With the current war between Iran and Israel being paused, the world has further felt the turbulence and uncertainty of the existing international order; especially the repeated bombing of nuclear facilities by the US and Israel has inevitably cast a huge shadow over global nuclear non-proliferation efforts.

At the media briefing for the 13th World Peace Forum held on June 26 and the 2025 "Tsinghua Salon" media salon, Professor Yan Xuetong, Honorary Director of the Institute of International Relations at Tsinghua University, outlined the timeline of the Israel-Iran conflict, profoundly analyzed the impact of recent international political events on the global order, and made macro-level judgments about the future direction of the international situation. Observers Network has compiled Professor Yan's speech and published it in full. This article has not been reviewed by the author.

Yan Xuetong:

It is a pleasure to discuss the background of this year's World Peace Forum with you all today. Perhaps you have also noticed that the attention paid to peace and security issues at recent international conferences has exceeded that for economic development issues. Let me first briefly outline the current situation, and then share some of my thoughts. First, let us look at the uncertainty brought about by the Israel-Iran conflict in the past two days.

Iranian ballistic missiles precisely strike near the Israeli stock exchange building

On June 10, U.S. and Israeli officials stated that Trump had told Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu that he opposed military action against Iran. My understanding is that this was not a deliberate statement from Trump at that time. Many people believe that the U.S. and Israel had already agreed to attack on the 13th, but according to the situation on both sides, the facts were not like that.

Trump clearly opposed military action on the 10th and believed that there was still a possibility of resuming the nuclear agreement between the U.S. and Iran at that time, and both sides had agreed to hold talks on the nuclear issue on the 15th. I think that at this point in time, Trump's public opposition to Israeli military action against Iran was sincere, because his political base—the "Make America Great Again" movement—requires him to fulfill the promise of "America First."

MAGA has always advocated that Trump should not start a war for Netanyahu's personal interests, nor should he use taxpayers' money and risk soldiers' lives, leading the United States to repeat the long-term wars in Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq that lasted more than ten years or even twenty years. MAGA insists that only if Trump "stops doing this," he can continue to gain support. Therefore, Trump's choice to publicly oppose the military strike on June 10 was essentially maintaining the support of his domestic base.

However, this incident also tells us that both the Republican and Democratic parties in the U.S. seem to be unable to escape the influence of Netanyahu's government. You can see a very strange phenomenon: Israel tells the U.S. government what policies it should adopt, and although the U.S. government is not willing, it is still forced to adopt them.

The simplest example is that after the Gaza war broke out, the U.S. provided humanitarian aid to Gaza, but the supplies were intercepted by the Israeli army during transportation and were not allowed to enter Gaza. Biden criticized Netanyahu for this, which was an open report. Biden said, "I provide military aid to Israel, and then I do a little symbolic assistance to Gaza as a gesture, but you block me, not allowing me to enter. However, Biden still couldn't stop Netanyahu.

Then, Netanyahu somehow managed to get the U.S. Congress to pass the Antisemitism Awareness Act, which means that not only is it illegal to act against Jews, but having such an awareness is also illegal. Saying something against Jews or having such a thought is illegal. Netanyahu managed to get the U.S. Congress to pass a law that contradicts the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution regarding freedom of speech, indicating his immense political influence.

By June 12, Trump said that Israel might attack Iran, but not imminently. These two sentences tell us that he had agreed to Netanyahu's plan to attack Iran, but the specific date was not clear. The next day, on the 13th, Israel launched a war against Iran. That same day, Trump said he knew that Israel would launch a war against Iran and approved Israel's request.

Satellite image after the U.S. attack on the Fordow nuclear facility

By June 19, Trump said that the reports about him approving the attack on Iran were completely fake news, maliciously fabricated lies, and that the U.S. had no intention of launching a military strike against Iran. This statement also sent a signal: the U.S. would not follow Netanyahu's instructions. Previously, there were reports that Netanyahu kept pressuring Trump to launch an attack, and then the MAGA faction in the U.S. raised objections.

