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Topic:
Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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Darth-Ghost
Registered:
Oct '03
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Date Posted:
4/17 8:05pm
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/17 8:07pm (1 edits total)
Edited By:
Darth-Ghost
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We also have to remember deomgraphic trends. Supposedely Europe and Russia will be mostly Muslim in the next 50-100, and the United States will becoming mostly Catholic Latino. The overcrowding in China and India could push them to expand their territory, perhaps India overflowing southern Asia and taking Pakistan, with China purchasing Siberia and the eastern half of Russia. A real power could finally emerge in Africa, we could have mining and energy colonies on the Moon. There could be a supergenius who creates something no one expected, another Einstein or Darwin. A nation could build an advanced defense system that makes itself safe from any nuclear attack. Advances in robotics, cybernetics, genetic enginering. An asteroid collision, an engineered plague. There are a lot of factors that could go in to the making of the 21st century, and the balance of any superpowers. I don't think anyone can tell. Who could have predicted backwards Russia and isolationist America would become superpowers in 1900, the decline of European powers and rebirth as a European Union, the invention and power of nuclear weapons, or the fall of the Soviet Union?
I predict America could benefit from a mutlipolar world as long as it realized this and adapted, instead of being blinded by pride or patriotism when the decline comes. The key is diplomatic cooperation, trade, and continuing to inspire and innovate.
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Gonk
Registered:
Jul '98
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Date Posted:
4/17 8:17pm
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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Not only would the United States not benefit from a multipolar world, but the WORLD would not benefit from a multipolar world.
Thrawn is right. A multipolar world will just mean one will eventially try to get an advantage over the other. Sooner or later, someone is going to pull a gun, so to speak.
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon
Registered:
Oct '00
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Date Posted:
4/18 3:58am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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Darth-Ghost posted:
We also have to remember deomgraphic trends. Supposedely Europe and Russia will be mostly Muslim in the next 50-100, and the United States will becoming mostly Catholic Latino.
Are you seriously buying into that crap? Not going to happen. All the Eurabia doom-scenarios aside, it's just fearmongering by xenophobic extreme-right wing elements in European politics. Don't trust le Front National, or that [...] of a Mussolini. (I would think the name would give it away, haha.)
Aside from that, we are already living in a multi-polar world, even if you are unwilling to accept it. Russia is resurgent and not willing to be bullied, I think the disputes around the energy suplies and NATO are sufficient proof of that. Or how about the fact that all our leaders are perfectly willing to pretend that Chechnya isn't happening. The EU is economically as powerful as the US is, it's just a fact. Not in a good way, by the way, the EU is a neo-liberal vehicle and if I were a 3th world government, I wouldn't trust it. It's going to be interesting to see what the CD&V is going to do about that in 2010, they're pledging they're going to fight for a mroe 'social Europe' , on the other hand, they can't even keep it real around here. Leterme, hah.
The US might have power projecting capapbilities that outmatch any other, we all know that invasions and land grabs are something of the past, at least for us sitting in our cozy 1st world computer chairs. Now, maybe Kenya vs. Somalia or something would be another matter, but even there it's not going to change too much. I don't think America would particulary benefit of a multi-polar world, but then again, there are more countries than the US, right?
acting like the US being the dominant power is a safe guard against nuclear holocaust, it kind of makes me laugh.
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Emperor_Billy_Bob
Registered:
Aug '00
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Date Posted:
4/18 4:03am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/18 4:04am (1 edits total)
Edited By:
Emperor_Billy_Bob
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T_T posted:
When several nations have nuclear weapons, a unipolar world is the safest option
If this is the premise on which you base your argument then I disagree.
Many political scientists, having grown up during the Cold War, view a Bipolar World as the most inherently stable of all.
In a Unipolar world with a power that is unchallenged, but not powerful enough to enforce universal peace, you have the prospect of the unipolar state 1. using its nuclear weapons without fear of retaliation, 2. using its military without fear of serious challenge.
In a bipolar world, you have two main powers who keep each other in check, and prevent the other from using force in a very direct way. The threat of MAD prevented nuclear weapons from ever being used, and there were no large scale wars during the Cold War.
