By hitting the Iranian cargo ship Ana in the Caspian Sea on Saturday, killing one crewman, Ukraine is deliberately seeking to connect its war with Russia with the USA’s against Iran. The fear is that this could even spill over into Europe – with consequences we cannot predict.
Moscow and Tehran have a long and complex relationship. Both regard themselves as under threat from a hostile West, but at the same time have distinctly different interests. Indeed, the Kremlin has considered Iran also to be a rival for influence in the Middle East and the South Caucasus.
When Russia bogged down in Ukraine in 2022, it turned to Iran to buy drones and missiles. Russia soon developed them further, and fed its experiences and upgrades back to Tehran, as well as the battlefield experience of co-ordinated drone and missile attacks that could penetrate advanced, Western-built air defences.
In January 2025, Vladimir Putin and the Iranian President, Masoud Pezeshkian, signed a 20-year strategic partnership. Longer on rhetoric than firm commitments, it didn’t include an agreement on mutual defence. Ironically enough, this was at Tehran’s request – something it may regret.
Nonetheless, Moscow has supported it through arm’s length measures. With Ukraine’s long-range strikes deep into Russia relying heavily on US targeting and intelligence data, Moscow has reciprocated with data from electronic intercepts and satellite monitoring that have helped Iran strike at US and allied military assets in the region.
Kyiv is painfully aware of the constant need to maintain Western support. Given the degree to which Donald Trump has seemed more sympathetic to Putin, President Volodymyr Zelensky is especially eager to forge a closer relationship with the White House.
Ukraine has already offered its own counter-drone expertise to Gulf states. The United Arab Emirates has ordered 5,000 of its interceptor drones, while more than 200 military advisers and technicians have been deployed to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE, as well as Jordan, where they work alongside the US military.
This month, Zelensky announced that Ukraine was creating a dedicated Long-Range Strike Command tasked, in his words, with “concentrating all available resources to reduce Russia’s war potential”. It will control most of the stocks of long-range attack drones like the one that hit the Ana.
This largely means the attacks across Russia, striking both military and civilian infrastructure such as energy sites, factories and ports. However, this command will also work with the Ukrainian intelligence agencies, which have mounted sabotage attacks against Russian assets in Africa and Europe. The implication is that it will also be involved in operations outside the primary conflict zone.
Kyiv claimed that the Ana was carrying drone and missile components when it was hit. However, it had just left the Russian port city of Astrakhan. In other words, it was supplying not the Russian but Iranian war machine.
Unsurprisingly, Tehran has reacted with fury. But for Kyiv, provoking Tehran was probably the idea. Just as its operations against Russian mercenaries in Sudan and Mali were spun as in part a gesture of support for France, which was alarmed by the spread of Moscow’s influence in Africa, so too Ukraine wants to present itself as a useful ally in the current Gulf conflict.
Iran increasingly relies on the Caspian Sea to bypass blockades of its southern ports on the Persian Gulf. By demonstrating that it has the capacity and will to interdict these routes, Kyiv is seeking not just to put pressure on Tehran but also demonstrate its value to Israel and the United States.
There is, of course, a flip side, in that Ukraine’s actions may also widen both conflicts in unpredictable ways.
Iranian commentators have pointedly noted that Kyiv is within the range of their missiles. Their Ukrainian counterparts have countered with warnings that their Flamingo cruise missiles could reach Tehran. It is unlikely that there will be such exchanges of fire for the moment, though.
Meanwhile, just days ago Iran accused the UK of being an “accomplice” in the US war, pointing to American bombing sorties out of RAF Fairford. Its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned that “any base used for aggression against Iranian territory constitutes a legitimate target for our forces”.
A particular concern is that Iran will respond by supporting Russia’s campaign of subversion and sabotage in Europe. Tehran needs Putin’s support more than ever. It may well also want to punish the West for its support of Ukraine.
The IRGC notoriously maintains networks of operatives in Europe, as well as close links with a number of organised crime gangs thanks to its control over the routes whereby Afghan heroin travels west through the Middle East.
In particular, while the Russians are considered stronger in cyber operations and recruiting deniable “disposable assets”, the Iranians are better able to leverage connections within jihadist circles and also have access to greater operational funds thanks to their drug connections.
As a French security source told The i Paper, “the IRGC is a dangerous and ruthless organisation. Combining its capabilities with those of the Russians would create an unpredictable security threat that I’m not sure we’re ready for”.
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