MAGA insisted that the U.S. should not allow Netanyahu to decide its policy towards Iran, and the U.S. should never go to war, and even many active-duty soldiers and retired veterans openly expressed this view. Thus, on June 19, Trump firmly denied that the U.S. had attacked Iran, calling these reports "fake news." But just three days later, on the 21st, Trump announced that the U.S. had successfully attacked three Iranian nuclear facilities. The U.S. Defense Secretary revealed that Trump decided to launch the strike at the last minute.

Nevertheless, regardless of the circumstances, Trump ultimately followed Netanyahu's wishes in formulating the policy toward Iran.

By June 22, Netanyahu claimed that the U.S. military action was carried out after "full coordination" with Israel. What does "full coordination" mean? It means that Israel first persuaded the U.S., and then the U.S. agreed to take action. The U.S. military operation was entirely driven by Netanyahu. Without Netanyahu's coordination, the U.S. would not have attacked Iran, which is equivalent to the U.S. attacking Iran according to Israel's will.

At the same time, some senior members of the U.S. House of Representatives started drafting plans to prevent President Trump from launching further military interventions against Iran. Although the strike on the 22nd had already ended, they emphasized that similar actions must not happen again.

Afterward, Trump's views changed again. On the 23rd, he announced that Israel and Iran had reached a ceasefire agreement, but less than four hours later, the two countries resumed fighting. When Trump announced the ceasefire, many people said, "Look, the U.S. really has the ability, the U.S. says stop and it stops," but within less than four hours, the fighting resumed.

Trump himself admitted that it was Israel who started the attack, and he knew he couldn't control Israel. He said to reporters at the White House: "I must calm down Israel." "Israel, we just reached an agreement, and they came out and dropped a large number of bombs, which I have never seen before. This is the largest bomb I've ever seen, and I'm very dissatisfied with Israel's behavior." "These two countries have been fighting so long and so fiercely, but they don't know what they're doing!"

He was very emotional at that time. If you watch the original English video, you can hear him using a swear word starting with F to curse Netanyahu. From this, we can't help but ask: How much control does the U.S. actually have over Israel? In this war, is it the U.S. that makes the decisions, or is it being led by Israel, even being forced into making decisions it didn't want to make?

In international relations, there is a saying called "the tail wags the dog," referring to small countries dragging big countries into war, which is a common occurrence. The key is to figure out: Why is the U.S. dragged into this war?

Related information shows that Trump urgently called Israel, asking them not to attack Iran anymore; Netanyahu responded that Iran had violated the ceasefire agreement and could not cancel the military action. If this information is true, it indicates that the two sides had a heated argument on the phone. The report said it was a tough conversation, and it was unclear what the outcome would be. After some time, the Israeli government announced a ceasefire, but whether it was real or not, no one knew.

On the 24th, China's permanent representative to the United Nations also stated that they hoped this ceasefire would truly last and not be deceptive. I don't know how the media friends see it, but it seems that few people believe this ceasefire is a lasting event, most expect it to be temporary, and no one knows how long it will last.

Later, Trump attended a NATO meeting and warned that the conflict between Israel and Iran may soon break out again. This also means that the U.S. doesn't have confidence that this ceasefire is under its control, that when it tells them to stop, they will stop, or when it tells Israel to stop, they will stop. Even Trump himself feels that Netanyahu may not listen to him, which is why he gave this speech at NATO.

If we sort out the events from the 10th to now, we can see that the U.S. has not gained the initiative that many people imagine in this war, which makes the international situation very uncertain. If the U.S. government and top decision-makers are forced to make every decision, where is the certainty? Where is the certainty?

Even the decision to launch large-scale overseas strikes is delayed until the last moment, instead of being carefully planned and executed three to five months in advance. All decisions are made at the last minute. From the 10th to the 21st, it took only 11 days, and the supreme commander of the armed forces had to decide within 11 days whether to "attack" or "not attack," and this decision turned around 180 degrees within less than two weeks. Do you think this international security can have certainty?

