This is what I am most afraid of and could see happening. Though I don't think it is that easy, i3ut it could happen.
Given that time is infinite (even if human existence won't be), you have to assume it will happen at some point. Nuclear capabilities have been the strongest deterrent to large scale war. We are only 70 years into that existence. That is a minute time frame compared to Human history.
I don't know if I'm the character you are referring too but if so I will reiterate I think it is a flawed comparison given the differences in technology, tactics, populations and several other things. I'm not sure why you have such a focus on poison gas and for the record the Japanese did use poison gas during WWII. For that matter while restraint was showed by the Allies and the Axis in the European Theater on using poison gas that didn't stop the Germans from using such weapons as V1 and V2 which had very little military strategic value but caused a lot of terror among civilian populations. Of course the US didn't refrain from dropping two weapons of mass destruction on Japan. All that said I agree with you that an all out nuclear war is very unlikely. It is one thing to drop a nuke when you are the only one who has them but another when a lot of other guys have them too.
That was absolutely a dig at you! I thought it was an amusing way to bring up my comparison. I know the Japanese used it, which was why I consistently referred to the European Theater. As for the rockets used by the Germans, did they have poison gas warheads? No, because both sides chose to forgo its use, my point about a possible world war being fought in the future without atomic weapons. So after all the angst, you essentially agree with me! :-D-
Aren't major countries like the US and China so dependent on each other that they wouldn't go to war.
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If you are really interested in this question, read this book: About half is a recounting of events and the general mood leading up to WWI, and the other half is more or less about the first month of the war. They weren't calling it a world war, but the universal consensus was that a war in Europe, essentially a rehash of the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 was essentially impossible. Pundits and politicians smugly proclaimed it from the rooftops. The book details all the reasons why, which are pretty much word for word the reasons that people give now as to why a future world war is impossible. The title of the book comes from the fact that, when the war started in July, Kaiser Wilhelm gave a big speach to the leaving troops about how they would be home in time to see the leaves fall from the trees in August. Essentially, the lesson of the book is that the only way another monumental f**k-up of a war like that can happen again is at the point that people become convinced that the thing is impossible. Basically, the cause of long protracted destructive wars is the smug self assurance that people have in their own ability to control events that are spiraling out of control and by believing that it is possible to will a quick, decisive victory. So yes, it can happen again, as soon as people stop being vigilant about avoiding such a possibility. And honestly, as the cold war fades into people's memories and exists only as a detached academic subject, I'd say that the possibility becomes exponentially greater that it will happen. If you want a recent example of this mindset, think of the way that the Bush White House was so positive that the army was going to roll into Baghdad as the conquering heroes, and democracy and love for America were going to spontaneously erupt. They were honestly caught off guard when that didn't happen.
Once again while they refrained from using poison gas they didn't refrain from using other weapons of mass destruction for the time. Such as fire bombing. For that matter the Germans did use poison gas just not on military targets. Also let's not forget that the Germans were also attempting to develop an A bomb and I'm guessing they would've used it most likely on the Russians first and then maybe the British. What angst?
I've read excerpts of the book but I know the general gist of it. Good recommendation and definitely something we should consider now in 2014 when thinking that world war is impossible. I would put it in the highly improbable category but you are right that we need to be very vigilant about the use of force and entanglements that could spiral into something much greater.
I read the entire thing back in the 1960's, and it's a great read. It's also scary as hell, since so many "smart" people totally blew it. “Arguments can always be found to turn desire into policy.” ― Barbara W. Tuchman, The Guns of August
If it starts, it will either be at Afghanistan's southern border, the Kashmir border of India-Pakistan, or the newly opened shipping lanes in the arctic.
20,000 Russian combat troops on the Ukraine border and a giant ego in charge. I've said all along that Putin was caught completely off guard by the ouster of Yanukovych and was pushing it to the edge to save face, appear strong and would use the threat to smash any Western leaning dissent within his borders but wold not actually invade Eastern Ukraine. Now I'm not quite so confident. The more the world makes him a pariah, and he probably was as surprised by the screw-up of MH-17 as anybody though he is certainly complicit, the less he has to lose. Given a credible excuse he may try to "repatriate' the Russian people of Eastern Ukraine. It would only take a couple of weeks to secure a new border and he could stop at a culturally defendable (Russian dominated ethnic make-up) point and not be too much worse off than he sits now. IF NATO chose not to react. If he miscalculates and NATO does get actively involved we could get a shooting war in Europe and it's escalation could be pushed to World War status by rouge and unpredictable events. I still think he is just in for a decades long harassment action to use for his own domestic purposes and to negotiate a continued interest in the politics of the Ukraine as a buffer state, but, the man with nothing left to lose is the most dangerous man.
I listened to a talk yesterday by a U of MN professor on Chinese confrontations with Japan and in the South China sea. He stated that he felt that the US treaties with Japan, Taiwan and with the ASEAN nations were pretty clear that if the PRC used military force against those countries, including over the Diaoyutai / Senkaku Islands, that the US would be obligated to step in to help those countries. Some rocks in the Eastern Pacific could be the spark to a next world war.
I think China thinks in longer terms than the West. I think they could wait 100 years to repatriate Tiawan and know they are 25 years from being able to project any power beyond their shores. For now it's just bluster and bluff to maintain their claims.
This mentality may just cripple their economy however (look for example at the replica large scale cities that are completely vacant). Housing and building infrastructure is the #1 indicator of GDP growth, however if there is nobody occupying this sector and making payments on it, then it shall collapse as history has told (the US housing crash with Fanny and Freddy).
War requires massive amounts of debt and money printing. In the near future, Bitcoin will be the ubiquitous transnational currency of the world. It cannot be inflated, and states will find it impossible to build the war fighting capabilities we are accustomed to in the past century.
And so why would imperialist nations embrace it? Seems you give reasons why it won't be embraced worldwide. Hope and wish I was wrong, but I just don't see the people in power letting that happen.
Imperialist nations won't imbrace it, but they can't stop it. Like BitTorrent, it's a distributed network with no central authority or control. The country would have to shut down the internet to stop it, and that's becoming harder and harder to do.
No, they could just shut down the exchanges, and any means for people to transact real goods with virtual currency (see: China). In any case, Bitcoin in its' current form won't be a transnational currency of anything given wallet security issues, and extreme volatility, some of it based on pure speculation. You wouldn't want to hold bitcoin, just like you wouldn't want to hold subprime assets unless you had a high risk preference. There would be inflation directed by technical f**kups like the following as well, which call into question the secondary infrastructure behind bitcoin, and add to the risk factor. http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesly...ound-at-mtgox-and-how-to-protect-your-wallet/ Add in the volatility generated by governments deciding to turn on and off the democratic access points for their citizens to transact in virtual currencies, and bitcoin becomes more of a roulette wheel than solid hard currency. I have faith in the underlying technology behind bitcoin---the cryptography insight of having an extensible public chain that communicates proof-of-work---I think the technical aspect of it is fundamentally sound---but it relies on a secondary infrastructure to democratize access that is very very difficult to deal with and predict. I wouldn't exactly be blustering about it right now, bitcoin has proven some of the many difficulties associated with distributed economics. it'll get somewhere eventually, but it won't end wars now, or for the next few decades.
Prolonged food shortages and price inflation for common goods usually change or topple governments. That shift in power could be the spark of another WW if the global market itself becomes too rigid and inflexible for its own good...by the same reasons it's so efficient at getting foreign made products to market quickly. Defense department has been running simulations and studies on the effects of global climate change and its big impacts to national security...
