adjust to shifting circumstances.  

The purpose is not to know exactly what will happen, but rather to create a framework for considering what factors may influence what happens next. 

Sami Omari is an Afghan-born international relations, diplomatic, and policy consultant with extensive experience working alongside NATO, International Security Assistance Force, and the U.S. Department of State, including the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), as well as diplomatic missions on governance, conflict, and legal reform in fragile states. He previously served as a prosecutor and legal advisor in Afghanistan and later worked as a cultural and security affairs instructor with Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Australian Defence Forces, delivering training on culture, security, and civil–military relations. Mr. Omari also served as Government Liaison Manager for NATO in Afghanistan, where he worked closely with Afghan government institutions and international partners during key phases of the conflict, including the period surrounding the U.S.–Taliban Doha negotiations and the release of Taliban prisoners.

Now based in Australia, he works as a strategic consultant focusing on South and Central Asian security and strategic affairs and is currently completing a Master’s in International Relations at Flinders University.

This article is published under a Creative Commons License and may be republished with attribution.

Great‑power rivalry is reshaping the strategic environment, and smaller states such as Australia are increasingly exposed to its pressures. A dangerous structural power transition is underway, and for states without the weight to influence it, the risks are becoming existential. Recent crises — from Georgia and Ukraine to the Middle East and the South China Sea — show how quickly smaller states can be drawn into conflicts they neither choose nor control. Many have responded by seeking gains from great‑power competition, but this “gains‑maximising” hedging often raises the stakes and ultimately increases vulnerability.

A different approach is needed. Risk‑mitigating hedging — built on diversification, strategic restraint, and the cultivation of fallback options — offers smaller states a more sustainable way to preserve autonomy as rivalry intensifies. This is not a call for neutrality or disengagement. Rather, it is a recognition that in a volatile strategic environment, ambitious bets can backfire and entanglement can occur far more quickly than policymakers anticipate.

The power struggle among the major players is no longer abstract. US–China competition in the Indo‑Pacific and the Russia–West confrontation in the post‑Soviet space now define the international system. The US National Defence Strategy Commission has already warned that America “might struggle to win, or perhaps lose, a war against China or Russia,” especially if forced to fight on multiple fronts. This is the classic danger zone of a power transition: rising powers confident enough to challenge the status quo, and established powers anxious enough to push back.

In this environment, smaller states are the most exposed. They cannot shape the trajectory of great‑power rivalry, yet they bear its consequences most directly. Georgia and Ukraine illustrate how quickly local disputes can be absorbed into systemic competition. The Philippines has repeatedly found itself pulled into the US–China contest in the South China Sea. Even Australia — geographically distant from Eurasian flashpoints — has experienced punitive economic coercion and heightened strategic pressure.

Yet smaller states are not passive objects. Some navigate rivalry more successfully than others, and the difference often lies in the strategies they adopt. Malaysia, Vietnam, and Kazakhstan have preserved strategic agency despite intense pressure. They have avoided sharp binaries, resisted the temptation to enlist one great power to solve problems with another, and maintained diversified relationships across multiple partners. This has not insulated them from risk, but it has reduced the likelihood of punitive reactions and preserved room to manoeuvre. By contrast, other states — Ukraine, Georgia, and at times the Philippines — have found themselves in situations where local disputes were drawn into the orbit of great‑power confrontation, leaving them trapped in escalatory dynamics they could not control.

This comparative evidence underscores the value of risk‑mitigating hedging. It differs sharply from gains‑maximising hedging, which seeks to leverage great‑power competition by engaging deeply with one power on issues the other sees as sensitive or threatening, in the hope of extracting advantages. In a period of heightened rivalry, such strategies can narrow options and increase exposure. Risk‑mitigating hedging, by contrast, aims to preserve autonomy and reduce vulnerability as systemic pressures grow.

A risk‑mitigating strategy has four core components.

First, cautious self‑assessment. Smaller states must recognise the limits of their agency and the constraints imposed by great‑power rivalry. This does not mean fatalism; it means strategic restraint and a realistic understanding of what can and cannot be influenced. Second, engagement in lower‑stakes, non‑contentious issues. Smaller states should hedge their economic and security bets while avoiding issue areas that sit at the heart of great‑power competition. Elevating local disputes to the systemic level is a recipe for entanglement.

