War! What is it good for? For most of us, the answer is “absolutely nothin’,” as Edwin Starr sang in his 1970 hit. But who it’s good for is another question. Certainly not for the many people killed, wounded and maimed, whose families and lives are shattered, who lose homes and infrastructure and experience the effects of trauma for years afterward. And not for the environment, with bombs, fires and emissions from war machinery and destroyed and burning ships and factories devastating water, air and land.
But it’s good for banks, oil companies, weapons manufacturers, corrupt politicians, prediction-market gamblers and insider traders.
United States banks amassed close to US$50 billion in profits in the first three months of 2026, as the U.S.–Israel war on Iran jolted stock markets, the Guardian reports. During the war’s first month, with oil prices spiking, the world’s top 100 oil companies raked in $30 million an hour! The biggest beneficiaries were Saudi Aramco, Russia’s Gazprom and U.S.–based ExxonMobil, the world’s main opponents to climate action.
A BBC investigation of trade volume data found “a consistent pattern of spikes just hours, or sometimes minutes, before a social media post or media interview” by U.S. President Donald Trump regarding policies and events in the Middle East, Venezuela and elsewhere that sent crude prices tumbling and equities soaring. Did someone get a heads-up? We can only guess.
Weapons manufacturers such as Lockheed Martin have seen dramatic stock price jumps and increasing government contracts as wars rage on.
Meanwhile, the rest of us are hit with rising inflation as volatile oil and gas prices and shortages cause costs to rise on everything from fuel to groceries to medicine. We can count ourselves lucky if we’re at least not caught in the middle of the bloody conflicts in Russia-Ukraine, the Middle East and elsewhere.
It may be true that wars can sometimes be justified — as Catholic bishops pointed out in response to attacks on the Church and the Pope from President Trump — if they’re “in self-defense, once all peace efforts have failed.” But the U.S. administration can’t even keep its justifications for joining the war against Iran straight — and has also offered varying excuses for its recent attacks on Venezuela.
Instead of praying and working “toward lasting peace while avoiding the evils and injustices that accompany all wars,” as the bishops have urged, people in the U.S. administration, such as former Fox host and current Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, have prayed for “overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.”
The U.S. has claimed, without evidence, that its attacks on Venezuela and on small boats in nearby waters are to halt that country’s alleged drug trafficking. Some in the U.S. administration have admitted the attacks have more to do with oil and a few have made no secret of their desire to see a more pro–U.S. government in charge.
As for the war on Iran, “the Trump administration still hasn’t been able to land on one coherent answer. Some contradict each other, and some contradict Donald Trump himself. Some — delivered hours apart by senior officials — are flatly incompatible,” the Guardian reports. They range from destroying Iran’s missile and nuclear programs to self-defence to helping Israel realize its objectives to toppling the regime.
Regardless of the reasons given, some people are reaping massive profits and some are hoping to benefit by distracting from domestic scandals. Meanwhile, too many people continue to suffer and die. The horrific impacts will persist for generations.
It all points to the folly of an oil and gas–fuelled economic system in which profit and power are worshipped regardless of the enormous costs to people, animals, the environment and all we have created to make our brief lives better, from art to infrastructure.
One of the few bright spots amid the bloodshed and chaos is an acceleration of the renewable energy transition as many countries distance themselves from the geopolitical and economic instability of fossil fuel reliance. But it shouldn’t take wars to do the right and necessary thing.
As Starr sang, “Life is much too short and precious to be fighting wars these days. War can’t give life, it can only take it away.”
David Suzuki is a scientist, broadcaster, author and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. Written with David Suzuki Foundation Senior Writer and Editor Ian Hanington.
Learn more at davidsuzuki.org.
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