Iran war threatens a global recession, Finland’s Stubb warns

The U.S. president’s European golf buddy calls for extra efforts to stop regional conflicts from spiraling toward World War III. 

By TIM ROSS
in Helsinki, Finland

^{Photo-Illustration by Natália Delgado/POLITICO}

 Finland’s President Alexander Stubb says he believes his friends can cope with what he calls “tough love.” 

So one of Europe’s great optimists is not hiding his unusually bleak assessment of where his one-time golf partner Donald Trump’s presidency is taking the world. 

The Iran war, he said in an exclusive interview, risks triggering a “self-inflicted global recession” that could have more severe consequences for the economy than the coronavirus pandemic. And with Ukraine peace talks seeming indefinitely stalled, conflicts are now raging in Europe and the Middle East. 

Stubb just doesn’t want to call it World War III — “yet.” 

As the EU leader with arguably the best personal rapport with Trump, and an authority on international affairs in his own right, the Finnish president is an influential voice at a time of multiplying crises. 

Speaking to POLITICO from his modern presidential apartment in Helsinki, Stubb said an expert he trusts had warned him that the economic impact of the Iran war “could be worse than Covid.” The world, he argued, should listen. 

“I think we’re now in a situation whereby this could be a self-inflicted global recession,” Stubb said. “It shows you what happens when you act outside the framework of international rules and norms.” 

One thing the Middle East conflict has demonstrated already is how interconnected countries and supply chains are with energy markets and geopolitics. “Everything is linked to everything: Oil price to gas price, to food price, to fertilizer price, to price of pharmaceuticals, the list goes on.” 

That’s why, in Stubb’s view, the Trump administration’s “transactional” America First approach to foreign policy won’t work. 

“Diplomacy is rarely a transaction,” he said. “I mean, interest can be transactional, but even then, you should find mutual interest. And what we’re seeing now is the demise of international institutions or rules exactly at a time in history when we need them more than ever — whether it’s about solving conflicts, solving climate change, solving ethical issues linked to artificial intelligence or biotechnology, solving development.”

And, he added: “Some people are creating this illusion that you can live in a world with national boundaries and that we’re not interdependent, and I think nothing is further from the truth, as we can see in the Strait of Hormuz right now. We’re all affected, if nowhere else, at least at the gas pump.” 

Talking, but not WhatsApping

Stubb has a better claim than most European leaders to know what Trump might do next. He correctly predicted last fall that Trump would hit Russia’s President Vladimir Putin with a “big stick” while many were skeptical. Harsh U.S. sanctions on Russian oil exports followed a few weeks later. 

But now Trump has eased those sanctions to mitigate the impact of the Iran war on fuel prices — throwing a lifeline to Russia’s straining economy in the country’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. 

Does Stubb worry that Trump is losing interest and could walk away from his promise to end the Ukraine war? 

“I mean, I hope not. He’s very preoccupied with Iran right now,” Stubb said. “For understandable reasons, the war in Iran is taking a lot of oxygen out of what’s going on in Ukraine. In my mind, it seems like the peace talks are now on hold.” After three rounds of negotiations involving officials from Washington, Kyiv and Moscow, none are planned in the near future. “This could be because of Iran or it could be because they have reached an end of the road.”

Should European allies rally to help Trump in the Gulf, as he has asked? In what is unlikely to be an accident, Stubb echoes Trump’s own blunt assessment about Ukraine not being America’s problem. 

“This might sound a bit harsh, but Iran is not my war,” Stubb said. “Ukraine is my war.” 

Yet, on some level, the two conflicts are already connected — Russia is reportedly helping Iran identity U.S. targets to hit, while firing Iran-designed drones at Ukraine. The doomsday risk is that these conflicts could escalate into a third world war in the months or years ahead. Stubb doesn’t like the term, but nor does he deny the danger. 

“To talk about a world war is big, probably too big for the human mind to understand at this stage in the development of international relations. What I can say is that after the Cold War, many of the conflicts were local,” he said. “Now we are seeing an escalation to regional wars. What we need to do is work 24/7 to de-escalate and make sure that these wars don’t spill over further. The problem is that when you don’t have international rules and norms guiding our behavior, conflict is always behind the corner.”

“I would not like to talk about World War III — yet.” 

While the risk of facing major wars on two fronts is real, Stubb also sees potential for Ukraine to win new allies in the Gulf and even in America as it offers its critical drone warfare expertise to states under attack from Iran. Russia has fired thousands of Iranian “Shahed” drones at Ukraine since 2022, and Kyiv’s military has responded with sophisticated technology and techniques for defending against them. 

“I hope the Americans understand that they need the Ukrainians — more than they need the Russians. And that Russia is the nemesis for them. So, in that sense, this could tilt the balance in the right direction.” 

Stubb doesn’t believe Europeans should get involved in the Iran war while the fighting continues. But if Trump wants help with peacekeeping in the Hormuz Strait waterway, so vital for the oil trade, perhaps they can discuss it later. 

Talking, though, is something Stubb does “a little bit less” with Trump than he used to. The U.S. president is busy these days with the Gulf. 

“We don’t do formal calls,” he said. “We do informal calls, on the mobile, and texts. I don’t do WhatsApp.” 

The rift in the West 

The world has changed, in the first three months of 2026. And Stubb has changed his analysis to match it. He published a book just a few months ago arguing that the “global west” — Europe and America — would guard the values of the liberal world order. But Trump’s America, he thinks, isn’t interested. 

“We are probably seeing not a rupture, but a rift in the transatlantic partnership,” he said. “So the global north takes the role of defending the liberal world order, whereas the global west becomes the U.S. that is more transactional. It’s just a reality.” 

Stubb is famously busy, a man with as many personal interests and professional accomplishments as he has high-level friendships. He turned away from a potential career as a professional golfer to pursue academic studies, diplomatic work and ultimately politics. 

He also came second in his age group in Finland’s national triathlon competition last year. At 57, he has crammed his presidential apartment in Helsinki with bikes of various kinds. 

On a visit to London last week, he went running in Hyde Park with Canada’s Mark Carney and watched football in Downing Street with Keir Starmer, after touring an exhibition with King Charles and taking a selfie with Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine. He speaks to his best friend in politics, Norway’s PM, most days. 

This week he hosted a birthday dinner for new liberal Dutch PM Rob Jetten (complete with cake and a song) and then a summit of 10 leaders in Helsinki — the so called Joint Expeditionary Force defense grouping — inviting Zelenskyy and Carney to dial in. 

It’s hard to imagine a leader who more completely manifests his belief in the “win-win” value of forging strong alliances. His style is more one of a hyper-energetic athlete speed-dating world leaders than conventional diplomacy. 

But amid the frantic networking there is also a steeliness to Stubb. True to the Finnish culture of resilience and grit, Stubb won’t give up on America completely, or say NATO is over, despite Trump’s threats not to defend European nations who don’t pay their way on defense. 

Perhaps he draws strength from the method he uses to last the course when out running, cycling or swimming in the Baltic cold. 

“Anyone who does endurance sports understands that 20 percent of your training is hard, 80 percent is easy — that’s how you maximize your performance,” he said. “You have to go easy to go hard.”