Has World War III Already Started?

Some experts have noted that World War II began as a series of separate conflicts in Europe, Asia, and North Africa, and that it did not become a “world war” until cross-regional linkages among allies and adversaries made it one. This raises many questions about the ongoing Russia-Ukraine and U.S.-Israel-Iran wars, the connections between these two conflicts, and their implications for a potential war in the Indo-Pacific that many fear. Chief among these questions are how these ongoing wars are linked and how they might expand to include additional participants or to make other wars more probable.

On March 25, 2026, the Center for the National Interest welcomed two expert panelists to probe these questions—

—Nikolas Gvosdev, a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College, has non-resident fellowships at the Foreign Policy Research Institute (where he is editor of Orbis) and at the Carnegie Council on Ethics in International Affairs. He is a contributing editor at The National Interest and a former TNI editor. He has co-authored and edited several books, including Decision-making in American Foreign Policy: Translating Theory into Practice and Russian Foreign Policy: Vectors and Sectors.

—Paul Poast, an associate professor in the Department of Political Science and Committee on International Relations at the University of Chicago, is also a senior nonresident fellow at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and a columnist for World Politics Review. He has written or co-authored four books, including The Economics of War, Arguing about Alliances, and most recently Wheat at War. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan.

Paul Saunders, president of the Center for the National Interest, moderated the discussion.