Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#61

Post by mathgeek » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:03 PM UTC

rich_sasha wrote: post #38

kypro wrote: post #5

I doubt it simply because there's still a massive power imbalance between western and non-western countries. A war with China and Russia would obviously be awful for the human race, but there's almost no way China and Russia would win such a war, nor would it make sense to fight it. I mean what does the "winner" of WWIII gain? You might win the war, but now the planet is a nuclear waste land. I think China and Russia…

I would like that to be true. Did Germany stand a chance to win WWII? Probably not, or at best a slim chance; it made huge, surprising victories against most of continental Europe, but it just picked on too many opponents. By the time the US was in, it was (slow and deadly) game over. They believed their own BS and went ahead with it regardless. I guess the risk here is that Russia or China could also believe their o…

Nazi Germany stood a reasonable chance of winning WW2. They made many mistakes as well as underestimating the resistance that Britain would provide, but victory was certainly feasible through 1941 or 1942.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#62

Post by deepdriver » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:04 PM UTC

porbelm wrote: post #54

deepdriver wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There was absolutely zero talk of the US/NATO directly intervening militarily in Ukraine. NPR hosted the former commander of NATO who called for the US to enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine, to include shooting down Russian jets. Numerous Senators and Congressmen backed one as well. https://www.npr.org/2022/03/03/1084310587/former-nato-comman...

Yeah but the U.S. didn't do that, did they?

The assertion was "zero talk" of such intervention, my point is that there quite a lot of public and private discussion on the matter. Yes, Biden ultimately shot down the idea (thankfully). Unsettling to me that it picked up enough steam where he felt he had to make a statement on it.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#63

Post by rvz » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:05 PM UTC

drKarl wrote: post #7

The TikTok spying is probably irrelevant since most TikTok users are teenagers. I was surprised when Putin went ahead and actually invaded Ukraine since I didn't see the cost/benefit justifying the invasion. Putin had a war chest of more than 600 billion dollars. Like half of that was on western banks and it's now frozen, so Putin can't use it. They're burning through the rest quickly as Russian economy is going to t…

> The TikTok spying is probably irrelevant since most TikTok users are teenagers.

Repeating the exact same problems that Facebook has done years ago, interfering with elections and a tool for spreading disinformation for billions.

TikTok is essentially the same but worse, with the disinformation not only spread to billions but it can be targeted geographically and dictated algorithmically based on watch time alone and account information. [0] Even worse when the videos or the accounts are located in the front line of the whole scene.

The moment we will see them take the nastiness of these ideas [1] on to TikTok, it will only get worse for the users on the social network for the years ahead.

Soon, you will have no say and you will be very happy to keep on pleasing and working for the algorithm.

[0] https://www.nrk.no/osloogviken/xl/tiktok-doesn_t-show-the-wa...

[1] https://2ndsmartestguyintheworld.substack.com/p/wefs-global-...

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#64

Post by acidioxide » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:09 PM UTC

Everybody says that WWIII won't happen because nobody would dare to use nuclear weapons, but I think that there is a possibility for a world war without nuclear war. Russia didn't use nuclear weapons in Ukraine.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#65

Post by csours » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:10 PM UTC

It's a very difficult question.

War between nations has mostly gone out of style. From Putin's stated point of view, the war in Ukraine is a police action in a province (more or less) of Russia. Old school Russians think of Belarus, Ukraine, and Georgia as property.

It's similar with Taiwan. Mainland China thinks of the island as part of the country, so they would not really see it as going to war with another country.

I think it would be interesting to think about the groundwork for WWI, like the Franco-Prussian war in 1870.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#66

Post by smallstepforman » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:11 PM UTC

atemerev wrote: post #37

vbezhenar wrote: post #19

WW3 will not happen. Countries are not stupid to destroy the Earth. Local wars here and there happened and will happen in the future. There's nothing special about Ukraine or Taiwan in that regard. World will move from US-centric model to multi-polar model. One pole is China, one pole is Russia, one pole is EU, one pole is US, one pole is Iran. Confused about India but probably it'll be a separate pole as well. Proba…

I think that the world is now more unipolar than ever before. Russia is repeatedly proving that it worth nearly nothing both in military and political sense, the Chinese military power is also very much overestimated. EU is nearly defenseless on their own too. Only the US has the military power to win any existential war (small wars of course can still be “lost”, as the adversary can become the prize not worth taking…

I must make the assumption that you’re young. China today has set its path to carry out an action in 5-10 years when it’s ready. You never engage when you’re not prepared. You build up, plan, prepare, then act. That takes time. Remember, revenge is best served cold. China has stepped down today, but I can reassure you, in 5-10 years it will act militarily to avenge its current embarrasment. Just like Russia prepared for the last 8.

Russia won the war in the first 72 hours, now its grinding Ukraine and its supporters, they’re too stubborn to back away. Russia has also only committed 10% of their resources, the rest are on standby in case NATO intervenes.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#67

Post by Ekaros » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:11 PM UTC

mytailorisrich wrote: post #2

> With Russia invading Ukraine & China preparing to invade Taiwan, I can't help but wonder. And before that the US invaded Iraq (twice), Afghanistan, various other countries (arguably including Vietnam and Korea). The USSR also invaded Afghanistan. Plus various other proxy conflicts. WWIII, in the sense of an all out war, won't happen because the opponents all have nuclear weapons and are too big in any case. The Wes…

The big players and medium players will continue to play out their proxy conflicts where they can. Some fighting might happen, but I don't think we will see an other global war. There is just too little to play for even without nukes.

Africa and Middle East might be riskiest areas. Also Pakistan and India might escalate. Not sure about South America if something would go on there.

I think China will limit their territorial ambitions to opportunities to project power and areas they have history or claim with.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#68

Post by sudden_dystopia » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:12 PM UTC

World war 3? No probably not in the traditional sense of war like world war 2. But could this be the ground work for a devastating nuclear war? Absolutely.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#69

Post by senectus1 » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:12 PM UTC

I dont think so.

I think that there will be some wars... to distract or reset from the mess the global economy is in. but nothing "World War" sized.

Re: Ask HN: Is WWIII already in its early stages?

#70

Post by rich_sasha » Wed, Aug 17, 2022, 12:16 PM UTC

mathgeek wrote: post #61

rich_sasha wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like that to be true. Did Germany stand a chance to win WWII? Probably not, or at best a slim chance; it made huge, surprising victories against most of continental Europe, but it just picked on too many opponents. By the time the US was in, it was (slow and deadly) game over. They believed their own BS and went ahead with it regardless. I guess the risk here is that Russia or China could also believe their o…

Nazi Germany stood a reasonable chance of winning WW2. They made many mistakes as well as underestimating the resistance that Britain would provide, but victory was certainly feasible through 1941 or 1942.

Did it really? It will always be hard to estimate, I read articles arguing either way.

But it seems, certainly, from the perspective of 1930s, WWII would mean for them attacking a coalition of Poland, France and UK, and attacking Russia and USA down the line (I understand this was always the plan). UK and France were the two dominant superpowers of the era, with US on the way up.

It's not, IMHO, incomparable to the current situation. Only a madman would attack the "West", be it NATO, EU, or its allies in Asia; the chances of victory are perhaps not negligible, but expected gain certainly very poor. But it seems there's something in human history to disregard such calculus and plough on regardless.