What is the likelihood of a third world war, and why can’t we avoid it?
To imagine future wars is to indulge in dangerous fantasies. Most likely, even the most plausible forecast will turn out to be wrong. The development of nuclear weapons has significantly changed the conditions of any future global conflict. There is no doubt that armed forces everywhere are developing plans for a probable war, providing for a variety of, even fantastic, possibilities, he writes in his column on Yahoo news British historian Richard Overy, author of books about the Second World War.
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Three possible disaster scenarios
Imagine for a moment that the Iranian government announces the creation of a nuclear bomb and threatens to use it against Israel. The United States reacts by threatening military intervention, as it did in 1991 and 2003 in Iraq. Iran says it will not tolerate a third Gulf War and is seeking allies. American troops are preparing to invade Iran; general mobilization is announced in Iran. Russia, China and North Korea are expressing support for Iran, and Washington is expanding its invasion force to include the British contingent. Russia, upping the ante in anticipation of the West backing down, is entering the game. A nuclear confrontation begins, which ends in disaster. World War III begins with an exchange of nuclear strikes, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Or imagine: China's dissatisfaction with Taiwan's status leads to a build-up of invasion forces. The United States is caught up in its own political crisis. Japan, pondering whether to intervene, is watching with concern the exchange of harsh statements between China and Taiwan. The UN condemns China's actions, and he, confident that a quick victory will prevent other countries from interfering, does not react and gives the order to begin the invasion. (This, by the way, was what Hitler hoped for when he invaded Poland in 1939). The US activates rescue plans for Taiwan, and each side uses tactical nuclear weapons against the other's military. North Korea and Russia are siding with China. There is no general nuclear attack, but Russia, dividing America's strategic interests between two theaters of war, as it did in World War II, calls on Europe not to intervene. The conflict continues to escalate.
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Now consider a completely different kind of global conflict. The growing division between the democratic West and the authoritarian states of Eurasia has entered a dangerous new phase. Neither side wants to risk open war, but there is a possibility that the destruction of satellite communications will undermine the military and economic capabilities of the other side. The Western satellite communications system is suddenly under attack. It is difficult to take countermeasures due to the breakdown of communications. Not knowing what to do, Western countries announce military mobilization, but Russia and China demand its end. Just like in 1914, the flywheel, once started, is difficult to stop. Welcome to the First Space War.
These three scenarios are possible, although none of them, to be clear, are likely.
However, the question of how a third world war might break out haunts us today more than at any time since the end of the last world war. Conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, Myanmar and Sudan are reminders of the ever-present, real possibility of a major war. And Russia's regular threats to use nuclear weapons suggest that our fantasies may not be so far from reality.
Violence as a tool of survival
Perhaps we should ask a different question: why do we fight wars at all? War has been a feature of almost all of history, and military violence preceded the creation of the first states. Why did humans develop belligerence along with the ability for social cooperation? Scientists have been puzzling over this question for the last hundred years.
Evolutionary biologists and psychologists believe that war was a means for ancient man to ensure the survival of the species. No biologist today claims that violence is in our genes. But early hominids, organized into small bands of hunter-gatherers or fishermen, almost certainly used violence to defend against invasion, secure resources and food, and sometimes to attack neighboring communities.
Violence as one of the tools of survival of ancient man became psychologically normative, as well as biologically useful.
However, this view is challenged by other sciences, which view war as a phenomenon associated with the development of sedentary cultures and political systems - be it a tribe, a proto-state or a state. 10 thousand years ago there were already wars in the world. This is confirmed by archaeological finds. Wars took many forms: a deadly raid, a ritual confrontation, or a massacre like the Nataruka massacres at Lake Turkana in Kenya 9 years ago.
Obviously, one did not need to have a state to participate in violence, as the tribal wars prove. However, wars produced warrior elites in various cultures where war was exalted and approved. Remember the Spartans, Vikings, Aztecs.
During the period of state formation, which began approximately 5 thousand years ago, war was an accepted custom everywhere.
The main causes of wars
Wars are always fought for the sake of something, be it pleasing the gods by capturing prisoners for execution or sacrifice, or capturing resources, or wars for faith, or expanding power over others, or simply a defensive war. This mixture of motives remains constant.
Resource seizure is an obvious motive: from the ancient Romans, who destroyed enemy cities, captured slaves and treasure, and demanded tribute, to the Japanese forces in 1942, who seized the oil and raw materials of Southeast Asia.
The tradition of religious wars also dates back thousands of years, from the Muslim conquests of the Middle East and North Africa in the early Middle Ages, through the era of the Christian Crusades, to the current jihadist campaigns of militant Islam.
Security, as Thomas Hobbes wrote in his famous work Leviathan back in 1651, is always at risk in an anarchic world where there is no single common authority to ensure it. Borders, as the wars in Ukraine and Gaza show today, are a stumbling block. But the long frontier of medieval China with steppe nomads and the vast frontiers of the late Roman Empire were also sites of constant invasions, defensive battles and punitive expeditions.
The struggle for power and the role of personality in history
The pursuit of power is perhaps the most common explanation for war, especially popular among political scientists and sociologists. The theory of power transition, which emerged at the height of the Cold War, envisions a constant race between major hegemonic powers, each trying to outdo the other. It is speculated that the race could end in war, as a declining power tries to defend its position or a rising power seeks to dislodge an opponent. At one time, this theory was applied to the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union, but they never went to war with each other.
Now these theories are being extended to the confrontation between the United States and China. This has become a favorite scenario for those predicting 1914st century conflicts. However, this theory doesn't work well. Both world wars began with a major power attacking a weaker one—Serbia in 1939, Poland in XNUMX—and then drawing other powers into the vortex. This could happen to Taiwan and is already happening to Ukraine.
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The theory of power as a cause of war works best when we look at specific individuals who aspired to become great conquerors, men whose ambitions drove their nations to conquest. Remember Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler. But their power usually evaporates with the death or defeat of the leader. This is the most dangerous and unpredictable cause of war.
After the end of the Cold War, it was fashionable to say that war was obsolete. If this were really true, we could now live in a world without weapons and fear. While few actively sought a third world war, few foresaw or wanted the previous two. The sad reality is that our understanding of the causes of war has so far done little to eliminate war from human history.
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