Threat of World War

(Contributed to HellasFrappe by EIR Strategic Alert) - Prof. Han Xudong of the National Defense University of the People's Liberation Army, in an extraordinary article headlined, "As Possibility of a Third World War Exists, China Needs To Be Prepared," deals with this question.

He wrote in the People's Daily on Sept. 16 that:

     "As the Ukrainian crisis deepens, international observers have become more and more concerned about a direct military clash between the US and Russia. Once an armed rivalry erupts, it is likely to extend to the [rest of the] globe. And it is not impossible that a world war could break out."
     "Currently, the world has entered an era of new forms of global war. Outer space, the Internet and the sea have become the battlefields of rivalry. China should not be pushed into a passive position where it is vulnerable to attacks. We must bear a third world war in mind when developing military forces, especially the sea and air forces." 

Pope Francis said essentially the same thing, on the occasion of a commemoration of the outbreak of World War I.

     "A third world war in pieces" is already being waged, with crimes, massacres, destruction, he said.

And German historian Michael Stuermer, writing in Die Welt, gave the diagnosis that since the Ukraine crisis began, world politics has found itself in an experimental mode, in which the time-tested rules of crisis prevention and crisis management have been thrown overboard, and senior staff are inexperienced in the management of emergencies.

The saber-rattling, he wrote, fails to take account of the limitless possibilities of destruction and self-destruction.

The security architecture that emerged during the Cold War and that ended in German unification—amazingly, without catastrophe—was an era of undeclared small wars with no beginning and no end, extending from Indochina/Vietnam to Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria. In the Ukraine crisis, he wrote, both sides have acted without a goal or an exit strategy; nobody knows where it will end. One escalation drives another, and the reasoned imperatives of the long nuclear peace seem to be forgotten.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev, for his part, addressed the situation at an economic conference in Sochi recently:

     "Essentially the entire system of European security is threatened, as well as fundamental values, further globalization, and basically the entire concept of peaceful development. I have a feeling that the West has completely forgotten that Russia has its own national interests. History clearly shows that all attempts to exert pressure on Russia by such measures [sanctions], have been in vain. We will not give in to any political blackmail. We are the largest country in the world, a nuclear power in which 150 million people live, an area with immense natural resources and a huge market for goods, services, and investments. The West, however, acts as though Russia simply does not exist on the world map."

From the Chinese military to the Pope, the Russian government, and growing segments in all European nations, people see that World War III has actually already started, that all the rules of war prevention have been thrown overboard and there is actually no longer a security system.

Why then do we not immediately pull the emergency brake and stop this madness, this train that is hurtling at full speed toward a wall behind which there is only a great void?