Trump once hesitated about whether to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities, and finally used seven stealth bombers to attack Iran's nuclear facilities

Therefore, we can see from this why people feel that the current international order is becoming increasingly unstable, and the uncertainty is constantly increasing. One of the key reasons is that the U.S. itself does not have the ability to carry out military operations according to a set plan, but has to deal with the situation as it changes. However, I think it is actually possible for the U.S. to actively control related events, which is the first point.

The second thing is that when people pay attention to the war between Iran and Israel, other military conflicts also occurred during this period. Including the Ukraine-Russia conflict that has been going on for three years, the Gaza war that has been going on for almost two years, and the four-day air battle between Pakistan and India a few days ago.

Now, military conflicts are increasing, and they are no longer short-term, symbolic battles like the four-day air battle between India and Pakistan, but rather showing a trend of long-term continuation.

When the Ukraine-Russia conflict broke out, some predicted it would end within 48 hours, three days, three weeks, or three months, but now it has been over three years and is still ongoing. Similarly, when the Gaza war broke out, many people believed that Israel's campaign against Hamas was a sure thing, just a few days, but since October 7, 2023, it has been nearly two years, and the conflict continues, with new attacks yesterday.

Let's look at this situation: On May 19, 2025, Trump said that Russia and Ukraine would continue to discuss a ceasefire, and the Vatican was willing to mediate the talks. He emphasized that the conditions for a ceasefire could only be determined by Russia and Ukraine themselves, because only they understand the details of the negotiations, and no one else could resolve it. The atmosphere and tone of the talks were very amicable.

U.S. President Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky met face-to-face for about 15 minutes in St. Peter's Basilica before the funeral of Pope Francis on April 26. AFP

This is the situation on May 19, 2025, but before Trump took office, how did he envision ending this war? He said he could end it in 24 hours, and later changed his mind, saying it could be done in two weeks.

When he finally got involved in this matter on May 19, when Ukraine and Russia began negotiations, after several months—since January 20, when he took office, it has been about four to five months—only then did he deeply realize that this was something the U.S. could not decide, that the U.S. had no power to determine when and under what conditions the war would end.

He said that this could only be decided by Ukraine and Russia themselves. This is what the general public says, "You don't know the cost of firewood unless you manage the household," when he actually did it, he realized that he couldn't decide it.

Putin said in a call with Trump that a more comprehensive peace agreement could only be signed after reaching consensus on broader conditions. Russia would propose and prepare to cooperate with Ukraine to draft a memorandum containing potential peace agreements; if such an agreement is reached, both sides could achieve a ceasefire for a certain period. At this moment, we see that both sides are aware that the war cannot be ended in the short term, and signing a peace agreement is extremely difficult.

Indeed, it's not just the Ukraine-Russia conflict, but the Gaza war is also hard to achieve a lasting peace in the short term. Israel and Hamas have reached how many ceasefire agreements, constantly reaching ceasefire agreements, like men constantly losing weight, losing weight and then gaining it back, so men say losing weight is a lifelong career.

What I mean is that the trend of prolonged warfare has become evident. A ceasefire does not mean the arrival of peace. From ceasefire to achieving true peace, it may require multiple or even countless ceasefire agreements, and no one can predict exactly how many rounds of agreements it will take to achieve peace, which is another aspect of the uncertainty we see.

Also in May, on the 16th, Trump called Zelensky to mediate, but the talk didn't go well, and he accused the other side of lacking willingness to cooperate. At this point, the U.S. realized that not all countries receiving military aid would act according to the U.S. will.

I guess Trump was somewhat surprised when dealing with Zelensky. Although he might have expected some difficulties when dealing with Israel, he didn't expect it to be so complicated. This made him realize that providing aid doesn't mean he can decide the other party's actions. After the aid ends, how the other party fights is ultimately up to them. Then he also called Putin to continue discussing solutions.

