Does anyone sense another World War in years to come?

I would think that another World War would be inevitable and could possibly start because of China’s expansionist policies . I’m not sure what sort of coalitions would result from such a scenario . The US and Taiwan with Japan as Allies .
Let’s hope such a conflagration would be avoided through diplomatic maneuverings .
Good QUESTion .
=)

@lx102303 good answer…but can you explain further?

There has been a number of debates regarding the probability of a start of a new world war. Nowadays we are depending too much on technology and our country does not have enough military to support another World War, but if it does happen, then what Einstein said would be true:
“I do not know with what kinds of weapons the Third World War will be fought, but the Fourth World War will be fought with sticks and stones.”

China holds military exercises every year practicing an invasion of Taiwan and China and Japan are in dispute over the Senkaku islands . China is expanding it’s military forces .

@Smitha – another good answer from Smitha ! Happy New Year !
=o)

The feeling comes and goes for me. When 9/11 happened I was afraid there might be a world war. When we went into Iraq after 9/11 my overwhelming feelings of eventual peace in the middle east fizzled. I had really felt peace could happen, most people I know called me nuts.

The bombings recently in Russia and the Boston Marathon, both Chechnyian Muslim fanatics from what I understand, make me wonder what Russia is going to do? My mom thinks Russia should get rid of Chechnya altogether. I don’t mean bomb it, but excise it from the country. i think if Russia made a huge move against the Middle East America would likely be pulled in.

For whatever reason I don’t worry much about China or Iran.

Depends on how you define World War. I doubt we will see anything near the scale of WWII again. I think the two bombs we dropped on Japan will prevent anything like that from happening again.

Well, if everyone got serious there would be no countries left to fight each other, so, no. I don’t think so.

GodI hope not, but with conflicts it weeds down the poor and makes the rich richer, and super power governments getting stranger all the time ,you never know.

I remember the Cold War, the October missile crisis, Viet Nam, the 70’s, Reagan, Chernobyl, the Gulf War, etc.
I don’t think I have ever felt as far from WWIII as I do now.

It is already underway. It started with the illegal invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Eventually, as Islamic terrorism spreads and the influence of Islam gets stronger world-wide, eventually there’s a good possibility of a war between some of the leading Islamic states – which keep yelling “jihad” – and the rest of the world. It wouldn’t last long – just long enough for someone to lob a few nukes in the right direction – but it would change the face of the planet forever. Let’s hope it never comes to pass, but all the key ingredients are in place – all it will take is for one nutjob to push a button.

@TheRealOldHippie
Some on the right already talked about dropping a nuke on Iran’s deserts to “send them a message”.
http://swampland.time.com/2013/10/23/sheldon-adelson-nuke-iran/

We can always nuke ‘em ‘till they glow and then let God sort ‘em out!!

So is the use of hippie in your username ironic?

I don’t sense it at all just now but the world is changing rapidly and in unpredictable ways so who knows what might happen.

No. The days of conventional war are over, at least for now. Plus too many national economies are intertwined for such nations to go to war against each other. China and the United States, for example. No, if WWIII happens it won’t be for several decades at least (maybe a century or more, depending). WWIII will be fought over the last few drops of oil and/or clean water. It’ll be kinda like the “Resource Wars” in the ‘Fallout’s series.

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Resource_Wars

Here’s my uneducated, uninformed prediction: The next war will not be started by China. They have too much to lose.
It will begin with the detonation of a nuclear device off the coast of Israel, by a group of nut-job Islamist extremists. Sadly the retaliation response will come swiftly and decisively.

When history reviews the details of the tragedy they will find the fissionable materials were made in 2014, in Iranian reactors under the guise of peaceful use of nuclear power.

@LuckyGuy Yeah, I really doubt that.

