Geopolitical analysis of the US–Iran crisis typically rests on cold calculations of power: air defence systems, missile ranges, sanctions packages, aircraft carriers. Yet occasionally it is more instructive to step deliberately one degree away from realism and ask: what if? Alternative scenarios can illuminate exits from deadlocked equations. Recall that when China brokered diplomatic normalisation
In mathematics, when solving systems of equations with multiple unknowns, there is the concept of a “temporary variable,” or in the terminology of statistics and economics, a “dummy variable.” If the number of equations you need to solve exceeds the number of variables, you invent variables to fill the gaps in the matrix. Once a