We see that the situation regarding ending the war is not as many people imagine. Although the U.S. is the "number one military superpower," there are many things it cannot do. Trump had confidently said he would "end the war quickly," and on February 12, shortly after taking office, he called the Russian leader, thinking that a single phone call would be enough.

Later, we found out that this was his "diplomatic basic strategy," relying on "phone diplomacy," where everything could be resolved with a phone call. After the phone call on February 12, he was happy, thinking, "See, I can get the other party to agree to talks with just one phone call!" However, on February 18, the U.S. held the first mediation talks between Ukraine and Russia in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and officially launched it. From February 18 to today (June 26), it has been over four months, yet the conflict remains unresolved.

You can look at historical experience: The ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas only lasted one round of ceasefire dialogue, and then the conflict resumed. The first negotiation lasted 1 year, 1 month, and 7 days; from this 1 year, 1 month, and 7 days to actually reaching a comprehensive ceasefire agreement, it may take many years. Other historical cases include:

The peace talks of World War I lasted 1 year, 10 months, and 25 days;

The negotiations of the Korean War lasted 2 years and 17 days;

The negotiations to end the Vietnam War lasted 3 years, 5 months, and 24 days;

The peace negotiations between Israel and Egypt lasted 5 years, 5 months, and 1 day

Historical experience tells us that after a war breaks out, it is not as we imagine, that once a major military power appears and asks the parties to "stop fighting, everyone cease-fire," the conflict can be terminated. In fact, many wars involve superpowers, but the involvement of superpowers does not mean the conflict will quickly subside. This is the imagination of some people, which is too naive and not easy to achieve. History repeatedly proves that the involvement of superpowers often only escalates the conflict, expands the scale of the conflict, and no superpower has ever ended a conflict immediately after its involvement.

Therefore, the day after the U.S. bombed Iran on the 22nd, the Russian TV station asked me in an interview: "Will the U.S. intervention immediately trigger a world war?" I answered that the involvement of superpowers indeed escalates the conflict, but it will not turn into a world war. At present, the danger of the conflict escalating to a world war has not appeared, and it is due to nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons impose constraints and limitations on the escalation of war by superpowers. Therefore, the conflict will escalate, but not further.

Intercontinental nuclear missiles remain the greatest guarantee for peace

Now I'll summarize briefly. What we have seen is this: Since the topic today is discussing Trump's administration and changes in the international order, it needs to be clear that this administration did not start from scratch to create a new international order, but accelerated the anti-globalization process that had already begun in his previous term. In other words, the anti-globalization wave did not originate here, but was deepened based on previous foundations, resulting in an increase in military conflicts and rising uncertainty in the international community.

This time, in the military conflict between Israel and Iran, he actively bombed Iran, then immediately demanded Israel to cease fire and not fight anymore. Think about the biggest pressure he faced: Was it from Iran? From Israel? From international condemnation? No. Was it because the U.S. economy slowed down? Because oil prices fluctuated violently? Because the stock market performed poorly? Also not. The real reason he was eager to stop was the internal division crisis within the MAGA faction.

The MAGA faction is his most solid supporters domestically. If the U.S. keeps attacking Iran, and the conflict between Iran and Israel escalates into a full-scale war, the U.S. will have to be involved for a long time and send troops to fight, resulting in serious divisions within the MAGA and threatening his regime stability. The Netanyahu government understands this well and fully exploits it.

My understanding is that regardless of what atrocities Netanyahu commits in Gaza, and the brutality he inflicts on women and children, whether it's the Republicans or Democrats, the decision-makers must support Israel. Regardless of how they later criticize Israel, after criticizing, they still have to endorse Israel. I think the main driving force behind the current U.S. Middle East policy is not external or international factors, but domestic considerations. So you see, the U.S. even requires reviewing all social media accounts of students coming to the U.S., and anyone who says bad things about Israel is banned from studying in the U.S. You can imagine how much influence the Netanyahu government has on U.S. domestic and foreign policy.

