Another Step Toward International War

What happened and is happening between Israel and Hamas, like what happened and is happening between Ukraine and Russia, should raise revulsion and fear in everyone. That is true both because these conflicts reveal the unimaginably terrible and revolting ways people can and do treat other people—especially innocent civilians—and because no one anywhere can be sure that they won’t someday find themselves in some horrible war. While Israel, Hamas, Ukraine, and Russia are in hot wars, thankfully the major powers (the US and China) are not, though they remain at the brink of one. It appears that we are at a very critical juncture in which we will soon see if the Israel-Hamas war spreads and how far it spreads and, longer term, whether the great powers are forces for peace (and will back away from the brink of direct conflict) or get involved (and cross the brink). Hopefully the horrific and tragic images we are all seeing will encourage restraint. However, it is very likely the case that the images of civilian casualties we are seeing now and will see during an escalating war in Gaza will lead to new conflicts both between countries and within countries (e.g., repulsive violence against Jewish and Muslim populations in many countries). In my opinion, this war has a high risk of leading to several other conflicts of different types in a number of places, and it is likely to have harmful effects that will extend beyond those in Israel and Gaza. Primarily for those reasons, it appears to me that the odds of transitioning from the contained conflicts to a more uncontained hot world war that includes the major powers have risen from about 35% to about 50% over the last two years since I wrote my book Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order.

In today’s post, I describe how I see what is happening within the context of how these sorts of things have repeatedly played out in the past. I also will make another suggestion for what leaders can do to move toward a better world—i.e., a more broadly prosperous and peaceful world.

How These Things Transpire

Based on how and why conflicts between countries have typically played out in history and based on a logical assessment of what is now happening, it seems clear that 1) these two wars (the Israel-Hamas war and the Russia-Ukraine war) reflect these four sides crossing the lines from contained pre-hot-war conflicts to uncontained hot wars that will be brutal until the end (which will probably not be until one side clearly defeats the other), and 2) these types of brutal wars are more likely to spread than subside. These two hot wars make clear how horrific hot wars are. If they spread to other countries, most importantly the major countries, there will be a much more horrific hot world war. I hope that the emerging picture of what this would look like will encourage restraint at this critical juncture of being on the brink.

As you probably know, I believe that the world order is changing in ways that haven’t happened in our lifetimes but have happened many times in history (for an overview that’s shorter than the book, I also created an animation of the key ideas in Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order. In brief, there are five big forces that always interact and are now interacting to drive the confluence of all major changes in the world. They are 1) the debt/money/economic force, most importantly the dynamic that occurs when there are high levels of debt and high rates of debt growth, 2) political conflicts within countries due to large and irreconcilable wealth and values gaps that are leading to emerging civil wars between extremists of the right and the left, 3) geopolitical conflicts between countries due to big changes in who has wealth and power and how to divide up wealth and power, 4) forceful acts of nature, most importantly droughts, floods, and pandemics (today primarily caused by climate change), and 5) the force of humanity’s inventiveness, most importantly in inventing new technologies (today artificial intelligence is the leading transformative technology). In my book, I lay out how these things typically transpire, and then I compare what is actually happening with the template and how other cases have transpired in the past to help me see and be ready for—and help you think about—what’s most likely to happen.

Based on the perspective I have gained from studying history and from my over 50 years of experiences betting on what’s likely to happen, it seems to me that the Israel-Hamas war is another classic, unfortunate step toward a more violent and encompassing international war. In other words, it’s part of a larger war dynamic. Anyone who has studied history and is watching what is going on should be concerned about 1) these conflicts moving from being contained to being all-out brutal wars that continue until the other side is clearly defeated, and 2) these conflicts spreading to involve more countries. In order to gain perspective on how these pre-war stages in the Big Cycle unfold, I suggest that you study other pre-war periods, such as those in the two years prior to World War I and II in both Europe and Asia. What is happening now sure looks a lot like that. 

What Is Happening

When Hamas attacked Israel, like when Russia attacked Ukraine, there was a classic, irreversible transition from the pre-hot-war part of the cycle (when talking is possible) to the hot-war part of the cycle (when there is bloody fighting that goes on until one side achieves total victory over the other side). As I explain in my book, as a principle, “people dying in the fighting is the marker that almost certainly signifies the progression to the next and more violent civil war stage, which will continue until the winners and losers are clearly determined.” It is unlikely that this Israel-Hamas war will be limited to Israel and the Gaza Strip and likely that it will continue until one side clearly wins over the other. It is also likely that the wars involving Israel, Hamas, Ukraine, and Russia will have big effects on the ongoing great power conflicts, and it is very likely that Hamas acted with support from more powerful countries.

