In fact, this WWIII simulation looked very like Mesoamerican flower wars from the beginning. Both main participants, China and the US, operate through multi-level proxies that don’t even bother to formally declare war between each other (Ukraine hadn’t, they simply signed dubious unconstitutional martial law decree, and there was that) or to stop trade. Ukraine, for example, appears the first country in recent history of the Information Age that gladly surrenders its sovereignty in the name of military industry field testing. Destructive testing, of course.