At 06:10 PM 6/19/2007, Alfred Urrutia wrote:
Because you think you can? Not a great reason, of course, but a
common one for a would-be conqueror.
I'm skeptical as to whether that would fly in China.
Retaliation or punishment is still a valid and justifiable reason
(in the court of public opinion) for going to war. And all the tech
in the world won't allow you to physically take something (like
land). You can shoot it, bomb it, burn it, etc., but you need some
grunts with rifles to physically stand on it to claim it.
Yes, but most countries have no interest in such things (particularly
those with the tech to wage war on the scale we're talking about). We
*might* get something like that in Kashmir. Where else? Taiwan? I
think if China and the West were going to go to war over that little
island they would have done it by now. So what's left that could
possibly be of interest to China? Or the U.S.? Those are the only two
superpowers left, and neither one has expansionist tendencies these days.
The more I see in life the more I realize that there's just no
profit in large-scale armed conflict anymore. We have better things
to do, and going to war costs a fortune. So why bother? Better to
just buy out anything that bothers you, and let the undeveloped
nations of the world continue to squabble amongst themselves. It
isn't *right*, but I can't really see any reason why a developed
nation would do any differently.
You sorely underestimate the two main reasons for going to war (not
saying they're good reasons).
Not really. I just recognize the fact that war is a very costly
business, and that most governments in the modern era are answerable
to bureaucracies. Going to war in response to 9/11 was a no-brainer,
but Iraq was a much tougher sell (and ultimately a bad idea, as it
fractured the Republican party and led to Bush being the most reviled
president in U.S. history -- it's not likely a future president, even
a Republican, will make the same error). We'll always have our stupid
little skirmishes, but we haven't had a real large scale war for 60
years, and I think there's a reason for that -- there's no more land
to grab, and there's no profit to be had in stealing it from someone else.
I'm not saying we've evolved or become more socially responsible or
anything like that. I'm just pointing out that the primary
motivations for war, and the mechanisms that enabled it decades ago,
are no longer relevant.
I don't know if I'd say I'm a fan, necessarily, but...well, it does
lead to stability. The fight's gone out of Europe, Russia's
bankrupt, China has its own problems to deal with, and the hot
issues in the U.S. are political corruption, energy sources, and
terrorism. If globalization is the price for a world without
large-scale conflict, I can hardly call it a bad thing. We need to
do better, mind, but even still we're heading in the right direction.
You confuse "for now" with "always".
Not at all. I'm just mindful of the fact that things change, and that
you can't assume the status quo will hold just because that's the way
it's always been. Europe was a land of conflict for centuries, but
that stopped after WWII. Europe is presently more unified than it's
been at any previous point in history, and it *isn't* showing signs
of falling apart. That doesn't mean it never will, naturally, but it
does mean we have no reason to assume it will any time soon.
Similarly, given that China has never been one to meddle in the
affairs of other superpowers (other minor powers is a different
story, but beside the point for our purposes) it's safe to assume
that, barring radical events, it will continue to carry on in that
vein. Same with India and the U.S. (which is prone to meddling but
faces such intense scrutiny at home, and so much turnover in
administration, that managing anything large scale for long is
completely beyond its means).
That leaves...well, Africa and the Middle East, both of which are so
FUBARed at the moment that *any* prospects of a productive future are
looking pretty damn slim (and the big players in the world have
largely written them off).
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