In other words, we should recognize that these two hot wars (the Israel-Hamas war and the Russia-Ukraine war) are not just between the parties directly involved in them—these wars are part of the bigger great power conflicts to shape the new world order—and they will have big effects on the countries who are allies and enemies of the four sides in these two seemingly irreconcilable wars. These two wars will cost the allies of these countries a lot. For example, the US is now fighting proxy wars in Europe and the Middle East while preparing for war in East Asia. As these wars spread, they will cost more. 

Fortunately, the progression toward a world war between the biggest powers (the US and China) has not yet crossed the irreversible line from being containable (which it is now) to becoming a brutal war between the biggest powers and their allies. If these major powers do have direct fighting with each other, in which one side kills a significant number of people on the other side, we will see the transition from contained pre-hot-war conflicts to a brutal World War III.

To push the point home, I want to make clear that I believe that we are in that brief part of the Big Cycle when the conflicts are heating up and the leading powers still have the ability to choose between crossing that line into brutal war or pulling back from the brink. Because the one thing we know about wars is that they never go as expected, and they are more brutal than they are expected to be—in fact so much more brutal than expected that even those who were most boldly in favor of having the wars regretted having them. I hope that the leaders of the great powers will wisely step back from the brink, even while they must prepare to be strong enough to successfully fight and win a hot war. In my opinion, for this to go well not only will the restraint of the participants be tested, but alliances that are prone to draw in non-fighting parties will also be tested. That is because being allied and helpful to the allied countries in these brutal wars is always very costly and raises the risks of being drawn fully into the war. That’s how local wars spread into world wars. 

Now let’s remember that the four other big forces will affect this international conflict just as the international conflict will affect how the other four forces transpire. For reasons I explain in Chapter 5 (“The Big Cycle of Internal Order and Disorder”) and Chapter 6 (“The Big Cycle of External Order and Disorder”), when the leading empire is experiencing debt problems and great internal conflict and seems more vulnerable on the world stage, many different countries will push to get what they want, adding to the overall picture of the global balance of power. In these cases, it is always useful to see how the sides are lining up into the new Allied and Axis powers to understand what is likely to come. This picture of how countries are aligning is clarifying quickly.

While I assume that we all wish that war can be contained or reversed, history has repeatedly shown that once the line is crossed into hot wars, the opposite tends to be true—i.e., rather than reason and compromise increasing, they stop so that one has to pick a side and fight for it or step away from the fight. It is increasingly likely that you will have to make that choice. This will also affect where people want to live.

What Can Be Done to Improve Things

Rather than just describing what I think is going on and what might happen as accurately as I can, I will also offer a few suggestions of things that can be done to make things better. 

In my recent post, when I looked at the internal conflict issue in the US (prompted by Kevin McCarthy losing his position due to the small number of extremists beating those who are bipartisan), I shared my pipe dream that a strong bipartisan leader would emerge to become president, have a bipartisan cabinet, and create a bipartisan commission of smart folks from both sides to re-engineer the system to produce much broader-based productivity and prosperity that is built on sound finances and investments. I realize that this won’t happen, so I shared my more attainable hope that moderates from both parties openly state that they are willing to work in a bipartisan way and create a bipartisan voting bloc that is strong enough to deliver the swing votes that determine outcomes. I believe in this path because I believe that if there is not a big move toward strong bipartisanship that leads to big, smart reforms that bring about broad-based productivity and income gains, there is likely to be some form of debilitating civil war. As I also explained in that post, in order to reduce the risk of a debilitating civil war taking place, I believe that having different people be able to pursue their different preferred approaches to life by going to the states that are most aligned with their preferred approaches will help relieve the tensions (though it will have some drawbacks and unintended consequences as well, which I won’t digress into now).

I will now share with you both my pipe dream that is not attainable and my more attainable hope for what will happen to deal with the international conflicts that are bringing us to the brink of a hot world war. My pipe dream would be to have world leaders recognize that having hot wars is the worst possible thing to happen and that working together on creating a path and processes for minimizing the chances of a hot war developing is the best thing they can do. My more attainable stretch goal would be for the US and China to jointly broker peace in Ukraine. While that is a stretch goal, it might be attainable as conditions are ripening for this to happen. Imagine if the two leading and opposing world powers that are currently lining the sides up for a hot war join forces to deliver peace. That would be shockingly terrific because besides delivering peace, it would reduce the risks of the Russia-Ukraine war leading to worse wars and would also show that they could work together for peace. If they did that, maybe they could develop a dynamic that would bring about peace rather than conflict in other cases. Imagine how great an alliance in pursuit of world peace between the two greatest opposing countries would be.

As always, I will keep you updated as events unfold. Stay tuned. 

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