By Jean Baptiste Ndabananiye
“I want to discuss something that I think is one of the most important patterns in all of human history. And once you understand this pattern, everything happening right now in the Middle East will make complete sense to you. The pattern is this.
Every great empire that has tried to conquer Iran, Persia, has either collapsed, retreated or been permanently weakened. Every single one without exception. And I want to argue, using game theory and structural history that America is next,” says Professor Xueqin on the YouTube Channel, Prof. Jiang Xueqin Analysis. Professor Xueqin has now turned well-known, owing to his two predictions, which have stunningly come true, you can learn more about by clicking here.
Great empires which have been devastated by attacking Iran
“Let’s now go back and look at history carefully, because history does not repeat itself exactly. But as Mark Twain said, it rhymes. And in the case of Iran, it rhymes very, very loudly. First, Alexander the Great. Everyone knows Alexander. He conquered Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Persia which is today Iran. And people say ‘Wait a minute, didn’t Alexander actually win? Didn’t he conquer Persia?’ Yes, he technically conquered Persia. But what happened next?
He died at 32 years old. His empire immediately collapsed. His generals fought each other. The Macedonian empire was finished. And in its place, who rose to power? The Parthians, Iranians who then controlled the Middle East for the next five hundred years. So, the lesson here is simple. You can temporarily defeat Iran, but Iran defeats you in the long run,” explains Professor Xueqin.
He further says that the second empire after the Greek empire is the Roman one. “The Romans were the greatest military power of the ancient world. Nobody came close. And the Romans fought the Parthians, the Iranians for over three hundred years. Julius Caesar planned to invade Persia but was assassinated before he could. Emperor Crassus invaded and was destroyed at the Battle of Carrhae in 53 BCE, one of Rome’s greatest military defeats.
Emperor Trajan invaded and technically won, but immediately had to retreat because of uprisings everywhere. Emperor Julian invaded in 363 CE and died in battle. 300 years of war, and what happened to Rome? Rome fell, while Iran— the Sasanian Persian Empire was still standing.”
The third empire which experienced a distressing impact is the Arab Caliphate. Professor Xueqin says “People often forget this, but the Arabs did conquer Iran in the 7th century CE. Yet, what happened? Iran absorbed the Arab conquerors. The Persians converted into Islam, yes, but they transformed Iran into something distinctly Persian. They gave the world Persian art, poetry, philosophy, and science. Within a few centuries, Iranian dynasties like the Buyids, the Samanids, and the Safavids were ruling again. Iran was never truly conquered. It absorbed its conquerors and made them Iranian.”
The Mongols didn’t emerge genuinely victorious too. “Fourth, the Mongols. This is perhaps the most dramatic example. The Mongols in the 13th century were the most destructive military force in human history. They destroyed Baghdad, wiped out cities across Central Asia and killed millions.
And yes, they conquered Iran. But again, what happened? The Mongol conquerors converted to Islam, adopted Persian culture and became Persians. The Ilkhanate, the Mongol rulers of Iran, became patrons of Persian art and literature. Iran absorbed the Mongols,” elaborates Professor Xueqin.
The Soviet Union, according to him, didn’t dodge the fate. “Fifth, the Soviet Union. More recently, in the 20th century, the Soviet Union occupied northern Iran twice, once during World War I, and once during World War II. Both times, they were eventually forced to leave. In 1946, Stalin refused to withdraw Soviet troops from northern Iran. This was one of the first crises of the Cold War, and the Soviets were eventually forced out. A nuclear superpower forced out of Iran. So, this is the pattern.
Let me be very clear about this, because I want you to understand it deeply. Iran is not just a country. It is a civilizational force. It has been continuously inhabited for over 3 000 years. It has one of the oldest continuous cultures in the world. And throughout all of history, every empire that has tried to permanently subjugate Iran has failed. The empires fell. Iran survived.”
Reasons why the pattern occurs
Employing game theory and structural analysis, Professor Xueqin explains why this pattern exists. “Because this is not just luck or geography. There are specific structural reasons why Iran defeats empires. Reason one, strategic depth. Iran is a very large country, four times the size of Iraq, with a population of 90 million people. It has the Zagros Mountains in the West, the Alborz Mountains in the north, deserts, and difficult terrain everywhere. Napoleon famously said ‘Never march on Moscow.’ He could have also said ‘Never march on Tehran’.
