The New Axis of Evil is so hilariously lame it feels like God is playing a prank on us.

Think of all the decades since WWII where the whole world somberly predicted WWIII was going to be total Armageddon, a final, apocalyptic battle that would wipe out civilization and herald the end of history.

Then Putin handed us the mother of all mulligans when it turned out our most menacing, dangerous rival, with an army large enough to invade Europe at will, turned out to be jaw-droppingly terrible at absolutely everything except war crimes and getting killed in massive numbers.

In Ukraine, Putin is an existential threat. But if he attacked NATO, he'd get absolutely curb-stomped. (And no, he's not using his nukes. The whole point of this war is to grow and strengthen Russia. Triggering a nuclear and getting nuked 50 times does not advance that goal.)

I really think China's gonna fight a lot like Russia, because it shares many of the same problems., though not to the same extent. Corruption, morale, hubris, and inexperience will cost them a lot at first. They'll probably course-correct after a while, but they'll take a lot of damage beforehand.

Then you've got North Korea and Iran. The fact that these guys are half the Axis says a lot, and the fact that people keep putting them on the list and pretending they're some deadly duo never, ever stops being funny.

Sidenote: Eritrea exists.