The war in Iran, which began with airstrikes in the first quarter of 2026, has already left behind its first month marked by devastation. In the early days of the war, it was reported that Iran’s religious leader Ali Khamenei had been killed. Although this created a shock effect, the regime confirmed Khamenei’s death and declared Mojtaba Khamenei as his successor. In the post-Khamenei period, the killing of high-level figures such as Ali Larijani through targeted operations directly struck at the decision-making mechanisms of the Iranian regime. However, these losses did not prevent the state apparatus from maintaining its military and political control, nor did they disrupt the continuity of the regime.
Heavy ballistic missile attacks by Israel on Iran’s strategic bases and by United States on logistical centers in the region have continued reciprocally. Despite claims by the United States and Israel of “precision strikes,” civilian residential areas, hospitals, and schools in Isfahan, Tabriz, and Shiraz were directly hit. One of the most widely condemned examples was the bombing of a school in Iran. In a process where thousands of civilians have lost their lives, the killing of hundreds of children has laid bare the humanitarian devastation of the attacks and the colonial nature of Western intervention in the region.
New radar systems deployed in Turkey despite rift within NATO
The war in Iran has once again brought the debate on the NATO, which Donald Trump had in fact initiated some time ago, back to the forefront. The war has further exposed strategic fractures within NATO. Pressure by the United States to draw its allies directly into the war and to completely destroy Iran’s energy infrastructure has triggered a search for strategic autonomy within the European wing, particularly in France, United Kingdom, and Spain. The United Kingdom, especially in its recent statements, said, “This is not our war.” Following these remarks, Trump made and continues to make statements targeting European countries.
Turkey, for its part, maintained its position within NATO during this process and strongly denied, through the Presidency of Communications, allegations that it had provided logistical or military support to operations, stating that its focus was on border security. However, throughout the war, missile fragments, later denied by Iran, claimed to have been launched from Iran fell into Turkey. This was frequently discussed as part of a strategy to draw Turkey into the war. It was announced that advanced radar systems, along with next-generation “Patriot” and “SAMP-T” air defense batteries, were deployed at NATO bases in Turkey, specifically Kürecik and İncirlik Air Base, to monitor ballistic missile activity in the region in real time and to ensure uninterrupted data flow to Israel’s air defense shield. Sources from the Presidency of Communications and the Ministry of National Defense stated that this reinforcement was aimed entirely at “protecting NATO’s southeastern flank” and “enhancing early warning capabilities.” However, this move has been recorded as a concrete step that escalates tensions in the region and effectively turns Turkey into a direct logistical hub of the war.
Trump administration and the us war deadlock
As the military phase of the war deepens, the strategic deadlock faced by the administration of Donald Trump has begun to be discussed more openly. According to analyses published in outlets such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, although the Trump administration had framed the war as a rapid “regime change” or “surgical intervention,” resistance on the ground and Iran’s ballistic missile retaliation have deprived the United States of the possibility of an “honorable exit” from the war. Reports based on information leaked by senior officials within the Pentagon indicate that despite Trump coming to power with a promise to “end wars,” he has, under pressure from Israel, already burned his return ticket and become trapped in a quagmire. While the collapse of the regime was expected following the assassination of Ali Khamenei, the defensive line consolidated around Mojtaba Khamenei has undermined the “quick victory” scenario envisioned by the United States. Political scientists emphasize that Trump is caught between rising anti-war protests within the domestic public and Israel’s unending military demands. They underline that this situation has inflicted irreparable damage on the global leadership image of the United States and that the White House is now attempting to buy time by intensifying attacks, lacking any clear exit strategy.
War continues on three fronts
The war, on the other hand, has not remained limited to Iran alone. Expanding across the region, the conflict has widened through simultaneous interventions by Hezbollah in Lebanon and Ansar Allah in Yemen. The controlled tension that had long persisted along the Lebanese border has turned into a full-scale war, as Hezbollah launched comprehensive ground operations and advanced missile attacks targeting military bases and logistical centers in northern Israel. According to field reports published in outlets such as Al Jazeera and Le Monde, this move by Hezbollah has severely strained Israel’s defense systems and forced the army to redeploy a significant portion of its forces to the northern front.
