[Answered] Critically examine the internal contradictions of BRICS exposed by the Iran war. Evaluate the feasibility of a multipolar world order amidst the U.S.’s renewed push for unilateralism.

Introduction

The Economic Survey 2025–26 notes the rise of fragmented geopolitics, while the Union Budget 2026–27 emphasises resilient partnerships, making the Iran conflict a critical stress test for BRICS and the evolving multipolar order.

Internal Contradictions within BRICS Exposed by the Iran War

The February 2026 U.S.-Israel strike eliminating Iran’s Supreme Leader and command structure, without UNSC authorisation or U.S. Congressional declaration, constituted the most severe stress test for BRICS+ since its 2024 expansion.

1. Divergent Strategic Alignments: India, current chair, issued no condemnation, no emergency summit, and no collective statement, reflecting deepening QUAD alignment and strategic autonomy increasingly interpreted as U.S. convergence. Brazil, Russia and China issued individual condemnations, exposing absence of unified voice. These divergent orientations weaken the bloc’s capacity to adopt a unified foreign policy stance.
2. Security vs. Economic Divergence:  Gulf members (UAE, Saudi Arabia) remain tethered to U.S. security guarantees, rendering BRICS incapable of acting as a collective security provider when Iran — a founding expansion member — faced existential attack.
3. De-dollarisation Paralysis: BRICS mechanisms (NDB, CIPS, BRICS Pay) were designed to insulate against Western financial coercion. Yet no emergency liquidity or payment-channel support was activated for Iran, revealing institutional shallowness and lack of political will.
4. Ideological Divergence: While Russia and China utilize BRICS to challenge U.S. wrecking-ball politics, members like the UAE and Saudi Arabia remain tied to the U.S. security umbrella, making a unified anti-hegemonic stance impossible.

U.S. Unilateralism and the Rubio Doctrine

1. Marco Rubio’s February 2026 Munich Security Conference speech openly called for dismantling multipolarity, reclaiming Global South market share, and restoring pre-1945 Western civilisational dominance.
2. The subsequent Iran operation, bypassing Congress and UN operationalised this vision: kinetic regime-change paired with economic coercion (Board of Peace reconstruction bypassing UN).
3. This marks a shift from rules-based hegemony to transactional unilateralism enforced by overwhelming military superiority.

Feasibility of Multipolar World Order

Multipolarity exists as distribution of capabilities (India 7.4% growth, China’s manufacturing dominance, Russia’s energy leverage), but lacks collective agency.

1. Structural Weaknesses: BRICS+ suffers incompatible threat perceptions, veto-like divergences, and no binding security architecture.
2. Middle-Power Hedging: India, Brazil, Indonesia leverage size to avoid bloc entrapment but risk fragmentation.
3. Institutional Erosion: UNSC paralysis and U.S. contempt for multilateralism leave minilaterals (I2U2, Quad) as partial substitutes, yet insufficient for systemic challenge.

Way Forward

1. Convene emergency BRICS+ virtual summit under neutral facilitation (Brazil/South Africa) to issue joint position on sovereignty violations.
2. Activate NDB emergency liquidity window and CIPS expansion for sanctioned members.
3. Establish BRICS Standing Security Coordination Committee with mandatory consultation protocols.
4. India to recalibrate strategic autonomy via visible diplomatic initiatives (Track-II mediation, joint energy-sharing arrangements).
5. Accelerate minilateral economic coalitions (G20, IORA) to build parallel norms outside U.S.-led reconstruction frameworks.

Conclusion

The spectacle of the Iran war has proved that multipolarity is currently a reality of power distribution but not of collective action. If the U.S. continues its bulldozer politics and BRICS remain internally fractured, the world risks descending into a Nihilistic Anarchy where the will to violence dictates politics. The task for 2026 is to build a Multilateralism 2.0 that does not rely on a single hegemon or a paralyzed bloc.