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Jabbadabbado
Title: Senate Floor Moderator
Registered:
Mar '99
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Date Posted:
4/18 4:39am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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But plenty of proxy wars. The bipolar nature of the cold war didn't prevent the Vietnam war or the invasion of Afghanistan. A military superpower is going to be sorely tempted to use its military power to achieve political ends. This seems true whether it is balanced by another superpower or not.
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Emperor_Billy_Bob
Registered:
Aug '00
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Date Posted:
4/18 4:41am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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Jabbadabbado posted:
But plenty of proxy wars.
These proxy wars had limited consequence for the world as a whole - compared to the two massive wars that were more or less directly a result of the multipolar state of affairs preceeding them.
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goodfellas
Registered:
Jun '03
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Date Posted:
4/18 7:24am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/18 7:28am (2 edits total)
Edited By:
goodfellas
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I don't think anyone will benefit from a multi-polar world while we hold nuclear weapons. That seems to be the direction things are going in, so hopefully I'll be dead or close to it before that world emerges. 2050s right?
I think the USA benefited overall from a bipolar world because it was able to use its military power against a widely perceived enemy without drawing serious outcries of being imperialist. It was much easier to project power by claiming to counter Soviet influence. Projecting power in the "War on Terror" has just made it look like a bully.
I'd also argue that NATO worked a lot better while the Soviets were around. All I read now about NATO are articles heralding its decline. It hasn't really made the transition from anti-Soviet alliance to anti-terrorist, because of the much more controversial nature of hunting down terrorists in other nation's territory in the first place.
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more like UNwise
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Gonk
Registered:
Jul '98
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Date Posted:
4/18 8:12am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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In a Unipolar world with a power that is unchallenged, but not powerful enough to enforce universal peace, you have the prospect of the unipolar state 1. using its nuclear weapons without fear of retaliation, 2. using its military without fear of serious challenge.
Naturally this is going to depend on the nature of the unipolar power in question, but both of these scenarios are ultimately more remote than the threats of a multipolar world.
First of all, using nuclear weapons without fear of retaliation carries a stigma; and while that stigma may not be efficient deterrance, it has to be asked if such an act would seriously be in the power's favor in a cost benefit analysis.
In terms of the second point, fear of a serious challenge or not may not necessarily stop a power in a multipolar world either. The world was multipolar pre-WWI and pre-WWII, as well as pre-French Revolution. This did nothing to stop the armies from marching; in fact, they marched more often than today.
Essentially, the main benefit of a unipolar world is that if a power is unchallenged, it behooves it to keep things as they are. If a country defies it, it COULD send in it's military... but again one has to weight the cost benefit analysis. Why would a unipolar power literally take over the world when it has everything it wants already?
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Jabbadabbado
Title: Senate Floor Moderator
Registered:
Mar '99
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Date Posted:
4/18 8:38am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/18 8:40am (1 edits total)
Edited By:
Jabbadabbado
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Exactly. And I think the invasion of Iraq has to be understood in that context. I continue to believe that the invasion was a tactical mistake, but in view of the largest possible strategic context, the invasion can be read as an effort to return the Middle East to a pre-UN sanction, pre-Saddam, pre Iran-Iraq war, pre-Iranian revolution status quo of stability, including of course the critical issue of promoting the stability and reliability of oil markets. Military action in Iraq was the continuation of more than a generation of military interventionism in the region to promote stability for oil producers. The end of the Soviet Union changed the political cost-benefit analysis of what was viable militarily for the U.S. to undertake but did not necessarily revolutionize U.S. strategic interest or involvement in the region.
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon
Registered:
Oct '00
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Date Posted:
4/18 11:41am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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I don't think you can equate the fact that the world was multi-polar before the French Revolution as a reason that the armies marched more back then than they do now (Which would also be forgetting that war was a completely different matter in the time period). Hey, after the Battle of Waterloo there was also a balance of powers in a multi-polar world and it created one the longest periods of peace that Europe had know up until that point. You are reducing history to a point where it's just illogical to make any references to it if you think that the balance of power was the only reason war was what it was back in the 19th century and why war isn't that way today. The reason that there aren't that many wars today as back then has very little to do with the fact that the USA is the predominant military power. For one, Europe today is unified, which it wasn't back in those days. Number two, the global economy just isn't as supportive as war in that context as it was before... and we can go on and on.
