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Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

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Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#181

Post by zaru27 »

learc83 wrote: post #169
zaru27 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the same token, there's no reason to think they'll fall anywhere near or under 5% in the near future. They have 1.5 billion people with a higher average IQ than the US with a strong educational culture, increasing economic opportunity with a lot of i's to dot in various industries, their per capita is still a fraction of that of a developed company, and there are another 1000 reasons to paint a fuller picture beyo…

>By the same token, there's no reason to think they'll fall anywhere near or under 5% in the near future. Why? It's fallen 6 points since 2010. The OECD long term forecast puts it at 5% in just 2 years, and predicts it will drop down to around 3% within 10 years. This is without any serious problems. These numbers are also based on official GDP estimates, and there are studies that estimate that China's GDP is 30% lo…

Last one regarding, for example, US developing a massive competitive advantage with the internet right after their housing market crash.

I won't debate any further because clearly I'm going to get downvoted for doing anything other than linking a business insider article on why chinese local debt is going to collapse tomorrow in the HN echo chamber. If you want to believe it's inevitable China is going to plateau in rapidly, by all means.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#182

Post by wpietri »

tomohawk wrote: post #148

The thing about war is that at some point, the conditions line up where it becomes seen as a solution (if not the only solution), and its not easy to see the point at which that will occur ahead of time. Will China's big sea grab start a war? So far, they've been able to smother any of their neighbor's push back, and have just ignored any international rulings against them. What about when they invade Taiwan, which t…

And I'd add that it need only be a solution to the person who can start the war. Authoritarian leaders find fights with external enemies extremely useful to quash dissent. Given the global drift toward authoritarianism and nationalism, and especially given how the world's largest military is in the hands of an authoritarian, I think the risk for war is disturbingly high.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#183

Post by crispinb »

tomohawk wrote: post #148

The thing about war is that at some point, the conditions line up where it becomes seen as a solution (if not the only solution), and its not easy to see the point at which that will occur ahead of time. Will China's big sea grab start a war? So far, they've been able to smother any of their neighbor's push back, and have just ignored any international rulings against them. What about when they invade Taiwan, which t…

> At what point do their aggressions spill over into a larger conflict?

When perceived benefits outweigh costs. The US's multiple invasions of, and coup plots against, other countries didn't 'spill over into a larger conflict' because the US's power & ruthlessness have been well-understood by the world. The costs of resisting US militaristic aggression have just been too high. The same has applied to Russia, and perhaps will in China's case if it makes good on its threats (though it would have to fight on multiple fronts for decades to even approach US levels of aggression).

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#184

Post by lozaning »

pvaldes wrote: post #171
bsder wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is that, even with 393 millions of guns, USA can't stop recurrent fireforests year after year. Not exactly true. The problem is that nobody wants to pay the money to do so--especially the people who live in those areas. In addition, you only get to burn those forests once . After that, they are no longer a threat because there is no fuel.

> After that, they are no longer a threat because there is no fuel. Not necessarily. I bet that the new replacement ecosystem will be, in fact, much more flammable. The water has quit the area.

The issue we worry about post fire is not more fire, it's landslides next time whatever excuse we get for a rainy season comes around.

You simply can't burn a forest to the ground twice without growing another forrest in between.

https://www.fs.fed.us/science-technology/fire/after-fire

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#185

Post by learc83 »

bdamm wrote: post #180
sarchertech wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a very good point. They weren't widely used. But Japan did use both chemical and biological weapons against the Chinese. We don't really know why Hitler didn't use them, but it's likely that his experience in WWI gave him a unique hatred of chemical warfare. Regardless by the time Germany accepted that they were facing an existential threat, they couldn't have used Chemical weapons to completely decimate their…

He did of course use chemical weapons in his death camps.

Very true.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#186

Post by AtHeartEngineer »

We are so close, probably within 50 to 100 years, of having technology far beyond what we can comprehend now. We have the chance to be multi-planetary, automate pretty much all work, and fullfil everyone's basic needs...if we don't destroy everything first.