Third, diversification. Broad and balanced ties across multiple powers and institutions reduce dependence on any single actor and help avoid binary choices. Extra‑regional partners — Japan, South Korea, India, the EU, and middle powers in Southeast Asia — can play a crucial role in widening strategic options.

Fourth, scepticism about security assurances. Alliances with great powers have a mixed record of providing protection. Everything depends on the situational interests of the great powers themselves. Donald Trump’s transactional approach to US allies is a reminder of this. While previous administrations also calibrated their commitments according to US interests, Trump made this conditionality far more explicit — pressing allies to increase defence spending, signalling reduced willingness to underwrite European security, and framing support for partners in Asia as contingent on their contributions to US strategic goals. His renewed focus on burden‑sharing and a more selective approach to alliance obligations has reinforced this pattern, as illustrated by reports that Washington sought advance assurances from Australia on how it might respond in a hypothetical US-China conflict – a request Canberra publicly declined. This underscores how exposed smaller states remain to the shifting priorities of great powers, and why cultivating fallback mechanisms involving multilateral formats — diplomatic, economic, and security‑related — helps spread risk and reduces vulnerability.

For Australia, adopting a risk‑mitigating hedging strategy does not mean abandoning the US alliance or retreating into isolation. But it does require recognising that a hypothetical US–China war for global dominance is not Australia’s war. Issues not directly tied to Australia’s immediate interests should be deprioritised. AUKUS, in this context, is a double‑edged sword. It is intended to deter potential Chinese aggression, yet it also increases Australia’s salience as a strategic target precisely by deepening Australia’s role in the US effort to contain China. Beijing’s view of AUKUS as a “critical step by the US to construct an Asia‑Pacific NATO” reflects that. Alliances are most effective when they enhance agency, not when they lock smaller states into escalatory dynamics.

As competing great powers increasingly securitise the behaviour of smaller states, risk‑mitigating hedging offers the best chance of navigating the binary without being consumed by it. Australia cannot change the structural forces driving the US–China rivalry, but it can choose how to position itself within them. Preserving autonomy, avoiding unnecessary entanglement, and maintaining diversified strategic options will be essential for surviving a world on fire.

Dr Alexander Korolev is a Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations in the School of Social Sciences, Faculty of Arts, Design, and Architecture, at the University of New South Wales, Sydney. He received an MA in International Relations from Nankai University, Zhou Enlai School of Government, and a PhD in Political Science from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. His research interests include international relations theory and comparative politics with special reference to China and Russia, great power politics, and China-Russia-US relations. He can be reached at: a.korolev@unsw.edu.au. For more information, visit: https://research.unsw.edu.au/people/dr-alexander-korolev

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.

Since 2014, and more recently since 2022, Ukraine has been at the epicentre, unfortunately, for all the wrong reasons. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine’s eastern regions, Luhansk and Donetsk, and the occupation of Crimea in 2014, initially considered through the prism of a “hybrid war,” which history illustrates, became clearly an appeasement of the aggressor and has evolved into a full-scale invasion since 2022. According to the severely miscalculated plans of the aggressor, Ukraine’s independence was expected to be liquidated in a matter of days. However, Ukraine is still standing and fighting against one of the top five military powers in the world, yet with the help of its partners, now in the fourth year of the all-out war. For anyone who knows Ukraine’s history well, this is hardly surprising. But what is the situation now, and what has been learned from this war? What lessons can Ukraine offer to the world?

Growing Scale of the War

Over twelve years since the beginning of Russia’s war against Ukraine, the understanding of its nature and implications for the region and the wider world, including Australia, has changed significantly. While in 2014–2022 it was initially viewed as a local conflict between Russia-backed separatist forces in eastern Ukraine, this interpretation no longer holds. The scale of the war has expanded significantly: both the frontlines in the east and south and its geographically vast country, one of the largest in Europe, are the epicentres of warfare. While there is currently a stalemate on significant parts of the front, the frontline stretches for up to 1,200 km, and Russia’s aerial warfare is threatening the rest of Ukraine with daily strikes, including long-range missiles, glide bombs, and various types of drones. The scale of such attacks has become unprecedented, with more than 700 drones and missiles launched in a single day on 8 July 2025. The scale of these attacks has been enabled by Russia’s reliance on Iranian drones and its ability to circumvent international sanctions through North Korean components and Chinese supply chains.

