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Do you believe in the possibility of a new global war?

Is there still risk of "global war"(between 2 or more of 7 large powers)


  • Total voters
    48

Maximus Zeebra

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This is just a thread coming as a response to being in this thread.
http://www.debatepolitics.com/military/62745-can-chinas-military-strength-rank-second-world.html

The thread is turning into several debates about possibilities of war and future of the military of different states.

So, I am just asking if you believe there is a possibility of global war(war between 2 or more of the 7 biggest powers).
Included in that is not war between any of the big powers against either North Korea and Iran if anyone just might consider them among the 7(which they arent).

So...
 
The world has seen what happens during world wars and I doubt it would be stupid enough to engage in one during the nuclear age.
 
The important large scale competition will be economic.

The US spends far too much of its GDP on defense, to protect us from nobody in particular, and nobody with a real military threat to our homeland that we can't already deter (nuclear). The rest of the world is glad to let us squander our resources on defense, and spend theirs on their economy.

The US will continue to do well economically in high tech and innovation, and if you have the correct brains and education and work ethic, you can make a lot of money.

In low tech industry, the US will have to adapt to the entry of 2.5 billion workers in Indian and China, and we can't support the high wages the unions negotiated in manufacturing in the modified world, where 1/3 of the worlds population that was largely disconnected until 30 years ago, has re-connected. Some balancing must go on there, and it will take 20 uncomfortable years to re-balance. Workers in that segment of the economy will have to learn to live in smaller houses and to vacation close to home or not at all.

We are too proficient at killing large numbers of people for war make sense. What can you realistically achieve, and what will it cost you? Local wars may make sense, if you go unopposed by the rest of the nations, like Russia and Georgia. But global war does not make sense.

The US should cut our defense (miss named, its really global offensive capability) to just protecting our nation, and force the other nations to waste their economic resources to protect themselves. We should put the savings on reducing the deficit, or economic development that will give jobs to workers who are not in high tech (the vast majority of the population). If workers who are not prepared for jobs in high tech don't have other jobs, they will be a drag on our society, since we are not going to let them starve to death.

I think the world has fundamentally changed in the last 30 years, and the old assumptions about how it operated are not all true anymore. Some are, and some are not. Figuring out the fundamental changes, and what old solutions still apply, and more importantly which old solutions no longer are adequate is what we should be doing.
 
Not unless some crazy wackos like the Iranian government get nuclear weapons.
 
5% is far too much? :confused:

What the rest of the world is spending:

Rank ↓ Country ↓ Spending ($ b.) ↓ World Share (%) ↓
— World Total 1464.0 100
1 United States United States 607.0 41.5
2 People's Republic of China China 84.9a 5.8a
3 France France 65.7 4.5
4 United Kingdom United Kingdom 65.3 4.5
5 Russia Russia 58.6a 4.0a
6 Germany Germany 46.8 3.2
7 Japan Japan 46.3 3.2
8 Italy Italy 40.6 2.8
9 Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia 38.2 2.6
10 India India 30.0 2.1
List of countries by military expenditures - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The number 2 spender, China, spends about 15% of what we spend. Why do we need to spend 8 times what they spend. Who is the threat to our national sovereignty? What is the nature of the threat? Are we properly spending to protect ourselves from the threat against us today? Will another futuristic fighter plane be effective on combating Islamic Fundamentalism? Why do we need to spend so much?

It seems our problem as a nation is not that our military is too weak, but that our economy is not stable, and is doing a poor job of providing jobs for our population, good jobs that provide a good standard of living, and health care that is accessible at prices that are reasonable.
 
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Not unless some crazy wackos like the Iranian government get nuclear weapons.

But then the response will have to be to use nuclear weapons against them. Like France have stated for example, they will not hesitate to use them.
 
The important large scale competition will be economic.

The US spends far too much of its GDP on defense, to protect us from nobody in particular, and nobody with a real military threat to our homeland that we can't already deter (nuclear). The rest of the world is glad to let us squander our resources on defense, and spend theirs on their economy.

If they could would anyone really shoot themself in the foot by attacking one of the biggest economies in the world anyways? This goes for all the big 7.
 
What the rest of the world is spending:


List of countries by military expenditures - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The number 2 spender, China, spends about 15% of what we spend. Why do we need to spend 8 times what they spend. Who is the threat to our national sovereignty? What is the nature of the threat? Are we properly spending to protect ourselves from the threat against us today? Will another futuristic fighter plane be effective on combating Islamic Fundamentalism? Why do we need to spend so much?

It seems our problem as a nation is not that our military is too weak, but that our economy is not stable, and is doing a poor job of providing jobs for our population, good jobs that provide a good standard of living, and health care that is accessible at prices that are reasonable.

None of this changes the fact that we only spend 5% of our GDP on defense. Who cares what percent of the total world's defense spending we are? Seeing as how our economy is vastly larger than anyone else's, that's a meaningless statistic in this context.
 
None of this changes the fact that we only spend 5% of our GDP on defense. Who cares what percent of the total world's defense spending we are? Seeing as how our economy is vastly larger than anyone else's, that's a meaningless statistic in this context.

Why do you think spending 5% of GDP, or roughly 600 billion a year, or 8 times more than the second highest spender, is required?

Who is the boggy man who threatens us? What is the nature of the threat? What is required to defend ourselves from that threat?

