Written Apr 27, 2021
Arguably, the world is in a very precarious situation, despite the absence of global war. FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt) is palpable on multiple fronts: The threat of a 12-year long financial bubble bursting, the economic malaise following an unprecedented global shutdown (despite official “happy talk”), the prospect of geopolitical hot-spots (from the S China Sea to the Black Sea and the Middle East) blowing up, a Pandemic still “morphing”, ongoing global migration crisis (albeit in respite due to Covid), and continued social decay/unrest everywhere.
Entropy (order disintegrating into chaos) is visible everywhere, and people instinctively know that the process cannot be reversed instantly. In other words, chaos will worsen before eventual reinstatement of order. Angst arises from the thought of global chaos culminating in “World War 3”. After all, history shows that when socioeconomic and financial instability rise to a certain level, war invariably breaks out.
“World War 3” alarm bells went off following the January 2020 “neutralizing” of major general Qasem Soleimani, second most powerful man in Iran. Iran regards the incident as a declaration of war and has sworn “harsh revenge”, promising to “turn day into night”. The world takes those words seriously. Elsewhere, the military coup in Myanmar has escalated since then. Relationship worsened between the U.S. and Turkey; and between India and Pakistan. And of course, there is this among other festering China issues. Growing “World War 3” concerns are understandable.
Insofar as global war and peace, statistics show a favorable trend since the 16th century (see chart below). I guess we can congratulate ourselves for being more “civilized” (especially since the mid-20th century). Let’s just hope the trend is not “mean reversing” (i.e. overdue for war for having been at peace for so long). As well, this chart belies “global misery” (best expressed by mass migration out of desperation all over the world).
Alas, wars don’t happen by spontaneous combustion. They are initiated deliberately, after meticulous calculus, for specific purposes. Post- Renaissance, the chief purpose of war has always been economic rather than ideological. Further, global wars typically start when global misery is at intolerable levels, and end as a way to create a new world order. The most recent example was the creation of the Bretton Woods System at the conclusion of World War 2.
Gone were the days when the purpose of war was territorial claim. Religious, nationalistic, or vengeful wars may still happen regionally but not anymore on a world stage now manipulated by sophisticated geopolitics. Beyond exploiting other nations’ resources, new-age hybrid warfare is more about compelling other global players to comply with your own policies. In a globalized world with interconnected systems of trade, finance, information, and security, this can easily be accomplished through trade war and currency war (both ongoing for a long time). More insidiously, it can be accomplished through influencing other nations’ values and ideals, thus policies by infiltrating their media, schools, political machinery, and industries. And oh by the way, economic warfare goes beyond trade and currency (some view trade war as the mirror image of currency war, and when both fail to resolve conflicting interests in a zero sum game, kinetic war ensues). You can engineer unbearable price increase in bare essentials like energy and food for the citizens of your enemy without engaging in military warfare.
On the kinetic (military) front, the first place to look is that tanks on the ground but what happens in space. No modern warfare is possible these days without GPS, and there have already been multiple incidents of satellite sabotage in space which modern “journalists” (i.e. obscenely over-paid script-reading “pretty faces”) don't cover.
Then there is ”Hybrid” (information) war made possible by a digital world connected by social networks that never sleep. Influence — via propaganda and disinformation — is now exerted directly on foreign populace, enabling non-state actors to act on their influenced thoughts in real time, catching their own governments by total surprise. (This is what TikTok is all about. More than gathering intelligence, it is an opinion influencer.)
A first cousin of information warfare is cyber warfare which can be used to steal or manipulate massive amounts of data, or destroy entire infrastructures and disable entire nations in seconds. We’ve come a long way since the World War 2 platoons taking weeks to blow up a bridge, baby!
Finally, there is always the horrifying specter of biological/chemical warfare. Odd how that subject died completely with Covid, eh? Political correctness, perhaps (we all know how important political correctness is in our modern “cancel culture”). But don’t worry, the “authorities” seem to all regard the origin of Covid as having been independently and thoroughly investigated to have unequivocally ruled out any possibility of biological warfare. The devastating 2nd wave of variant strain killing thousands per day in India is now found in Europe and Australia, boding ill for Covid ever being “over” for any country. Brazil’s average of 1000 deaths a day from the first wave hasn’t leveled off yet. But I digress from the subject at hand. The Pandemic is just bad break, — right?
One thing is for sure. Wars are no longer just between nation-states, governed by some archaic decorum like the Geneva Conventions. 911 demonstrated this in spades. We all know “sleeper cells” abound everywhere around the world, waiting to spring into action — whether as agitators in local protests and riots, or as outright terrorists. In a globalized world, non-state actors (terrorist groups, transnational criminal networks, drug cartels, etc.) transcend nationality and ethnicity. Wars with, and between these non-state actors are as ongoing and vigorous as wars between nation-states. Not only that, the complex relationships between actors can dynamically change national wills and thus the relationship between nation-states. One frequently reads about (almost whimsical) about-face changes in alliances, seemingly out of geopolitical “convenience”. (That said, one does wonder if history can be entirely wiped out. For instance, does “the West” truly regard Turkey as a staunch NATO ally? Or has it not forgotten these are the same people who sacked the Byzantine Empire, — the last bastion of ancient western civilization, — and sided with Germany against the Allies in both World Wars 1 and 2?).
All these factors support the view that modern war is without borders and amorphous. Especially on a global scale, it is not a discrete action of full scale armed conflict, but a continuum of coercion, limited-scale conflicts, and diplomacy. Coalitions constantly change, as shared or conflicting interests shift. One can therefore argue World War 3 has already been in progress for quite some time. Only question is, how far will it escalate?
Well, kinetic war (i.e. full scale armed conflict) is only the last resort when the coherent execution of “soft” wars (leveraging trans-border corporations, non-governmental organizations, media, social and educational channels) fails. After all, Sun Tzu did write “To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skills.”
If we buy the preceding argument, then there is no “end” to World War 3 either. Full scale armed conflict can certainly (start and) end. But limited- scale conflicts will likely persist, both for show and ”surgical operations”. “Soft” wars, — via trade, financial, informational and cultural influence, — will certainly persist, and most probably escalate.
Wars are means, more often than not to financial ends. Remember Mitch McConnell admitting aid to Ukraine actually circles back to the United States via payments to arms dealers and military contractors of all kinds? In other words, wars are a means of money laundering. Ergo, wars have no end to them. If there is any end, then it must be total world domination (you know, the theme of every Bond movie). That doesn’t look to be an issue of the 2020s.
That all said, there is the one wild card: Actions taken by irrational actors; you know, the stuff of Dr. Strangelove. All bets are off then.
