World War 2.5

Beware Those Rushing to Declare World War III

“War, what is it good for?” — Edwin Starr
Absolutely nothing.

That is, unless you’re dealing with a regime run by madmen hell-bent on annihilating Jews, Christians—hell, the entire Western world—because their ideology cannot tolerate anything that doesn’t submit to it.

We are living in dangerous times. Scroll through social media, turn on cable news, or skim a few headlines and you’ll find no shortage of confident declarations that the world has already crossed that line. Every missile launch, every proxy attack, every geopolitical standoff gets folded into the same dramatic conclusion.

World War III has begun.

Except… it hasn’t.

What we are living through is more complicated—and more dangerous in its own way. Let’s call what’s happening globally more of a World War 2.5 vibe than what the pathetic left-wing nuts seem quick to shout from the rooftops: “It’s happening! Israel started World War 3.”

This is not a formal global war with clearly defined alliances and battlefields like we saw between 1939 and 1945. Instead, it’s a messy, interconnected set of conflicts stretching across continents, ideologies, and technologies—many of them carrying the familiar stench of antisemitism at their core.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Iran and its network of proxy militias across the Middle East.
China probing the boundaries around Taiwan.
Cyberwarfare, economic warfare, and information warfare happening in parallel.

These conflicts are not isolated. They influence each other, fuel each other, and test the global order that emerged after World War II.

Yet the phrase World War III keeps popping up everywhere.

In the social feeds of total maroons.
In newsletters from the ideological extremes of both the left and the right.
In the rhetoric of desperate candidates running for votes in the midterms.

[SIDEBAR] And then there’s California’s biggest political prima donna—Gavin Newsom—sucking on anyone-who-can-bear-him’s thumb while tap-dancing like Gregory Hines as he high-kicks off his audition to be Pantsuit POTUS ’28, spewing whatever nonsense he thinks people want to hear.

Why? Because fear travels fast—and panic sells.

Who would have thunk I’d live to see the day when the “Information Age” would become a curse?

We are living in a time when information moves at the speed of outrage. Dramatic headlines generate more clicks than considered analysis. Algorithms reward escalation, not restraint.

And the almighty buck now sits at the epicenter of what was once celebrated as a cultural watershed moment—now twisted into a darker reality that often feels impossible to escape.

There’s also a revealing pattern in who seems most eager to declare World War III. Many of the loudest voices come from the political extremes—the far left and the far right—and from online ecosystems where antisemitism increasingly thrives.

For the conspiratorial right, global conflict feeds fantasies about shadowy “globalists.” For parts of the activist left, the same narrative portrays Israel and the West as the architects of endless war—colonizers, apartheidists, imperialists.

They’re all propaganda-aholics.

This crowd isn’t capable of anything meaningful besides political theater.

Calling every escalation World War III simply proves they’re conflict junkies. Their hysteria obscures the reality we actually need to understand—and it undermines the seriousness of the moment, including the risks faced by American troops.

[SIDEBAR] The antisemitism on both sides of the spectrum — pun intended — and the hysteria they sow is the key reason why so many Americans have become “the enemies within.”

These people are not peaceniks. Time and again they reveal themselves to be vile, violent agitators who thrive on chaos.

In many ways, the forces that drove World War II never really disappeared. Authoritarian regimes still seek expansion. Democratic societies still struggle to respond with unity and clarity. They also buckle under pressure and allow illegal aliens to swarm their land, causing trouble in many unfortunate cases. And antisemitism—one of the darkest engines of the twentieth century—has returned to the streets and campuses of the twenty-first.

Not that it ever fully left, yet the echoes are unmistakable.

This is what the early stages of the 1930s looked like. And we cannot—must not—allow it to flourish again.

History didn’t neatly close the book in 1945. It simply turned the page.

That’s why the phrase World War 2.5 may better describe the moment we’re in.

The global order created after World War II is being tested from multiple directions at once. Not through a single world war—at least not yet—but through a series of overlapping confrontations that challenge the same principles of sovereignty, democracy, and stability.

Recognizing this distinction matters.

If this is World War III, then the conversation ends—panic sets in and analysis becomes moot—and global disorder takes hold.

However, if we understand this moment as something more like World War 2.5, we are forced to confront a harder truth.

History is not repeating itself exactly.

It’s evolving toward a worse order.

And the choices the world makes now will determine whether this unfinished chapter remains a series of dangerous conflicts—or eventually becomes the World War III everyone seems so eager to declare.

If you haven’t read or listened to my book, please do.

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