If Russia wants to start a war, it's not going to ask the permission of the US, neither did any of the ex-Yugoslavian countries.
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Jabbadabbado
Title: Senate Floor Moderator
Registered:
Mar '99
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Date Posted:
4/18 12:19pm
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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The world is definitely as war-torn as ever (Africa!) but that's not necessarily relevant to the point. Stability and peace among the world's major industrial powers is underwritten to a large extent by America's status as a hyperpower: peace in Korea, Japan, stability and unity in western Europe, the flow of oil from the Middle East, etc. is all anchored by the U.S.'s hegemonic military presence.
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon
Registered:
Oct '00
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Date Posted:
4/19 3:18am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/19 3:23am (1 edits total)
Edited By:
GrandAdmiralPelleaon
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That's simplifying a whole lot to the point where it's ridicilous, especially saying that peace and unity in Western Europe or peace in Japan are anchored on the military presence and hegmony of the USA. Same deal with the flow of oil out of the Middle East. I don't think it's necessarily hinged completely on the American military presence the way you are making it out to be.
In what way would peace and unity in Europe (or Japan) be linked to American hegmony anyway?
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Emperor_Billy_Bob
Registered:
Aug '00
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Date Posted:
4/19 6:42am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
- Date Edited:
4/19 6:46am (2 edits total)
Edited By:
Emperor_Billy_Bob
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon posted:
That's simplifying a whole lot to the point where it's ridicilous, especially saying that peace and unity in Western Europe or peace in Japan are anchored on the military presence and hegmony of the USA. Same deal with the flow of oil out of the Middle East. I don't think it's necessarily hinged completely on the American military presence the way you are making it out to be.
In what way would peace and unity in Europe (or Japan) be linked to American hegmony anyway?
Its actually linked to American grand strategy.
I went to a speech a few semesters ago by Micheal Lind, one of the former head intellectual guys in the Neoconservative movement.
Essentially, the US' big plan for continued global dominance is to use its military to secure the economic needs of the "Great Power" community (this is the subtext of what is going on in Iraq)
This, in turn, prevents other countries from building up their military in order to secure their economic needs, because they know we have them covered. Thus, there is little challenge in the hard power race (and this seems to be paying off by the fact that the US spends as much as the next 17 countries in the world put together on Defense budget)
We know that if we withdrew from East Asia, Japan would probably start building up its military and nuclear power in order to protect itself from the rise of China.
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon
Registered:
Oct '00
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Date Posted:
4/20 12:54am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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Japan still has one of the largest militaries. Even though they can't even legally have one according to their constitution. Even if Japan had a large military, that's not to say that would automatically lead to more instability or conflict. Bigger European militaries are in the same boat, it wouldn't automatically benefit or hurt European peace to have bigger armies. Unless you believe that peace world wide is linked with corporate colonialism, in which case I would question your morality compass.
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Emperor_Billy_Bob
Registered:
Aug '00
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Date Posted:
4/20 1:37am
Subject:
RE: Would America benefit from a multi-polar world?
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GrandAdmiralPelleaon posted:
Japan still has one of the largest militaries. Even though they can't even legally have one according to their constitution. Even if Japan had a large military, that's not to say that would automatically lead to more instability or conflict. Bigger European militaries are in the same boat, it wouldn't automatically benefit or hurt European peace to have bigger armies. Unless you believe that peace world wide is linked with corporate colonialism, in which case I would question your morality compass.
I would say history disagrees with you here. Military build up tends to be a symptom of an international system in which use of that military is expected to be necessary relatively soon. In addition, these buildups could be seen as CAUSING the outbreak of massive war to some extent, as was the case in the First World War where Germany knowingly sought conflict in order to fight a war when it was optimally powerful in comparison to the French-Russian alliance.
The Japanese are ranked 21st in size of army. This is hardly congruent with their actual soft power on the international scene.
European armies are relatively tiny compared to extra-european powers such as South Korea or Pakistan. The US hopes it STAYS that way.
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