Next, based on the "Israel-Iran war" and the "Ukraine war," let's look at the trends of future international changes and make a macro-level judgment. Last year, I talked about how the international order has shifted from globalization to anti-globalization; now, the uncertainty of the anti-globalization order has become even more severe, manifesting not only in the fields of war and military security, but also in economic cooperation.

In terms of military affairs, the trend of conflict is increasing, meaning that conflicts will become more frequent, not less. The Ukraine war broke out in 2022, but this war did not spread beyond its borders or attack the territories of other countries; the Gaza war is different, as it has continuously spread outward from the beginning, and getting involved in the Gaza war is not just a simple statement, but more and more countries are taking substantial military actions: Israel is striking Syria in the Golan Heights, fighting in Lebanon, the Houthi rebels in Yemen are involved, and now even attacking Iran. Therefore, this war shows a clear trend of diffusion.

Has it reached the limit? I can't say for sure, but the possibility of further diffusion cannot be ruled out. There is still a risk of the Gaza war further spreading, meaning that Israel may launch new military attacks on other middle-sized countries—whom I don't know, but at least, as Trump said, the possibility of re-engaging in a war with Iran exists.

Nuclear proliferation risks. The U.S. military strike on Iran clearly violates the basic principles of the international nuclear non-proliferation mechanism. According to the supervision arrangements of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), nuclear-armed states have the responsibility to provide security guarantees for the nuclear projects they oversee; however, in reality, Iran's nuclear facilities not only failed to receive protection but were also attacked by nuclear states. This creates a serious problem: when the U.S. attacks Iran's nuclear projects, other non-nuclear states will question whether the commitments of nuclear states to non-nuclear states are reliable.

Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Grossi, hopes Iran verifies the whereabouts of enriched uranium after the attack

Trusted, it is not enough for nuclear-armed states to claim their own assurance (whether it is China, the U.S., Russia, or France). Instead, it must be judged by non-nuclear states. This is what "Moral Realism" emphasizes: whether the morality of a great power is valid does not depend on its self-declaration, but on others' evaluations. Just as to judge whether "Yan Xuetong has morality," it is not up to himself, but depends on how others evaluate him, and this evaluation by others is the ultimate basis of morality.

The U.S. today's actions will inevitably cause non-nuclear states to doubt the reliability of nuclear powers, questioning whether they will attack the nuclear projects of non-nuclear states. As more and more countries have doubts about nuclear powers, the motivation or possibility of developing nuclear weapons will rise, which is detrimental to preventing nuclear proliferation.

Especially intriguing is that a non-nuclear state supports the U.S. in attacking Iran's nuclear facilities and supports Israel in attacking Iran's nuclear facilities, which is German Chancellor Merkel. Why? I don't know his real thoughts, but if European countries take this approach, what will be the result? Will they find an excuse to develop their own nuclear weapons? We don't know.

But Merkel's actions have caused confusion among many Europeans, and many have criticized her, saying, "Why did you say that?" What is your purpose? This shows that the risk of nuclear proliferation is increasing, not decreasing.

There is also a serious violation of human rights norms in the field of security, and Gaza is the most typical case. The mutual attacks between Iran and Israel have caused a large number of civilian casualties. However, these casualties are much smaller compared to those in Gaza.

Within two years in Gaza, over 50,000 civilians have died (some say it has reached 60,000), and the targets have been directly schools and hospitals. This exposes a serious issue: people today no longer care about complying with the laws of war, and even the verbal commitment to compliance has been omitted.

Therefore, the uncertainty of the international order is not just a change in degree, but may have a certain transformation in nature. The difference between globalization and anti-globalization is not just a change in the level of international cooperation, but a fundamental divergence in direction, whether it is moving south or north. The current anti-globalization order is a chaotic world order that we don't want to see.