In winter 2025, with no clear breakthrough on the frontlines, Russia employed another tactic aimed at directly affecting the civilian population. While Russia’s army continues relentlessly bombarding frontline cities and settlements, over the recent few years, and this winter in particular, it has chosen to systematically destroy electricity and utility infrastructure across the rest of the country, including the western-most cities. Such tactics are aimed at freezing the civilian population and making life in densely populated cities unbearable, which in turn would become a tool of psychological warfare to undermine the public’s will to continue resisting the aggression. Due to the massive scale of strikes and bombardments, the situation this winter was especially dire, as thousands were left without heating and with rationed electricity. At the same time, temperatures dropped to –25 to –30 degrees Celsius.

Ukraine’s Wartime Security and IT Know-How

What the years of war in Ukraine have shown is that, while initially seen primarily as a victim of Russia’s illegal aggression, Ukraine has developed several successful defence and security projects that can now offer important lessons to other countries facing security threats. Among many other innovations, Ukraine has gained expertise in drone interceptors, battlefield data systems, cyber defence and warfare, energy and utility infrastructure protection, and land demining. Just weeks after the beginning of the US- Israel war with Iran, Ukraine’s experience with the modern tactic of warfare has gained importance for global security, as it has become the first country in the world to share open battlefield data with its allies.

Ukraine’s agricultural sector has shown remarkable resilience during the war. While a significant part of eastern and southern grain- and sunflower-producing regions has become a battlefield or remains temporarily occupied, small farmers and large agricultural holdings have participated in land demining efforts. Together with its partners, Ukraine has been able to reroute its agricultural exports after Russia blocked its Black Sea ports during the early stages of the full-scale invasion. Moreover, having developed homegrown maritime drones, alongside British-French Storm Shadow missiles, Ukraine has been able to defeat Russia’s Black Sea Fleet by destroying more than 25 Russian naval vessels. These measures not only allowed Ukraine to break the blockade and open a grain corridor but also helped to maintain food security in African countries. Despite the war and the EU Commission ban on Ukraine’s grain sales in 2022, Ukraine managed to remain one of the world’s major agricultural exporters.

Ukraine’s war can teach important lessons about societal mobilisation and about the state institutions that continue to operate and provide public services under unprecedented conditions. Even though the resilience of Ukrainian soldiers and society, which should be more accurately described as a civic necessity, has now become a “buzzword,” Ukraine can teach the world how to persevere against the aggressor using modern warfare tactics and tools. In simple terms, Ukraine can teach many countries how to prepare for emergencies, organise the evacuation of military personnel and civilians from frontline regions, and provide administrative and social support for displaced populations both inside the country and abroad.

Ukraine as a New Regional Security Power

While the full-scale war is already entering its fifth year, many of these developments were achieved within a remarkably short time frame, particularly when compared with the institutional timelines required in other countries during peacetime.

This article is not intended as a celebratory account. Rather, it seeks to show how a severely miscalculated plan of aggression has, paradoxically, allowed Ukraine to emerge as an important security actor for Europe, a new security power, and a rapidly developing centre of defence innovation, including through major international partnerships. There is, however, an immensely high cost for such knowledge, counted in thousands of lost human lives and millions of internally displaced people and refugees. Ukraine’s hard-won experience should not be reduced to a mere “laboratory” for global warfare, behind which is real life.

Dr Iryna Skubii is a historian of Ukraine, the Soviet Union, and Eastern Europe. Dr Skubii is the inaugural Mykola Zerov Fellow in Ukrainian Studies and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne. Her research examines the economic, social, and environmental history of the region, with particular attention to food security and famines, commodity frontiers, and agriculture. She frequently comments on Ukraine’s political developments, Russia’s war against Ukraine, and its environmental and societal impacts for ABC News, BBC News, and SBS Ukrainian. Her essays have appeared in Inside Story, The Interpreter, and Griffith Review. Personal website: https://irynaskubii.com/

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.

