Strangely yes. This jacks up the price of oil in a way that doesn't dirty Putin's hands. It's a bit of a weird play but makes some sense.

The American war machine was getting light pocketbooks. Gotta start another conflict.

Im sure it will trickle back anyday now....any... day.....

This could very easily spiral into a full-on WW3 scenario. Note, WW3 may not look like what you expect it to look like. We've been culturally conditioned to think WW3 will look like thousands of mushroom clouds over major cities, but that need not be the case. WW3 could be a large conventional war just like the previous world wars.

Russia is already bogged down in Ukraine, and the US and NATO are supplying them. Israel is at war with a half a dozen countries, and the US is supporting them, including directly entering the war on Iran. The danger of WW3 lies is revealed when you ask, why did Israel choose this time to attack Iran? They chose to because now was simply the perfect opportunity. With Iran's proxy fighters around Israel devastated, with the Gaza a smoking ruin, Iranian power is lower than it has been in years. That's why they decided to do this now - kick them while they're down.

Us getting bogged down in Iran, however, presents other countries with their own windows of opportunity. And the biggest one is China invading Taiwan. China has been saber-rattling and openly planning an invasion of Taiwan, to be done at some point in the next few years. What better time to launch it than when the US has already been depleting their limited weapon stocks in Ukraine, and just got bogged down in Iran?

China is already involved in the Ukraine conflict; they're one of Russia's biggest suppliers. Iran also is a Russian ally, providing them thousands of drones. The alliance system of a potential world war is already laid out. It would be Russia/Iran/China vs the US, NATO, and assorted allies.

This would be unlikely to end up in a full nuclear exchange. Direct invasion of the homelands of Russia, China, or the US are not going to happen. But we could see multiple large conventional armed conflicts breaking out in multiple theaters, a conflict between two vast alliance systems that between them encompass most of the world's population.

If that isn't a world war, I don't know what is. Nukes don't need to fly to have a conflict that leaves millions dead.