If we could defend ourselves from all known threats to our sovereignty, and do it at 2% of GDP, should we as a nation spend more than that?

Have the CEO's of the defense contractors, the military industrial complex, built a political system to enrich themselves at the expense of the taxpayers, even when there is no creditable threat to our sovereignty as a nation? I think they have.
 
None of this changes the fact that we only spend 5% of our GDP on defense. Who cares what percent of the total world's defense spending we are? Seeing as how our economy is vastly larger than anyone else's, that's a meaningless statistic in this context.

That's not a fiscally conservative attitude. It's actually the opposite. And it's one of the many reasons we find ourselves Trillions of dollars in debt right now.
 
What the rest of the world is spending:


List of countries by military expenditures - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The number 2 spender, China, spends about 15% of what we spend. Why do we need to spend 8 times what they spend. Who is the threat to our national sovereignty? What is the nature of the threat? Are we properly spending to protect ourselves from the threat against us today? Will another futuristic fighter plane be effective on combating Islamic Fundamentalism? Why do we need to spend so much?

It seems our problem as a nation is not that our military is too weak, but that our economy is not stable, and is doing a poor job of providing jobs for our population, good jobs that provide a good standard of living, and health care that is accessible at prices that are reasonable.
China is not involved in countless of conflicts at the same time.
 
Who is the boggy man who threatens us? What is the nature of the threat? What is required to defend ourselves from that threat?

We are the most powerful country in the world, how could we not have enemies?
If we could defend ourselves from all known threats to our sovereignty, and do it at 2% of GDP, should we as a nation spend more than that?

No major world power spends 2% of its GDP on defense. Not even China.

That's not a fiscally conservative attitude. It's actually the opposite. And it's one of the many reasons we find ourselves Trillions of dollars in debt right now.

No, it's not. Defense spending is less than 20% of all government spending. In fact, it is barely more, as a percent of GDP, than other major countries.
 
None of this changes the fact that we only spend 5% of our GDP on defense. Who cares what percent of the total world's defense spending we are? Seeing as how our economy is vastly larger than anyone else's, that's a meaningless statistic in this context.

Spending five times what your likeliest opponent spends does not give five times the defence. Spending more than the rest of the top ten spenders together might seem excessive.
 
We are the most powerful country in the world, how could we not have enemies?

No major world power spends 2% of its GDP on defense. Not even China.

No, it's not. Defense spending is less than 20% of all government spending. In fact, it is barely more, as a percent of GDP, than other major countries.

Vague generalities. You don't answer my question.

You don't figure out how much to spend by asking "what % of my GDP do I need to spend to defend myself?". You should as, who are my main enemies, what is the risk they will attack, if they attack how will they do it, what do I have to do to prudently protect myself from those attacks?

Who will come at us with their navy to land troops on our shore? Who will send their bombers to bomb our cities? Does anyone have a big enough laser in space to disrupt our cities (I don't think so)? Can anyone hack our internet and halt significant commerce in the US with a relative small expenditure? Can we tell who did it? Can we retaliate so they won't want to do it?

I don't think anyone can float their navy over here, or send their bombers over here, or attack us with lasers from space (technology is not there, cost is prohibitive, what would they gain and at what cost?).

Terrorist attacks are here, and hacking attacks are here. What type of defense do we need?
 
Vague generalities. You don't answer my question.

You don't figure out how much to spend by asking "what % of my GDP do I need to spend to defend myself?". You should as, who are my main enemies, what is the risk they will attack, if they attack how will they do it, what do I have to do to prudently protect myself from those attacks?

Who will come at us with their navy to land troops on our shore? Who will send their bombers to bomb our cities? Does anyone have a big enough laser in space to disrupt our cities (I don't think so)? Can anyone hack our internet and halt significant commerce in the US with a relative small expenditure? Can we tell who did it? Can we retaliate so they won't want to do it?

I don't think anyone can float their navy over here, or send their bombers over here, or attack us with lasers from space (technology is not there, cost is prohibitive, what would they gain and at what cost?).

Terrorist attacks are here, and hacking attacks are here. What type of defense do we need?

Hey, do you know why no organized military bothers to attack us? Maybe it's because we have such a gigantic military, and thus nobody would stand a chance.

And why do we have such a gigantic military? I'd say a primary reason for it would be that we have such a gigantic economy. Our economy is about 2.5 times the size of China's, despite them having more than 4 times our population. The fact is that most noteworthy countries, China included, spend 4-6% of their GDP on defense. We do too, but we have so much more GDP than everyone else that 5% of it gives us a large enough military to overshadow the rest of the world and keep us safe from them.
 
Spending five times what your likeliest opponent spends does not give five times the defence. Spending more than the rest of the top ten spenders together might seem excessive.

Not when you consider that we have more money than the top ten spenders put together.
 
I voted "Yes."

My reasoning is that there will always be the possibility and/or risk of global war.

It may be very small, but it's still there.
 
And think about the second spender on the list get a lot more money per dollar.

I think you will find few who disagree with the statement "The US government is, in general, inefficient and corrupt."
 
You're in a global war now, with Militant Islam, most people are in a creepy denial though.

Thou hast ignored the addendum to the poll question, namely, "(between 2 or more of 7 large powers)".
 
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