I'm going to be real pissed off if we screw this up.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#187

Post by learc83 »

zaru27 wrote: post #181
learc83 wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>By the same token, there's no reason to think they'll fall anywhere near or under 5% in the near future. Why? It's fallen 6 points since 2010. The OECD long term forecast puts it at 5% in just 2 years, and predicts it will drop down to around 3% within 10 years. This is without any serious problems. These numbers are also based on official GDP estimates, and there are studies that estimate that China's GDP is 30% lo…

Last one regarding, for example, US developing a massive competitive advantage with the internet right after their housing market crash. I won't debate any further because clearly I'm going to get downvoted for doing anything other than linking a business insider article on why chinese local debt is going to collapse tomorrow in the HN echo chamber. If you want to believe it's inevitable China is going to plateau in…

Don't know why you're getting downvoted, but I linked to a lot more than articles about local debt. Perhaps you could refute the OECD long term forecast that predicts a plateau rather than setting up a straw man about business insider articles.

By the way, I'm not even saying that China won't overtake the US economy sometime this century, I'm saying that naive extrapolation based on current growth rates is a terrible way to predict the future.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#188

Post by MisterOctober »

jeffdavis wrote: post #29

What's the point of war in the modern world? Gain land/people? If there's a thriving economy there, war will probably change that quickly. If there's no thriving economy, what's the point? You could try to exploit the people/resources there, but the profits in that seem (at least compared to a world power) pretty thin. Unskilled labor and unimproved land are just not worth what they used to be. Specific resources mig…

To amplify some of the business-related points already mentioned : War as an industry is itself profitable and the mobilization of resources toward the purpose of a war being actively prosecuted puts desirable numbers in a lot of peoples' spreadsheets.

As opposed to run-of-the-mill 'defense spending', wherein materiel and training costs are limited by the nature of routine budgetary apparatus, an active war consumes gargantuan supplies of goods, from weapons and ordnance to socks and coffee, that need to be constantly replenished. And technical costs are free to spiral because the notion of failure in automated systems, communications, etc, is terrible to countenance.

Funding is also easier to get during an active war because, well, 'THIS IS WAR!' The point in this thread from restalis about salesmanship is spot-on.

It's also worth noting that the equities / stocks associated with war-oriented corporations are tremendously widespread in terms of portfolio inclusion. Nearly everybody has Lockheed, General Dynamics, etc etc etc in their retirement fund [for the somewhat circular reason that those stocks generally do perform in the long term].

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#189

Post by azernik »

NotAmazin wrote: post #175
tomohawk wrote: post #148

The thing about war is that at some point, the conditions line up where it becomes seen as a solution (if not the only solution), and its not easy to see the point at which that will occur ahead of time. Will China's big sea grab start a war? So far, they've been able to smother any of their neighbor's push back, and have just ignored any international rulings against them. What about when they invade Taiwan, which t…

You forgot to mention Israel's aggression on adjacent countries Lebanon and Palestine. Would Israel's constant belligerence start a war?

I think Israel (and, unlike GP, also Iran) are too small-time to start real global war. They're more the potential Bosnias or Serbias - small, belligerent countries that could drag their patrons into conflict.

Re: Reasons to Fear Another ‘Great War’

#190

Post by StephenMelon »

ridewinter wrote: post #98
jpollock wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know. Why did the aggressor nations invade (since 2000): Afghanistan Anjouan Crimea Gambia Georgia Iraq Lebanon Somalia Syria

Where is North Korea not on this list? Right...they have nuclear weapons. The surefire way of preventing invasion & war. That's why the Great War isn't going to happen again. If WWIII does happen it's game over folks.

Nuclear weapons are the reason why the competing global powers have found new ways to compete and project power abroad. Global wars have mostly moved from being violence-based to being fought via propaganda and economics. It probably mirrors the way smaller communities moved from physical to intellectual competition.
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