@Darth_Algar I hope I am wrong. But if you want to imagine what is possible you need to start thinking like a nut-job with a dream and nothing to lose. Sadly they have too many like minded supporters. They can pop off a device in the water a few clicks off the shoreline and cause incredible damage 120 seconds after they are sent to their reward in hell. The only thing stopping them today is lack of material and technology. And one of the biggest nutcases on the planet has already proven he can muster enough resources to make and detonate a device. He’d be happy to help an organization willing to put up the cash – real cash, not the counterfeit stuff they make.

@LuckyGuy But how would Israel start a WORLD war? I mean, how would it cause all the nations to start fighting each other? Seems to me if they do something like that it’ll be the world against Israel. Short war.

@LuckyGuy
It is more likely that such a nuke would come from Pakistan. They already have nuclear weapons. And it has not happened in the 15 years that they had nukes.

@Dutchess_III Howwould it start a WW? They would blast the bejeesus out of every country they thought was even remotely responsible. There would be a lot of posturing and tsk tsking from the West but secretly there would be a sigh of relief. That would draw anger from the countries who secretly cheer for every suicide bomber who ends up being a smudge on the dirt on people’s shoes.
@ragingloli Money can buy anything – especially in a country known for corruption and extremism.
I hope I am wrong.

What I’m saying @LuckyGuy, is that such a device is not very likely to come from Iran. Despite whatever rhetoric their president might say to appeal to his base, the fact is that since the Islamic revolution Iran has actually been a fairly peaceful country. They’ve not taken any aggressive acts towards any other nations, save for their war against Iraq in the 1980s (and in that case Iraq, not Iran, was the aggressor). Also, Ahmadinejad isn’t in power anymore, and the new guy seems to be willing to move towards at least thawing relations with western nations. I would worry about Pakistan before I would Iran.

I agree @Darth_Algar . The device may not come from Iran. However the fissionable material will. They didn’t build those modern labs stocked with all those centrifuges for nothing.
The device will be built by the country with the most corruption, the most hate for the West, and the least amount to lose. Throw in a few religious zealots and power hungry leaders and you’ve got a sh-t sandwich that the rest of the world will be forced to eat.

On LuckyGuy’s answer, I believe that there is some truth to it because I can remember when I was about 14, a teacher who was a Muslim told the class that America is the “Land of all Evil” and that the holy book which is the Quran predicts that one day there would be a missile from the East of the World that would launch and destroy the United States. I do not hold any personal belief to this, nor do I wish something like that would happen nor do I think that America is the “Land of all Evil”.

@Eggie The teacher believed it? Or, the teacher was explaining what some Muslims believe?

Well he believed it, and he was explaining what some Muslims believe.

@LuckyGuy Again, highly doubtful. To be frank I think you’re buying in to the rhetoric passed around by right wing warmongers who are wanting an excuse to invade Iran. Iran has showed no signs of pursuing nuclear weapons itself, and is, in fact, now in cooperation with the UN security council (including the United States). Why would they develop nuclear material to hand off to someone else to use in a weapon? That doesn’t make sense. Frankly, considering that we have literally tons of nuclear material unaccounted for (god knows who’s hands it could be in now) it would be more likely for the material for such a device to have a US origin.

I hate being evil.

@Darth_Algar You don’t know me well. I am far from a “right wing warmonger”. I am simply answering the OP’s Q ”....how would you imagine it?” That is how my mind works.

I believe that the only people willing to use a nuke are those who think they have nothing to lose, have the resources (money) and access to materials.
I gave you my scenario. If you wanted to bring Armageddon how would you do it?

Only time will tell. You and I can bet a coffee on it. :-)
Sadly, no matter how it turns out, we both lose.

@LuckyGuy I did not say that you are a right wing warmonger.

I have to ask though, what, exactly, makes you so certain that such material would come from Iran?

Umm… It might be the number of centrifuges ordered… or the power consumption of the processing facility. or the amount of special steel ordered to make processing vessels or…

All you need is 10kg of Plato minimum (extra spaces and misspellings are intentional) to do some serious damage. That is the size of a 10 cm, 4” sphere. A baseball. Easy to hide and ship . Sent it to a country run by nut jobs who control an engineering facility with the proven skills and… bingo.
The offshore location is a good choice because it is so hard to patrol and the resultant tsunami would make quite a mess out of the target country’s coastal cities yet leave them habitable later.
~A very considerate way to treat the holy land. That is better than turning it into glass that cannot be used for hundreds/thousands of years. (Note: ~ denotes sarcasm.)

weapons grade plutonium is quite a lot harder to make than material for reactors. just saying.