On 28 February 2026, the United States and Israel launched large-scale strikes on Iran, triggering retaliatory missile and drone attacks across the region. The escalation has once again brought a central question to the forefront of geopolitical analysis: Will this crisis remain a limited confrontation, or will it risk evolving into a prolonged and exhausting conflict? Experience from the past two decades in the Middle East suggests that many wars initially perceived as limited have quickly developed into complex, multilayered crises—conflicts that reshape not only the fate of a single country but the balance of power across an entire region.

Understanding the potential trajectories of this crisis requires attention to two interconnected levels of analysis: regional and global geopolitical competition on the one hand, and Iran’s internal political and social structures on the other. Focusing on only one of these dimensions provides an incomplete picture, as internal and external dynamics often reinforce one another in complex ways.

Why the Conflict Could Become Prolonged

At the early stages of many conflicts, there is often hope that the crisis can be contained quickly. However, the experience of regional wars suggests that such expectations are frequently overly optimistic. Conflicts such as the Iraq War, the Syrian Civil War, and the Yemeni Civil War illustrate how confrontations initially perceived as limited can expand as regional and international actors become involved. When military confrontations become intertwined with the strategic interests of regional and global powers, the likelihood of escalation increases significantly.

This pattern has been reflected not only in battlefield developments but also in public statements by political leaders and international institutions. For example, António Guterres warned that the military escalation in the Middle East risks triggering a broader regional conflict with “grave consequences for civilians and regional stability,” calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities and a return to negotiations. Under such circumstances, wars often develop three common characteristics: the geographical expansion of the conflict, an increase in the number of actors involved, and the gradual erosion of national infrastructure and economic stability. Over time, this dynamic can lead to a situation in which none of the parties can achieve a decisive victory, yet the costs of continuing the conflict keep rising.

As a result, a scenario in which the current crisis ends rapidly appears relatively unlikely. A more serious possibility is that the conflict could evolve into a war of attrition—one in which neither a decisive victory nor a swift resolution becomes attainable.

Possible Paths Toward Ending the Crisis

Despite these complexities, several theoretical pathways toward ending such a conflict can be considered. One possibility is that a primary actor concludes that its strategic objectives have been sufficiently achieved. In such circumstances, the conditions for de-escalation and negotiation may emerge. Historical experience suggests that this dynamic has played a role in ending or reducing the intensity of several conflicts. For instance, the gradual withdrawal of the United States from the Iraq War reflected a reassessment of strategic priorities after years of military engagement. Similarly, diplomatic initiatives and negotiated arrangements in the later stages of the Syrian Civil War were facilitated when some external actors adjusted their expectations regarding achievable military outcomes. Yet in complex geopolitical rivalries, identifying the moment when all actors share such an assessment is difficult.

A second scenario involves internal developments within Iran. In many regional crises, shifts in domestic political orientation or foreign policy strategies have helped reduce tensions and open space for diplomacy. The negotiations that led to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action illustrate this pattern. Concluded in 2015 between Iran and the P5+1 powers (the United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia, China, and Germany), the agreement required Iran to limit uranium enrichment to 3.67 percent, reduce its stockpile of enriched uranium to about 300 kilograms, and allow extensive monitoring of its nuclear facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency, in exchange for the lifting of nuclear-related economic sanctions. Such diplomatic arrangements demonstrate how shifts in policy priorities within Iran and among major international actors can create opportunities for dialogue and de-escalation even after periods of prolonged confrontation.

Nevertheless, the simultaneous realisation of these conditions is far from straightforward. Deep mistrust among regional actors, geopolitical competition, and security calculations make a rapid transition toward stability unlikely. As a result, even when opportunities for negotiation arise, translating them into lasting stability can remain a complex and uncertain process.

The Human Cost of War

Amid geopolitical analysis, one fundamental reality is sometimes overlooked: wars inflict their greatest damage on ordinary citizens. The destruction of critical infrastructure, economic disruption, forced migration, and social insecurity can profoundly affect the lives of millions of people. Early reports suggest that the human cost of the conflict has already been substantial. According to figures compiled by Al Jazeera, at least 1,255 people have been killed in Iran since the United States and Israel launched coordinated strikes on 28 February 2026, with many of the victims reported to be civilians.