At the same time, intervention from Yemen has brought global maritime traffic in the Red Sea to a near standstill. Ansar Allah announced that it had targeted strategic vessels heading to Israeli ports or belonging to the United States Navy with kamikaze drones and ballistic missiles. Data reported by agencies such as Reuters and Financial Times confirm that the Houthis have effectively turned the Bab al-Mandab Strait into a “prohibited zone,” creating an irreparable rupture in the global supply chain and driving energy prices to record levels.
Breakdown in global economic infrastructure and energy supply
The destructive impact of the war on energy corridors has pushed the global economy to the brink of a collapse that could eclipse the oil crisis of the 1970s. Comprehensive reports published by Financial Times reveal that more than 60 percent of Iran’s oil production infrastructure has been rendered inoperable, while the transformation of the Strait of Hormuz into a line of fire has paralyzed the global supply chain. The rise in oil prices toward the 120-dollar-per-barrel range has triggered the risk of hyperinflation, particularly in European and Asian markets dependent on energy imports.
Bloomberg and Reuters report that the near halt of tanker traffic in the Persian Gulf has severely disrupted not only energy flows but also global shipments of food and raw materials. The designation of the region as a “high-risk war zone” by insurance companies has driven freight costs to astronomical levels, turning the prospect of a global recession into a tangible reality. Economists broadly agree that if the war continues at this pace, the massive gap in energy supply will not only drive prices higher but will also evolve into a systemic crisis that could halt industrial production across the Western world and trigger widespread social upheaval.
Strategic disaster scenarios
At this stage, as the war has moved beyond its first month, future scenarios in the global media are no longer focused on a rapid victory but rather on the regime’s unexpected resilience and the transformation of the conflict into a regional knot. In its latest analysis dated April 2026, The New York Times writes that the assassination of Ali Khamenei, far from collapsing the regime, has instead united its military and civilian wings around a more radical line under the leadership of Mojtaba Khamenei and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). According to the newspaper, a new phase is emerging in which central authority has not weakened but has instead consolidated under a doctrine of “total defense,” leading to an increase in sophisticated asymmetric attacks targeting Israel and the United States.
The Wall Street Journal, in its assessment based on sources within the Pentagon, emphasizes that the war has expanded beyond Iran’s borders into a massive “regional fire” scenario encompassing Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. This situation, it notes, has trapped Western powers in an open-ended, costly, and strategic deadlock. Meanwhile, the Financial Times points to the most immediate threat as Iran abandoning its policy of “strategic patience” and placing the nuclear deterrence card on the table as a final means of defense, a move that could trigger an irreversible global security crisis. The newspapers converge on the view that the persistence of the administration of Donald Trump in this course not only risks further destabilizing the region but also opens the door to a “strategic disaster” scenario that could make the rift within NATO permanent.
Neither foreign intervention nor oppressive regime
In a latest statement from Imralı, made public by the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) at the end of March 2026, Abdullah Öcalan described the stage reached by the Iran-centered global war as a “historical reckoning” and underlined three fundamental approaches. According to Öcalan, the first approach is imperialist interventionism led by the United States and Israel, which aims to redesign the region through colonial logic; the second approach is the status quo-oriented statism represented by the Iranian regime, which disregards the will of the peoples and focuses solely on preserving its power. Öcalan stated that both forces have trapped the peoples of the Middle East in a bloody vise and pointed out that the solution lies in the model he formulates as the “Third Way.” He said: “Thirdly, there is the line of democracy and common life that we defend through the Peace and Democratic Society Process we have developed. The developments in Iran have once again demonstrated the legitimacy and importance of the process being carried out in Turkey.”
The statement emphasizes that the Kurdish, Persian, Azerbaijani, and Baloch peoples in Iran should rely neither on foreign intervention nor align themselves with an oppressive regime. It underlines that real power will emerge through the establishment of peoples’ own self-defense and self-governing assemblies. This third approach presents it as a strategic necessity that the chaos in Iran can only evolve into lasting peace through the democratic unity of the peoples.
Leave a Reply