Conquering Iran would require at minimum three to four million soldiers. The entire active United States military is about 1.3 million. So, the math simply does not work. There is no scenario in which America has enough soldiers to control the Iranian territory. None.”
The second reason is the inverted military pyramid. He says “This concept is very important. In a normal military, you have a cost pyramid. At the base, the biggest group, you have infantry soldiers. They are cheap, flexible, and can go anywhere. Above them, you have armor and tanks. Above that, naval power. And at the very top, the most expensive and least flexible, you have air power. Wars are usually wars of attrition. To win a war of attrition, your cheapest and most flexible resource soldiers must form the base of your strategy. That is how every successful empire in history fought.
But America has an inverted pyramid. Air power is the base. Everything is built around air power. Why? Because of the military-industrial complex. Air power is the most expensive, generates the most contracts and makes the most money for Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Raytheon. The entire American military strategy is built around selling expensive weapon systems, not around winning wars.”
To clarify the point, he gives some instances. “This is why you have the F-35 fighter jet at $ 100 million each, taking 26 years to develop, and the Iranians shoot one down. That is why you have the Gerald Ford aircraft carrier at $ 13 billion, and it has to run away from the Persian Gulf 3 weeks after arriving. That is why you have the Patriot missile system, billions of dollars, and cheap Iranian drones fly right past it. The American military is not designed to win wars. It is designed to generate profit for the military-industrial complex. Against Iran, this is catastrophic.”
The third reason is asymmetric cost exchange, according to Professor Xueqin. “This is perhaps the most devastating strategic reality facing America right now. I want you to really understand this because this is how Iran destroys empires today, not with swords or horses, but with mathematics. Consider this: one Iranian drone costs $ 50 000. One American interceptor missile costs between $ 3 million and $ 10 million, depending on the system. So, every time Iran launches one drone and America tries to shoot it down, America spends at minimum sixty times more money than Iran.
Sixty times. Iran does not shoot one drone. Iran shoots hundreds of drones simultaneously, overwhelming American air defenses. We saw a single Iranian ballistic missile being targeted by 11 different American interceptors. All eleven missed. That is tens of millions of dollars in American ordinance gone to stop one missile. America is racing to accomplish its mission before it runs out of interceptors. Let me say that again.”
He stresses “The most powerful military in human history is racing against the clock, before it runs out of weapons. That is the reality of this war. And this is ancient Persian strategy. You do not fight the empire head on. You bleed it slowly. You drain its resources. You exhaust its will. This is what the Parthians did to Rome for 300 years. This is what Iranians are doing to America today.”
Reason four, according to Professor Xueqin, is the will to fight. “This brings us perhaps to the most important strategic factor of all. I want you to understand something about Iranian civilization. This is not just a government fighting a war. This is a civilization that has been fighting for its survival for 3000 years. In Iranian eschatology, in their religious understanding, this war against America and Israel is literally a war against the Great Satan. This is existential. This is sacred.
In any war, you need three things: unity, capacity and determination. Iran has all three. What about America? Only 40% of America support this war. The administration is asking for a $ 20 billion war budget from a Congress that is deeply divided. The Pentagon is afraid to report casualties because of political backlash. America soldiers are dying, and the government is hiding the numbers.”
He underscores “The contrast could not be more stark. On one side, you have a civilization that has been preparing for this war for 20 years, studying American tactics, building drone factories, mapping every American base in the Middle East. On the other side, you have an administration that had no plan beyond the initial bombing and assumed Iran would simply surrender. They did not expect Iran to fight back. That is the level of hubris, of arrogance that we are dealing with.”
“Something very important”
“Now, I want to discuss something very important. War isnot just fought on the battlefield. War is fought across four dimensions: the military dimension, the economic dimension, the political dimension and the narrative dimension,” says Professor Xueqin before adding “Here is the key insight. America is trying to make the political, economic and narrative dimensions conform to its military strategy. Iran is using its military strategy to shape the political, economic and narrative dimensions.
These are completely opposite approaches, and Iran’s approach is far more sophisticated. America’s strategy is simple: bomb Iran into submission, force a surrender, install a friendly government, control the oil. That is the entire plan. To make this work, America needs the economy to stay stable, allies to stay loyal, and the media to stay supportive. What is actually happening?”
To respond, he says “The economy is being disrupted. Iran’s strategy is completely different. Iran’s military moves are calibrated to achieve economic, political and narrative goals simultaneously. Narratively, Iran is winning global opinion. Large numbers of Americans are openly rooting for Iran in this war. That is extraordinary. That has never happened before in American war, and it tells you everything about how the narrative dimension is going.
