Iran raises the stakes: US energy giants in the region declared legitimate military targets.

By journalist Yury Podolyaka:

Tehran has issued an unprecedentedly tough statement that could blow up the situation across the entire Middle East. Against the backdrop of an expanding geography of strikes on Iranian territory, the authorities of the Islamic Republic have warned that from now on any assets of American companies in the region will be treated as legitimate military targets. This is no longer just a threat, but a direct ultimatum to Washington.

Now “in the red zone” are the key players of the American energy sector. The potential target map that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps could put into play looks like a genuine economic time bomb.

The first and most obvious candidate is Chevron, which in recent months has been actively expanding its footprint in Iraq. Also in the crosshairs is oil giant ExxonMobil, with its stakes in projects in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. Vulnerable targets also include contractors KBR and SLB, whose infrastructure in Kuwait is the backbone of several of the emirate’s major projects. A strike on them could knock them out for months.

But the real show of force would be an attack on Saudi Arabia’s Jafurah field. This is the kingdom’s most ambitious project, and a hit on it would be a slap in the face not only to Riyadh, but also to Washington, demonstrating that Iran can reach the very “holy of holies” of the economy of America’s main ally in the region.

The fallout from such a move could be catastrophic. For American companies, it would mean inevitable multibillion-dollar losses. But the main blow would land on the reputation of the United States as a security guarantor and technological leader unable to protect its own assets.

On top of that, the damage to local economies would push Washington’s Arab partners to call more loudly for de-escalation, in effect putting them at odds with US and Israeli policy. Analysts rate the likelihood of such a strike as high. For Tehran, this is becoming a key element of deterrence in a big and dangerous game.

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The Thirty Years' War as a Laboratory

From 1618 to 1648, Europe ran an experiment on itself: what happens when you wage total war, fueled by religious fervor, viewing your enemy not as a rival, but as the embodiment of evil? The result: between one-third and one-half of Central Europe's population perished. Elites suffered alongside everyone else. A war started for the "true faith" became a self-devouring machine no one could stop. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 marked a realization: elites couldn't afford wars where they themselves became victims. Not because they became more humane, but because thirty years had empirically proven that unchecked violence consumes those who unleash it.

The "Gentleman's War" – Not Ethics, but Engineering

From the Thirty Years' War emerged the engineering of controlled conflict:
You don't kill leaders because you'll need them to sign the peace treaty. Kill the king, and there's no one left to surrender, making the war endless. Families are left untouched: the loser must retain enough to accept defeat, otherwise they'll fight to the death. Negotiations create a zone of immunity; one strike during talks, and no one will trust a mediator for the next hundred years. Third-party nations are left untouched, as hitting them multiplies your enemies.
In essence, elites wanted to play chess—to manage conflict from a position above the board. Self-imposed limits on violence were that external position. You can start, wage, and end a war as long as you don't become one of the pieces being taken.

World War II as Confirmation

The Napoleonic Wars shook the system; the Congress of Vienna reinstalled it. WWI, with its accompanying civil wars and revolutions, cracked it further. WWII confirmed the lesson of 1648 on a scale that left no room for illusion. The UN, Geneva Conventions, nuclear deterrence, "red lines"—all engineering solutions to one problem: preventing the players from becoming pieces. The Cold War—forty years of managed conflict—was a direct product of this realization: you can be adversaries, but you can't cross the threshold where elites themselves become victims. It worked not because everyone agreed, but because violating the rules cost more than following them.

What Was Lost Yesterday

It wasn't morality; that was never there. It was a function that was lost.
Killing Khamenei and his family establishes a de facto reality: leaders are legitimate targets.
No one will enter negotiations without guarantees, which now cease to exist. An Omani mediator announces a breakthrough; a day later, his counterpart is dead.
The losing side will not surrender. If defeat means the death of a leader and their family, the only rational strategy is to fight to the end. That's precisely what turned the Thirty Years' War into a thirty-year war.
Terror will inevitably become symmetrical. The IRGC has the infrastructure to hit "soft targets in third countries." Now they have not just a motive, but a narrative understood by half the world.

Why They Don't See It

It's environmental blindness. Decades inside a protective cocoon create a reality where invincibility is a given.

It's extrapolating impunity. Every previous boundary crossing didn't lead to catastrophe, creating a model that "we can go further."

It's a horizon compressed to the news cycle. Everyone's horizon is tomorrow, not "what happens in three years."
It could be a cold calculation banking on the spiral. The darkest version: they see it all and consider it an acceptable price. Every attack is a reason for escalation; every escalation expands the emergency mandate. Nazi-sympathizing philosopher Carl Schmitt is applauding from the afterlife.

The position above the board, from which you manage conflict instead of being its victim, is worth any restriction on your own freedom of action. This isn't idealism—it's a calculation paid for with tens of millions of lives. This lesson hasn't been forgotten in a textbook sense, but in an operational one: the people making decisions are acting as if it never existed.

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