4 ms·

You mean, replaced by the utter destruction of all things Earth? There isn't really much of another alternative to war.

by ysavir 10y ago

vinceguidry 10y ago
War gets replaced by the threat of war. You fight a big, awful war, and everybody hates it so much that there's political will to make everyone put down their weapons and focus on peace. War equalizes everything. It turns princes into paupers and paupers into princes. Enormous amounts of stored wealth simply evaporate and everything becomes the communal property of the state. You see this cycle all throughout history. Wealth and inequality build up, people complain, threaten war, and to allay them the elites throw a few ladders out. This creates not just elite families, but elite sections of society. Once you have sections of society hating each other, then you have the makings of war. People constantly worry about it, but we're still on the downswing from World War 2. Unfortunately we have not yet reached the point to where war threatens human survival. Nuclear weapons are just not powerful enough. What I am hoping for is that humanity has figured out the trick of de-escalation. That the US can project power all across the globe is a huge improvement. We can bring overwhelming force to any situation we find ourselves in. Instead of worrying about war, we now worry about our special forces personnel. Huge win. This keeps any one side from really gaining the power to threaten the broader peace of the region. Sure, right now we're not all that great at driving political goals through force projection, just look at Iraq, but we should get better at it over time.
- ysavir 10y ago
  So when you say "replaced by the threat of war", what you really mean is having one power assert uncontested control. I consider that to be a very one sided perspective... Yes, the US can exercise power all across the globe, but have you seen how other countries respond to that power? It might prevent military battles, but terrorism is still war, though fought with different tactics. And as far as having a single power goes... That's not a guaranteed promise, either. Look at ancient Rome: They achieved (more or less) unquestionable power and authority over the Mediterranean, and that simply led to decades of civil war. People living together in peace is a myth.
- ThrowawayR2 10y ago
  > War gets replaced by the threat of war. You fight a big, awful war, and everybody hates it so much that there's political will to make everyone put down their weapons and focus on peace. Indeed, we could call it the "War to End All Wars". The peoples of the world would be so horrified at the prospect that they would form some sort of league of all the nations to prevent such a thing from ever happening again.
k__ 10y ago
My idea was more that everyone would notice, that all can have much more wealth, if we don't bomb it away every now and then.

You mean, replaced by the utter destruction of all things Earth? There isn't really much of another alternative to war.

by ysavir 10y ago

You mean, replaced by the utter destruction of all things Earth? There isn't really much of another alternative to war.

War gets replaced by the threat of war. You fight a big, awful war, and everybody hates it so much that there's political will to make everyone put down their weapons and focus on peace. War equalizes everything. It turns princes into paupers and paupers into princes. Enormous amounts of stored wealth simply evaporate and everything becomes the communal property of the state. You see this cycle all throughout history. Wealth and inequality build up, people complain, threaten war, and to allay them the elites throw a few ladders out. This creates not just elite families, but elite sections of society. Once you have sections of society hating each other, then you have the makings of war. People constantly worry about it, but we're still on the downswing from World War 2. Unfortunately we have not yet reached the point to where war threatens human survival. Nuclear weapons are just not powerful enough. What I am hoping for is that humanity has figured out the trick of de-escalation. That the US can project power all across the globe is a huge improvement. We can bring overwhelming force to any situation we find ourselves in. Instead of worrying about war, we now worry about our special forces personnel. Huge win. This keeps any one side from really gaining the power to threaten the broader peace of the region. Sure, right now we're not all that great at driving political goals through force projection, just look at Iraq, but we should get better at it over time.

ysavir 10y ago
So when you say "replaced by the threat of war", what you really mean is having one power assert uncontested control. I consider that to be a very one sided perspective... Yes, the US can exercise power all across the globe, but have you seen how other countries respond to that power? It might prevent military battles, but terrorism is still war, though fought with different tactics. And as far as having a single power goes... That's not a guaranteed promise, either. Look at ancient Rome: They achieved (more or less) unquestionable power and authority over the Mediterranean, and that simply led to decades of civil war. People living together in peace is a myth.
ThrowawayR2 10y ago
> War gets replaced by the threat of war. You fight a big, awful war, and everybody hates it so much that there's political will to make everyone put down their weapons and focus on peace. Indeed, we could call it the "War to End All Wars". The peoples of the world would be so horrified at the prospect that they would form some sort of league of all the nations to prevent such a thing from ever happening again.

k__ 10y ago

My idea was more that everyone would notice, that all can have much more wealth, if we don't bomb it away every now and then.