Now I want to discuss something even more important. This war is not just about Iran. It is about the entire architecture of American global power. At the center of that is the petrodollar system. Since 1973, almost all oil in the world has been traded in U.S. dollars. This was agreed between America and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis would sell oil only in dollars, and America would protect the Saudi regime. Because everyone needs oil, everyone needs dollars. This creates permanent global demand for the U.S. dollars, which allows America to print money, run deficits, and finance its empire.”
Xueqin maintains that without the petrodollar system, America cannot afford its military, and “Without its military, America cannot maintain its empire. Now what is happening in this war? Everyday, the credibility of the petrodollar system is weakened. The Gulf States, the lynchpin of that system are under direct threat. The Gulf States are terrified. A terrified state that cannot guarantee its own survival may no longer be willing to recycle petrodollars into American stock markets and AI data centers.
If that stops, AI bubble bursts. The American financial Ponzi scheme unravels. This is how Iran destroys empires: not by conquering them but making the cost of empire unsustainable, by making the financial architecture of empire collapse from within. We have precedent for this. The Soviet Union did not lose the Cold War because America defeated it militarily. It lost because the cost of maintaining empire became unsustainable. Afghanistan was part of that. Iran may be America’s Afghanistan on a much larger scale.”
Xueqin contends that the United States of America cannot adapt to this situation. “The quality of American governance has collapsed. China just completed its 15th five-year plan, involving two years of consultation, expert committees, thinktanks across the country, and leading academic specialists. It is a detailed, serious, comprehensive plan for the future of 1.4 billion people. What does America have?
The State of Union has become a television show. There is no work, no program, no strategic plan, no analytical framework. The tariff war of 2025, which disrupted the global economy, was produced by four or five people with one-page document that would not pass a first-year economics student. This is the same administration that decided to bomb Iran. No plan beyond the initial strikes, no strategy for what comes after. Just an assumption, a delusional assumption, that Iran would simply surrender. Compare this to Iran. Iran has been preparing for this war for 20 years.”
Xueqin says that this preparation has permitted the Iranians to comprehend various strategic areas including the Americans’ psychology and the fact that the Americans dread casualties the most. “They [Iranians] built a strategy exactly around those weaknesses. This is the difference a civilization that has survived 3 000 years by learning from every attack and adapting, and an empire that has been dominant for 80 years and has forgotten how to think seriously about strategy.”
Xueqin’s prediction
“Let me now bring this all together. I want to give you my prediction not as prophecy but as an analytical framework based on structural history and game theory. I have made three predictions since 2024. First, Trump would win. That happened. Second, America would go to war with Iran. That happened. Third, America will lose this war and this will forever change the global order. That is what I believe is happening now,” he says before adding “ Let me be precise about what I mean by lose. I do not mean that Iran will defeat America on the battlefield in a traditional sense.
Iran cannot do that. America is still the most powerful military in the world. What I mean is this. America will find that the cost of continuing this war in money, political will, casualties, global reputation and economic disruption will become unsustainable. America will be forced to retreat from the Middle East. When that happens, when the American empire retreats, two regional powers will remain: Israel and Iran.”
He explains that the Middle East will be rearranged around those two regional giants. “Here is the deeper historical truth that I want to leave you with. Every empire falls. That is the lesson of history. Rome fell. The Mongol Empire fell. The British Empire fell. The Soviet Empire fell. Not because they were defeated militarily in one decisive battle, but because they overextended, because they could not sustain the cost of empire, because their internal contradictions, corruption, loss of purpose, and hubris caught up with them.
America is experiencing all of these things right now. A military designed to generate profit rather than win wars. A government that cannot plan beyond the next new cycle. A political system so corrupted that two trillion dollars disappears from the Pentagon budget and nobody is held accountable. A financial system so fragile that it depends on Gulf state petrodollars recycled into a stock market bubble.”
To conclude his analysis with regard to the United States of America, Xueqin says “And Iran, ancient Persia, is simply doing what it has always done. It is waiting. It is bleeding the empire slowly. It is being patient, because Iran has time. Iran has always had time. Iran has survived every empire that has ever attacked it, will survive this one too.”
“The graveyard of empires is not Afghanistan. The graveyard of empires, the original, the oldest, the most patient is Iran. That is my analysis. I want to keep your minds open. I want you to question everything I have said. I want you to look at the evidence and think for yourself. That is what predictive history means.”