Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Iran–United States war

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.‎

The result was redirect to 2026 Iran war. Closing early per WP:SNOW. (non-admin closure) 9ninety (talk) 15:28, 8 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Iran–United States war

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Because US involvement in the 2026 Iran war has been much more extensive than in the Twelve-Day War, turning this set index into a redirect to the article for the former was suggested during a requested move as early as one day after the war began. At RfD, some editors supported retargeting "Iran–Israel–United States war" to the 2026 Iran war article, but it ended up being retargeted to this page instead on the basis that both titles should have the same primary topic or lack thereof. Given that no convincing counterargument to the premise that the 2026 Iran war is the primary topic for these titles seems to have been presented in either discussion, this page should become a redirect to the 2026 Iran war article.

This change would require adding a hatnote to the article for disambiguation, but what that would link to remains an open question. One possibility is for "Iran–United States conflict" to become a set index or disambiguation page, making it suitable for disambiguating the redirected titles. I opened a requested move to propose that this be implemented through a broadening of the scope of the existing United States strikes on Iran page, but I recently withdrew it after its other participants and I agreed that this issue should be taken to AfD. Another way of implementing that would be moving this page to "Iran–United States conflict", thus keeping the United States strikes on Iran page as well. Both moves continue to be options, and participants in this discussion are welcome to specify their stances on them. However, the main proposal of the discussion is simply blanking and redirecting this page, leaving at the 2026 Iran war article a hatnote such as the following:

Finally, note that moving this page to "Iran–United States war (disambiguation)" would not be ideal as it would effectively create an unnecessary WP:1OTHER situation. The page lists no other entries aside from the Twelve-Day War and two of its subtopics (the two specific acts of war that involved both countries, which are not wars in themselves but are both mentioned in the first paragraph of the Twelve-Day War article), so a hatnote like the one above would suffice.

Participants in all three of the aforementioned prior discussions as well as the WikiProjects that were notified of them will be notified of this discussion (incidentally, my first AfD nomination). –Gluonz^{talk contribs} 05:00, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Note: this discussion has been included in the AfD sorting lists for the following topics: Military, Disambiguations, Lists, Iran, and United States of America. –Gluonz^{talk contribs} 05:00, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Move per WP:DABPAGE. Absolutiva 06:38, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
@Absolutiva: Move to where? –Gluonz^{talk contribs} 18:44, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I suppose redirect to 2026 Iran war for notability purposes. Absolutiva 21:06, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - ‘Conflict’ articles have tended to be prose articles about the over-arching conflict within which individual wars sit. See, for example, Iraqi conflict, Afghan conflict, Arab-Israeli conflict, Chechen–Russian conflict, Korean conflict etc. “war” articles tend to be about individual wars. FOARP (talk) 06:44, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to 2026 Iran war with hatnote, per nomination and WP:ONEOTHER. The 2026 war is now undoubtedly the primary topic, given its much longer duration and multifaceted global impact, and all that implies regarding coverage, readership, etc. The pageviews stats for 2026 Iran war dwarf those for Twelve-Day War, and as the views have leveled out over time the former has begun to level out at around 45,000~50,000 while the latter has at around 2,000~2,500. Iran–United States war lists only 2 wars and as one is the primary topic, that leaves us with WP:ONEOTHER:
If there are only two topics to which a given title might refer, and one is the primary topic, then a disambiguation page is not needed—it is sufficient to use a hatnote on the primary topic article, pointing to the other article. (This means that readers looking for the second topic are spared the extra navigational step of going through the disambiguation page.)
Hatnoting from one to the other is the appropriate solution to the ambiguity of the title. 2026 Iran war presently has no hatnotes, so doing so won't contribute to any clutter problems. – Scyrme (talk) 12:27, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: If the content of the current page needs to live somewhere, perhaps List of wars/conflicts/whatever involving Iran and the United States or something along those lines. The exact title needs workshopping but a "List of" title would gives more flexibility than a DAB page or even a set index article. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 13:15, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think that's necessary. The page was only created to address the ambiguity of the title very early into the 2026 war (within a day of it beginning) when it was very plausible the strikes would escalate to a war but not yet clear that the 2026 war would far exceed the 12-Day War in duration and scale and it was much too soon to judge whether there would be a primary topic between them. – Scyrme (talk) 13:22, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Agree —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 16:40, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Blank and redirect to 2026 Iran war per nom and Scyrme. A hatnote can be added to the target. Outright deletion, with the option to re-create a fresh redirect, is another option here. There is no important content that needs to be preserved here and nothing to be merged anywhere. However, in this case, there is some benefit to maintaining the page history just so the RM and XfD history is easy to find. If the content were otherwise problematic or we had no good place to redirect, outright deletion would be the preferred outcome. Given that there is no real benefit to deletion—and no harm to keeping the page history—the benefit of preserving the history takes precedent. —Myceteae‍🍄‍🟫 (talk) 16:40, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the others about a blank and redirect to 2026 Iran war I think it's the page that makes the most sense and has the least confusion overall--especially since I do not think that this is a "conflict" what is occurring in Iran is definitely a war. Agnieszka653 (talk) 17:54, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Note: Talk:2026 Iran war has been notified of this discussion. –Gluonz^{talk contribs} 19:00, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to 2026 Iran war would be the best course of action. For notability purposes, this is the primary (and only) "notable war" between US and Iran, so I don't see the point of a disambiguation page like this one. HarvardJock🏫 (talk) 20:41, 2 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to 2026 Iran war which is now the clear and obvious WP:PRIMARYTOPIC. Servite et contribuere (talk) 00:28, 3 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to 2026 Iran war per Scyrme. Achmad Rachmani (talk) 05:59, 3 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect and hatnote. It's better to have a hatnote about it. But also, I'm unopposed/neutral on a move to Iran–United States war (disambiguation) and retarget anyways. LIrala (talk) 04:42, 4 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect to 2026 Iran war. Accesscrawl (talk) 11:04, 5 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support redirecting to 2026 Iran war
I think Iran-Israel-United States war might be better, but WP:Consise applies, so support. Robloxguest3 (talk) 15:18, 6 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]

Redirect - I am also supporting a redirect for now. Though I am not sure if an article can be developed in the near future. Ratnahastin (talk) 13:46, 8 May 2026 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.