The violence has also extended beyond Iranian territory. Reports indicate that at least 13 people have been killed in Israel. At the same time, eight U.S. soldiers and several additional casualties in Gulf states have also been reported as the conflict has spread across the region.  These figures remain provisional, and casualty estimates are likely to evolve as the conflict continues and additional information becomes available.

For this reason, any scenario that can prevent the conflict’s expansion and reduce its humanitarian consequences deserves serious consideration. Even when a comprehensive political settlement seems difficult, efforts to contain the scale of violence can play a crucial role in reducing human suffering.

Strategic Deadlock and Political Transformation

In many prolonged conflicts, a moment eventually arises when the principal actors find themselves in a strategic stalemate. In such situations, none of the parties can fully achieve their objectives, yet continuing the conflict imposes steadily increasing costs. According to the theory of the Mutually Hurting Stalemate, developed by I. William Zartman, parties are most likely to pursue negotiations when they realise that neither side can achieve a decisive victory and that the costs of continuing the conflict are steadily increasing. This stage often opens space for discussions about alternative pathways to resolving the crisis.

In some cases, prolonged crises can lead to deeper transformations within political systems. Modern history demonstrates that severe political and economic crises can sometimes reshape the structure of states themselves. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the disintegration of Yugoslavia are examples of how sustained internal and external pressures can lead to significant political reconfiguration. Such transformations, however, rarely produce immediate stability and are often accompanied by considerable uncertainty and new challenges.

Self-Determination and Its Complexities

In this context, discussions about the principle of self-determination occasionally re-emerge. Although this principle is recognised in international law, its practical implementation has always been complex and politically sensitive.

Iran is a country with considerable linguistic, cultural, and historical diversity.  Scholars note that the country includes dozens of ethnic and linguistic communities that speak non-Farsi languages such as Azerbaijani, Turkish, Arabic, and Turkmen. A 2009 report by the then-minister of education, Hamid Reza Haji Babai, noted that 70% of Iranian students are bilingual.  Because the Iranian census does not collect data on ethnicity, estimates vary. Still, most studies suggest that non-Persians constitute more than half of the population, while large minority groups include Azerbaijanis, Kurds, Lurs, Arabs, Baluch, and Turkmen. Because official ethnic statistics are lacking and Azerbaijanis have experienced widespread internal migration to major cities such as Tehran, estimates vary significantly. Nonetheless, most scholars agree that Azerbaijanis are among the most ethnically, politically, and economically influential communities in the country.

For much of the past century, this diversity has been managed within a centralised political structure. Yet when states face simultaneous internal and external pressures, debates about alternative forms of power distribution can resurface. These discussions may encompass a wide range of possibilities—from governance reforms and greater decentralisation to broader forms of regional autonomy. At the same time, such debates inevitably intersect with concerns about territorial integrity and national security.

South Azerbaijan in Potential Future Scenarios

Among Iran’s regions, analysts often point to South Azerbaijan as economically, demographically, and geographically significant. Cities such as Tabriz have historically played an important role in regional commerce, industry, and political movements. Located at a crossroads linking Iran with the Caucasus and Anatolia, the region holds considerable trade and strategic potential.

Some analysts argue that regions with strong economic bases, urban infrastructure, and institutional capacity can play an influential role in periods of political change. In this context, governance reforms, greater regional autonomy, or independence could reduce internal tensions and provide space for negotiation. South Azerbaijan’s economic resources, population size, and strategic location, therefore, make it a significant factor in discussions about Iran’s possible political and regional trajectories.

An Uncertain Future

The current crisis surrounding Iran is not merely a military confrontation; it reflects broader geopolitical, political, and social tensions that have developed over many years. When this war eventually ends—whenever that may be—it is unlikely that its consequences will be limited to the cessation of hostilities. Instead, it may open wider debates about the region’s future political and security architecture.

The central question is whether the present crisis will become an opportunity to rethink governance structures and reduce regional tensions or simply add to the list of prolonged conflicts that have defined the Middle East in recent decades. The answer will shape not only Iran’s future but also the stability of the wider region.

Dr Abraham Alvandi is an Australian researcher and academic with a South Azerbaijani background. He is actively engaged in academic and leadership roles within the digital health sector. In addition to his professional work, he has held several key positions in South Azerbaijani community affairs, contributing to cultural, civic and advocacy initiatives

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.