After Trump's Attack on Iran and Russia's Ukraine War, People Are Asking If World War III Has Started

Folks are asking if World War III has started following President Donald Trump's attack on Iran and Russia's war with Ukraine. Trump joined Israel in an attack on Iran on Feb. 28, 2026. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an attack on Ukraine that occured on on Feb. 24, 2022, per U.S. News & World Report.

According to the Daily Sabah, Iran has retaliated by targeting U.S. military bases in the region, as well as Israel. At least 1,000 people have died in Iran, and 55,000 people have died in Ukraine. The duel wars and the fallout have led many to believe that WWIII is upon us. So, has WWIII started?

Technically, WWIII has not begun, but according to the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, it has. The Ukrainian president told the BBC that Putin had already started WWIII.

He was asked, "When Joe Biden was U.S. president, he was worried about Putin's nuclear threats, nuclear saber rattling, fear of World War III. Does Trump think the same way?"

"We have different views regarding a third world war," he replied. "I believe that Putin has already started it."

"The question is how much territory he will be able to seize and how to stop him," he continued. "Not because Russia must not win, but because Russia wants to impose on the world a different way of life and change the lives people have chosen for themselves. Therefore, I believe, and have long believed, that Putin has already begun this war and we're preventing it from becoming a broad, full-scale third-world war."

Trump was widely criticized for attacking Iran without approval from Congress. The attack included a bomb being dropped on a girls' elementary school in Minab, according to NBC News, and at least 168 people were killed. One mother who had arrived to find her child said, "By the time we arrived, the entire school had collapsed on top of the children. People were pulling out children’s arms and legs. People were pulling out severed heads."

Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) released a statement following the Iran attacks, calling Trump's war "illegal."

"Donald Trump is conducting an illegal and reckless war in Iran," he wrote. "Congress has not authorized this war, nor should it, as Trump drags us into a dangerous and unnecessary conflict. President Trump said at the time of the first attacks that he started this war because Iran’s nuclear and missile programs were an imminent threat to the United States. That was a lie."

"President Trump then said yesterday that he started this war because he ‘had a feeling’ that Iran was going to attack," the statement continued. "There is no evidence to back this up. Trump is risking the lives of American servicemembers and civilians in the region on his whims and lies. It is clear he had no plan at the start of this war, and there is no plan for how to stop it from becoming yet another U.S.-caused catastrophe in the Middle East."

"With families already struggling to pay rent and afford food for the table, the American people do not want their tax dollars used for illegal wars of choice. It is time to end this war," he concluded.

The U.S. is closing embassies in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait following the attacks and retaliation from Iran. The government is also advising Americans to leave multiple countries for their safety, per CBS News. The countries are Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Bahrain, Gaza, Jordan, the West Bank, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.