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There would also be more wars. One of the big changes in the 20th century is that now every country is interdependent on every other, so going to war is even

There would also be more wars. One of the big changes in the 20th century is that now every country is interdependent on every other, so going to war is even more costly for both sides, being cut off from half the world's supply chains. If you draw a chart of percentage of all humans alive who die in war, there is a sudden dropoff around 1900.

bsder 3y ago
Mostly due to vaccines. Wasn't WWI the first war in which more soldiers died from trauma than disease?
edgyquant 3y ago
I would love to see this chart, as I doubt that’s at all accurate considering how many died in the two world wars.
netbioserror 3y ago
War is the most costly when a government cannot fund it through debt and inflation. Nations used to go bankrupt waging war when precious metals were money. Now, they can defer the financial consequences approximately indefinitely, at least until we discover the straw the breaks the camel's back (IMO this is when debt servicing cost overtakes all other expenses and starts to consume more wealth than economic output).
- imtringued 3y ago
  I don't know why people mention precious metals as "harbingers of peace". What happened in the Roman empire is that private citizens assembled their own armies instead to usurp the emperor, repeatedly, several dozen times. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barracks_emperor https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barracks_emperor
  - netbioserror 3y ago
    The Romans still physically debased their money, and in the late Western empire, this was a strong contributor to its inability to hold onto its military units as citizens and barbarians became increasingly unwilling to accept denarii as pay. Thus, the erosion of its authority and the rise of barracks emperors. I should note that much later in the Eastern empire, after a long period of wallowing in inflation, corruption, and an ineffectual army, Anastasius I reformed the monetary system by refining the purities (and thus supplies) of coinage, which allowed him to clamp down on the state's accounting and tighten up the army. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anastasius_I_Dicorus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anastasius_I_Dicorus
steno132 3y ago
And in the century that followed 1900, history's first two world wars occured. If anything, interdependence creates more destructive wars because countries group themselves into (global) blocs who now go to war.
adrianmsmith 3y ago
> There would also be more wars. One of the big changes in the 20th century is that now every country is interdependent on every other, so going to war is even more costly for both sides, being cut off from half the world's supply chains. This is often repeated, and I believed it myself in the past as being self-evident, but the Russia/Ukraine war has changed my mind. Russia was selling gas, the west was buying gas. Other countries produced e.g. iPhones and Russians were buying them. It seemed to be a classic case of a situation where everyone loses if there's war, but yet the war happened anyway.
- wwtrv 3y ago
  > if there's war, but yet the war happened anyway. That doesen't mean that 10 additional wars wouldn't have happened otherwise. It's a bit like saying that safety standards don't matter because people still die in car crashes. Of course, you're right in a way. For the system to work you have to assume that states are governed by rational actors and that their citizens prefer having access to iPhones and other foreign goods (and not destroying their economy in general) over "fighting nazis/homosexuals/{insert idiotic thing}"... Russia's current account surplus finally became negative in the last few months so if that continues and their currency continues crashing, hopefully living standards for ordinary Russians will start decreasing at a faster pace and maybe they'll start thinking about regime change. Then again 2x more deaths during a single years than throughout the entire 10 year long war in Afghanistan didn't bother them to much so who knows...
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  One exception does not make the theory untrue. Consider sworn enemies like China and the US still trading with each other despite their soured relationship. And seeing how Russia has been severely weakened by Putin’s imperialist tendencies, other countries would be wary of repeating the same thing.
  - Teever 3y ago
    It isn't trade that keeps the peace, it's MAD and the United States policing the seas.

bsder 3y ago

Mostly due to vaccines. Wasn't WWI the first war in which more soldiers died from trauma than disease?

edgyquant 3y ago

I would love to see this chart, as I doubt that’s at all accurate considering how many died in the two world wars.

netbioserror 3y ago

War is the most costly when a government cannot fund it through debt and inflation. Nations used to go bankrupt waging war when precious metals were money. Now, they can defer the financial consequences approximately indefinitely, at least until we discover the straw the breaks the camel's back (IMO this is when debt servicing cost overtakes all other expenses and starts to consume more wealth than economic output).

imtringued 3y ago
I don't know why people mention precious metals as "harbingers of peace". What happened in the Roman empire is that private citizens assembled their own armies instead to usurp the emperor, repeatedly, several dozen times. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barracks_emperor https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barracks_emperor
- netbioserror 3y ago
  The Romans still physically debased their money, and in the late Western empire, this was a strong contributor to its inability to hold onto its military units as citizens and barbarians became increasingly unwilling to accept denarii as pay. Thus, the erosion of its authority and the rise of barracks emperors. I should note that much later in the Eastern empire, after a long period of wallowing in inflation, corruption, and an ineffectual army, Anastasius I reformed the monetary system by refining the purities (and thus supplies) of coinage, which allowed him to clamp down on the state's accounting and tighten up the army. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anastasius_I_Dicorus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anastasius_I_Dicorus

steno132 3y ago

And in the century that followed 1900, history's first two world wars occured. If anything, interdependence creates more destructive wars because countries group themselves into (global) blocs who now go to war.

adrianmsmith 3y ago

> There would also be more wars. One of the big changes in the 20th century is that now every country is interdependent on every other, so going to war is even more costly for both sides, being cut off from half the world's supply chains. This is often repeated, and I believed it myself in the past as being self-evident, but the Russia/Ukraine war has changed my mind. Russia was selling gas, the west was buying gas. Other countries produced e.g. iPhones and Russians were buying them. It seemed to be a classic case of a situation where everyone loses if there's war, but yet the war happened anyway.

wwtrv 3y ago
> if there's war, but yet the war happened anyway. That doesen't mean that 10 additional wars wouldn't have happened otherwise. It's a bit like saying that safety standards don't matter because people still die in car crashes. Of course, you're right in a way. For the system to work you have to assume that states are governed by rational actors and that their citizens prefer having access to iPhones and other foreign goods (and not destroying their economy in general) over "fighting nazis/homosexuals/{insert idiotic thing}"... Russia's current account surplus finally became negative in the last few months so if that continues and their currency continues crashing, hopefully living standards for ordinary Russians will start decreasing at a faster pace and maybe they'll start thinking about regime change. Then again 2x more deaths during a single years than throughout the entire 10 year long war in Afghanistan didn't bother them to much so who knows...
boeingUH60 3y ago
One exception does not make the theory untrue. Consider sworn enemies like China and the US still trading with each other despite their soured relationship. And seeing how Russia has been severely weakened by Putin’s imperialist tendencies, other countries would be wary of repeating the same thing.
- Teever 3y ago
  It isn't trade that keeps the peace, it's MAD and the United States policing the seas.