Yep.

And all that leads you to believe that Iran would hand that material off to someone else why? What would be their motivation in doing so? What would they gain by it?

They would not simply hand it off. It would be done slowly and gradually in a complicated manner.
Why do it? three reasons: money, the opportunity to help send “non believers” to their just reward, and to gain the secret admiration of radicals.
But mostly money. The small cadre who pulls off the deal will earn a fortune for their participation.

And what good would money do them knowing that if said material is ever used then Iran gets wiped off the map?

The individuals who get the money will not be living in Iran for long. They will be enjoying the high life in Monaco, Luxembourg, or the Caymans.

Ok.

China depends too much on western economies to gain anything by upsetting that. I’m not saying that China would not be involved in a future world war, but I just don’t feel it would start through them, though anything’s possible.

I don’t feel that it would start with North Korea either, which is a very isolated nation without any true strong allies. South Korea actually has one of the largest and most powerful militaries in the world, and I really believe that the south would crush the north rather easily, even without any outside help. It’s funny how the media never brings up how powerful the South Korean military really is when compared to the North.

North Korea could gain an early advantage in an attack, but its 1 million man army would soon be crushed. The South has nearly that many troops itself, and has double the population than that of the North. The South has much superior air power, equipment and technology. South Korea also has much better trained soldiers backed up by a much better economy while the North is isolated and their people are starving to death. South Korea has the capacity to increase its military to four million troops in a short period of time.

Personally I feel that if another world war would occur, it would start with the some type of incident in the middle east. A warmongering US president could even start a war up, by attacking Iran or something similar. I hope I’m wrong though.

It’s Islamism against the rest of the world. It’s not a traditional war with fought with trenches.

@mattbrowne While I agree with your posts about many Islamists posing as ‘moderates’, I do have to ask something though. Do you really think Islamism is that much of a world threat, and not just a fringe criminal element similar to large violent gangs (like MS13) or even the Mafia? Most Muslims would have to be Islamists in order for them to truly be a world threat in my opinion.

@Paradox25 – Unfortunately, it’s no longer fringe. At least 300 million Muslims worldwide are active or passive supporters of Islamism and their numbers are growing. At least the same number of Muslims no longer believe in Islam and are horrified by it, but there’s almost nothing they can do about it. This number is growing too, but they are usually powerless. Leaving Islam gets Muslims killed, so they pretend to stay Muslims. There are numerous examples in history showing that a minority willing to use force can control a majority.

@mattbrowne You and I think so alike it is scary. You just have more nerve to actually call out the group I was merely implicating.

@LuckyGuy – I just finished reading Malalas autobiography. It’s about the battle between modern Muslims and Islamists in Pakistan. A great book. I hope she wins the Nobel Peace Prize next time. It’s the passive, non-militant, moderate Islamists who make militant Islamism possible.

A moderate Islamist is like a Nazi who sprays antisemitic slogans on synagoges instead of burning them or blowing them up. Moderate Islamism is still a fascist political ideology.

Our only chance is to speak out against moderate Islamism. It has to disappear. Otherwise the Taliban and their ilk won’t go away. Schools for girls will still be blown to pieces.

@mattbrowne Imagine how different the world would be if on one night every abused, repressed, tortured female suddenly slit the throat of the abuser lying in bed next to her. That would put an end to it too.

@LuckyGuy – Well, Malala tries to change the Islamic world the Martin Luther King way. You’re suggesting the Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg way. It’s a tough call.

Is it better to rip the band-aid off quickly?

Think how different the world would be if CSGvS had been successful. Germany would have many more customers for BMW and Mercedes. ;-)