“What mattered in the Cold War was weight — how big are your missiles? How heavy are your tanks? What matters in globalization is speed. How fast is your modem? How good are your communications?” — Gavin Esler

“There were sharks before there were dinosaurs, and the reason sharks are still in the ocean is that nothing is better at being a shark than a shark.” — Douglas Adams

With nuclear weapons on the table, the room for conflict between the major powers is quite limited. A pipsqueak power like Iraq can get crushed (twice) by the global hegemon, but the West is quite careful about dancing around Russia in Ukraine. The difference? One has nukes and long-range missiles; one does not.

Sunlight will break into the world once the anti-ballistic missile shields are up and running. Then we can see the world go seriously to war again. Of course, some nukes will get through. Fighter jets equipped with city busters and submarines lurking off the coast with short trajectories will have a field day until the ABM shield is upgraded (second or third generation). In the meantime, roll out the tanks and the APCs, we’s gonna have us a war!

The nature of warfare is such that any slight edge in technology or manpower will be taken advantage of immediately. The shields that flout flying nukes will not be completely trusted, however, until they are battle-tested. This means that even when America has its shield ringing its land, Washington will hesitate before going after China or Russia. Particularly the Russians. The Cold War looms large in institutional memory of the Pentagon and CIA, and the nuclear standoff which lasted for decades consumed the mindspace of many a techno-bureaucrat.

The world has almost a superstitious aversion to using nukes. Only two have ever been detonated in hostilities, and that was as much to prove it worked as anything else. (And to usher in a new age dawning.) America could have used nukes against North Vietnam and the USSR could have deployed them against Afghani rebels, but neither did. The sacrosanct nature held.

When wars begin once again, they will be more destructive and horrific and confusing than ever. Billions of pieces will be in motion on the global chessboard.

The first to take down the opponent’s king (his capital city) will quite possibly institute a brutal occupation — maybe even a genocide of the one-time adversary. The Japanese during World War 2 were quite sure the Americans would be nasty occupiers. They turned out to be remarkably tame and civilized — but a new showdown was looming to the northwest with the Russkies and the Japanese were needed.

As wars get larger and larger and more and more truly global in nature, a final reckoning looms. An empire is ready to emerge on Planet Earth, one that is none too tender. This empire will be untoppleable by its very nature and rebellion will be futile. If the USSR had defeated the U.S. during the long cool war, and seized control of the entire Earth, it never would have fallen. And that was with a defective economic system. Quite likely the empire of the future will be based on sound economic principles, as high technology stems from smart political economic systems, and victory stems from high technology. Long live the sword, and may you learn to wield it properly nations of the future.