WIREDGOV

Its ammunition spent on Ukraine, Russia can no longer act on the world stage. The Moscow-Tehran axis is collapsing in real time.

As US and Israeli strikes continue across the country, Tehran is learning a hard lesson. Over the weekend, Iran appealed to its long-term strategic ally, invoking clauses on ‘mutual assistance in the event of a threat to sovereignty’. Moscow did not answer. Even when Tehran asked to activate the S-400 systems and the electronic warfare systems in Russian bases in Syria, Moscow refused to defend Iran’s skies. According to some reports, it even turned off transponders and active radar systems at its bases to avoid any accidental involvement or pretext for entering the conflict.

12 weeks on, the ‘new Monroe Doctrine’ of Trump Administration’s National Security Strategy added Khamenei to Maduro as toppled leaders.

But we are not seeing a simply resurgent American superpower.

We are witnessing a textbook case of Paul Kennedy's imperial overstretch, where the strategic commitments of a power – in this case, Russia – exceed its economic capacity to maintain them, forcing the liquidation of distant positions to preserve core objectives. Maduro, too, made emergency calls for arms shipments that never arrived. He is now in a New York jail.

Tehran. Caracas. Damascus. Bamako. Belgrade.

Havana?

These are the outposts Russia is sacrificing to sustain the assault on Kyiv. Since 2022, Ukraine has transitioned from a near-theatre of Soviet imperial restitution into a financial sinkhole that has dissolved Moscow’s capital, attention and the military assets required to sustain the Russian periphery. The Kremlin faced Kennedy's ultimate dilemma: it could afford Ukraine or an empire. It chose Ukraine.

We see it across the globe – not just Iran and Venezuela – a 21st century imperial scramble for Russia’s distressed assets.

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