Commentary: Why Washington can no longer treat Ukraine and Iran as separate wars

As the two wars increasingly collide, what looked like a geopolitical win for Russia has also become an opportunity for Ukraine, says international security professor Stefan Wolff.

Read a summary of this article on FAST.
Get bite-sized news via a new
cards interface. Give it a try.
Click here to return to FAST Tap here to return to FAST
FAST

BIRMINGHAM: When the Iran war erupted, Vladimir Putin appeared to be its biggest winner. Soaring oil prices, diverted Western attention and US military assets – they all seemed to strengthen the Russian president’s hand in his war against Ukraine.

But the longer the US-Israel war against Iran has dragged on, the more Ukraine seems to have found ways to make itself strategically useful beyond its own battlefield. 

While the world’s attention was on the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea, Ukraine struck Iranian cargo ships and their Russian navy escort in the Caspian Sea, which borders both Russia and Iran, on July 25.

It has made obvious the links between the two wars. The connections are not new, but their strategic consequences have changed. Rather than only benefitting Russia, they have also made Ukraine more strategically valuable to the US.

OPERATIONAL SUPPORT

CNA Games

Guess Word
Crack the word, one row at a time

Buzzword
Create words using the given letters

Mini Sudoku
Tiny puzzle, mighty brain teaser

Mini Crossword
Small grid, big challenge

Word Search
Spot as many words as you can
Show More
Show Less

The links between Russia and Iran have become operationally deeper, beyond the long-established weapons trade.

According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Russia has been providing “new assistance” to Iran, including satellite surveillance of four US bases in Bahrain, Jordan and Kuwait – all targets of recent Iranian strikes. 

Russia has denied the allegation. If accurate however, providing this kind of operational battlefield support would pit Moscow more directly against Washington in the Iran war. 

Drones remain the critical link between Russia and Iran, but even here, the relationship has changed. 

Moscow initially relied on Iranian Shahed-136 drones after its invasion of Ukraine stalled in 2022. In a striking reversal, Russia is now reportedly supplying Iran with upgraded Geran drones based on the original Shahed design.

ONE FRONT IN TWO WARS

But the deeper Russia-Iran partnership also has vulnerabilities. And Ukraine has found ways to exploit them and strengthen its standing with the US.

Ukraine has now also become a direct actor in the Iran war. Based on years of experience in dealing with Russian-Iranian drones, Kyiv sent military experts to the Gulf to help US, Israel and their Gulf allies to counter such attacks.

Its latest Caspian Sea strike also targeted the Iran-Russia supply chain itself, in contrast to earlier attacks against just Russian naval assets there. The flow of critical drones and drone components into Iran is now under direct threat, as are both countries’ wider maritime logistics and networks to evade oil sanctions imposed by the US and EU. 

Thus, a front in the Russia-Ukraine war has simultaneously become a front in the US-Iran war. One sustained Ukrainian operation could now serve two wars at once. 

Strikes against Russian and Iranian targets in the Caspian Sea could disrupt a critical supply chain that sustains Iran’s ability to attack US targets in the Gulf while weakening Russia’s war effort. And Ukraine has demonstrated its capacity to do so.

STRATEGICALLY VALUABLE

Supporting Ukraine is now beginning to make more strategic sense for the US, even from an America-first perspective.

More than a year after US President Donald Trump declared that Mr Zelenskyy had “no cards”, Ukraine is becoming harder to sideline.

One indication came when the two leaders met on Jul 28 in Washington. Mr Trump reiterated his commitment to licensing Ukraine to co-produce components for Patriot PAC-3 interceptor missiles and accelerate the cheaper PAC-3 ACE variant. This would ease pressure on the US-only supply chain that currently struggles to supply two simultaneous wars.

While the US president seemed to have second thoughts about the licensing deal on two days later, it is clearly not off the table.

US pressure on Kyiv to make concessions to Moscow has also receded, another sign that the Iran war has increased Kyiv’s room to manoeuvre. Taken together with Ukraine’s security cooperation agreements signed with Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar in March, these developments cement Ukraine’s role as a defence collaborator in Europe and in the Gulf. 

CHANGING CALCULATIONS, NOT TRAJECTORIES

Russia still looks like clearest net beneficiary of the Iran war.

The spike in oil and gas prices, driven by the de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz, has been worth an estimated 200 million barrels in extra revenue-equivalent for Russia, helped further by Washington’s loosening of sanctions against buyers of Russian oil like India. The diversion of Patriot interceptors away from Kyiv and towards the Middle East has weakened Ukrainian air defences and enabled Russia to intensify its missile and drone attacks on Ukraine.

However, this advantage may prove less durable in the long term for the Kremlin. Mr Trump now supports a sanctions package against countries who continue to trade with Russia and Iran, which the US Senate just moved forward in an unusually bipartisan vote.

Still, none of this is likely to fundamentally change the battlefield trajectory of either war in the immediate future. 

None of the warring parties’ stated aims have changed: Kyiv and Moscow appear unwilling to make any territorial concessions; the US and Iran remain far apart on agreeing on the future of either the Iranian nuclear programme or a regime for the Strait of Hormuz. All sides retain sufficient resources to continue fighting at current levels for some time, and they lack the incentives to stop. 

But the strategic separation between the wars is eroding. The longer the two wars continue, the more they will collide in Washington’s, Moscow’s and Tehran’s calculations and the more difficult it will be to treat them as separate problems. 

Stefan Wolff is Professor of International Security at the University of Birmingham and co-founder of Navigating the Vortex.

Sign up for our newsletters

Get our pick of top stories and thought-provoking articles in your inbox

Subscribe here

Get the CNA app

Stay updated with notifications for breaking news and our best stories

Download here

Get WhatsApp alerts

Join our channel for the top reads for the day on your preferred chat app

Join here