The second point is the economic aspect. The first disruption of the supply chain started with the U.S.-China trade war, causing partial breakdown of bilateral supply chains; when the Ukraine war broke out in 2022, sanctions against Russia triggered more chain ruptures. Now, the conflict between Iran and Israel brings about a new round of supply chain disruptions. The current trend is that we can't see the possibility of restoring the original supply chains, but the existing trend leads to more supply chains breaking.

So you see now there is a concept called "rebuilding the supply chain," which is different from "repairing the supply chain" (restoring the broken chains to their original state), but rather starting from scratch, building a new system. This supply chain may have completely different characteristics from the old one: previously, a product may have involved hundreds of countries, but now it may be completed by only three countries, which makes the new supply chain shorter and involves fewer countries. The remaining long supply chains also face the risk of further rupture.

The U.S. continues to implement sanctions measures, and the sanction policies of the Trump era have continued into the Biden era, forming a normalized sanction and anti-globalization trend. This makes the first means of U.S. economic cooperation no longer "cooperation," but "sanctions." The most commonly used method is the imposition of tariffs, and the U.S. frequently imposes tariffs, while other countries often retaliate with tariffs, leading to mutual sanctions becoming the new normal in economic interactions. In the past, the U.S. usually only used sanctions on individual issues, but now, sanctions have become the primary means. The U.S. will first consider sanctions and then consider cooperation, with cooperation under the premise of sanctions.

Trump started a tariff war after taking office

Therefore, this state of cooperation based on sanctions, whether it belongs to "compete without breaking" or "struggle for unity," I think the concept is somewhat inaccurate. But regardless, we can see that now, before discussing cooperation, it is first necessary to discuss struggle, sanctions, and punishment, and then negotiate how to cooperate under these punishments.

This is quite different from the logic of cooperation in the era of globalization, which focused on "what benefits can cooperation bring." Now, cooperation focuses on "how to minimize the losses caused by sanctions," and its essence has shifted from expanding gains to reducing losses, pursuing relative gains.

This new normal of cooperation based on sanctions: "If you cooperate with me, I will reduce the sanctions on you a bit; if you cooperate with me, I will lower the tariffs a bit," which is a new normal of cooperation based on sanctions. Therefore, since Trump took office, whether in the security field or the economic field, there have been some new characteristics. Some existed before, but have been strengthened in this period, and some were uncommon before, but have now become a routine phenomenon.

Many people used to refer to a post-Cold War concept of a globalized international order proposed by the U.S., which was supported by many European countries, called "rules-based order." However, the Trump administration has no longer used this term. You will find that many countries that previously used this concept, such as Europe and some U.S. allies, no longer talk about "rules-based order." Originally, China was not supportive of this concept, but now the Chinese government has started to discuss "rules-based order," and we have begun to take up this topic for discussion.

Although Trump has not explicitly proposed to establish what kind of international order, his "phone diplomacy" has already shown that he only communicates with the highest leaders of various countries, not with lower-level officials. Personally, I understand this as: he is trying to establish an international order based on personal deals between decision-makers, which is an important shift.

When the order and rules are based, we can discuss who violated the rules and who was right or wrong, and act according to the correct side, at least there is a set of guiding principles. But if everything is based on personal phone agreements (deals), can you imagine the consequences?

No one knows exactly what was agreed upon in the phone call; even if an agreement was reached, it is unclear whether both sides had a complete understanding of "that matter."

For example, Trump called Netanyahu and agreed on a four-hour ceasefire, but after four hours, the war reignited. Then Netanyahu argued in the phone call, "I didn't mean that, you misunderstood."

Therefore, an order based on personal phone deals is essentially uncertain, because you don't know the standards, you don't know the content, and you can't confirm whether both sides truly understood each other's intentions. If both sides are talking past each other, if I think he meant that, and he says he misunderstood my meaning, how to solve it? An order based on personal deals is destined to be full of uncertainties, because its foundation itself is unstable.

Today, I have shared these views, and I hope you will criticize any errors.

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