Are We Even Ready for World War III?

     This is a good article on the possibility of WWIII. Yet, among the things the author didn't consider is the very likelihood of Iran's allies coming to defend them or to attack us. Iraq, which, as with Iran, is now largely Shia since Saddam's downfall, will surely be one. 17 years of unending occupation and bloodshed, over a million dead, two and a half million more displaced, their economy a shambles, Nisour Sq... none of these things will be forgotten.
      In fact, I'm sure these things were in the backs or even forefronts of their minds as they voted on Sunday to expel our forces (Whether we go or not remains to be seen. Almost a decade ago, a few years after Nisour Sq., they'd voted to expel Blackwater and Obama just snuck them right back in.). Our embassy is a shambles, our military persona non grata. Iraq is a suddenly big and fierce bird of prey that has just come home to roost.

      There's the Hezbollah terrorist network set up by Soleimani that is now more than a de facto government in Lebanon, one successfully replicated by the late general in Iraq and Syria (the latter of which Trump had infamously done the Pontius Pilate thing) and other countries. We were never on Hezbollah's radar before. We are now.
      That's for starters and I'm just a layman and citizen journalist who's nonetheless always keen to learn more so I can get better at my craft. And my gut and head both tell me something no pundit, journalist or blogger has ever advanced, to my knowledge-
      The Muslim mind understands the value of and the motivating power behind the martyr. They have understood it far better than the collective Western mind likely ever will. On the 2^nd, Donald Trump thoughtlessly gave the Muslim world its martyr (as if they needed another one, considering how many we've given them), he gave them the basis for global jihad. I say "thoughtlessly" because despite having illegally assassinated Soleimani five days ago, he hasn't been attending his own intelligence briefings.
      And a man insane enough to assassinate a revered figure such as Solmeimani would be insane enough to make good on his threat to bomb 52 cultural sites (which he walked back today after getting yelled at by his bosses from Saudi Arabia earlier), including mosques, within Iran. It's not important what we thought, or thought we thought, of Soleimani. All that's important is what the Muslim world thinks of him now. And they don't think of Soleimani as a terrorist. To use a rule of thumb, when last October we killed Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the IS leader, there were no serious or credible threats of retaliation. The MSM or those of us on social media, or those in the government past or present did not wring their hands about the possibility of a WWIII. Soleimani's killing is an entirely different story.
      Then there's the United States' chronic inability to even grasp, let alone effectively combat against, asymmetrical warfare, something with which we'd nonetheless had experience going to back to the early 60's when we began to ramp up Vietnam. The North Vietnamese fought us to a standstill with shit-smeared punji sticks. Then we proved our ongoing feebleness against asymmetrical warfare in Iraq and Afghanistan (aka "the graveyard of empires.").
      And out of all the things in this world that can unite Shiite and Sunni alike, it's their collective hatred of Donald Trump and America. And expelling Trump from office may not even be good enough for a down payment on the reparations the next administration would be forced to make to Iran.