Proximate causes of the Israel, USA, Iran March 2026 war.

 What kicked this off? More precisely, what do I imagine could have kicked it off given the sad fact that of course I know nothing about what really happened and have no real information about it?

 Possibly Israel believed that it was at a "use it or lose" it moment with its regime penetration. Perhaps they thought that the big meeting of the regime leaders would feature a Changing Places style "man with the marked $50" moment. This would fit with the use of the pager attack against Hezbollah in 2024; it was rumoured that Hezbollah's leaders were getting increasingly paranoid about all their electronic devices and the Israelis had come to the conclusion that it was just a matter of time before the pagers themselves would be examined and dumped. 

Once Israel realised that this was their last shot at the regime they took the decision to roll the dice once more. But, Israel has got far, far more than they can of hoped for from US support, and they have bitten off more than can be chewed as a result. 

The 12 day war last year has been said to have ended with Israeli frustration. They are supposed to have felt that they had dismantled the Iranian air defence network at great cost in operational work and munition expenditure, and had then been restrained by the Americans from completing their strategic plans. They had wanted to continue beyond the strikes on the nuclear facilities and to destroy the ballistic missile inventory, then essentially deindustrialise Iran, preventing the reconstruction of the Nukes and the missiles. Now they have got the US to do that for them.

Netanyahu has achieved both one of the great diplomatic coups in history, as well as one of the greatest strategic blunders. In the short run it's clear to me that this conflict delivers great dividends for Israel. After all, what do they care about the closure of the Straits of Hormuz? Israel gets no oil from there, they are buffered by the deserts of Syria and Iraq from any ground war. While there are many suggestions that the USA will get involved in a ground campaign in Iran, Israel will point to the ground campaign in Lebanon, both directly securing Israeli interests and conveniently tieing their forces tightly to their home. Post war, Israel will dominate its neighbours and will clear away the ethnic division that have riven its society since Hamas came to power, or perhaps since the intifada. The way is then open for a secular and prosperous Israel to create its own future. 

This of course is the strategic catch. For Israel to have a future it needs either a secure international order, or the sponsorship of a global power. The opportunity of a secure international order seems incredibly distant, the Europeans are going to be completely preoccupied and completely insular for the foreseeable future. Certainly there will be no EU accession post ethnic cleansing.  There are currently two global powers, the USA and China. Russia's arm is both withered from demographic and institutional rot and burned from the Ukrainian disaster. China is heavily invested in the management of the Gulf, Israel has nothing to offer them, so it's the USA or nothing.

But Trump has done the wrong half of the job that Netanyahu needed to get done. The USA has, certainly, a developed military plan for this war, but the military part of the equation will count in the short term. In the long term there is no strategic plan, US grand strategy is out of the window and with it most of the long term utility of the US for its allies. If no one knows what it will do, or what it wants, no one can bet on it. Unfortunately for Israel there's no option. It may be ok, the caprice of US policy may yet accommodate the needs of Israel, but it may not. 

Because, the US may find that managing its interest without any allies may be more than it can do. The isolationists may get what they want - a withdrawal of interest from the world island, a recalcitrant and rebellious Canadian vassal, an emmiserated and forsaken Mexico, and the rest of the Americas by turns suspicious, afraid, and down right hostile. The rest of the world will be a distant land, of which the USA knows little and cares about only when it provides existential threat. 

But that's the golbal picture. To the south of Israel is Egypt, with more than 100m people, youth, solar power & mineral reserves. To the north is Turki, with 90m people. Israel must find some sort of accommodation with these powers, and fast. What that accommodation will be must be the focus of Israeli strategy from now on. The clock is ticking. 

What else prompted this? Was this a hare brained scheme to try to create a posture for the US mid terms? Did someone whisper to Trump that this would be another quick and easy win? Was he told that this secured his legacy? Nothing could have been further from the truth, but when you deal in lies, as Trump has all his life, then truth can feel like an odd currency.