Future Conflict Eco-Systems in the Midst of Climate/Resource Pressures

I'm currently reading Col Hammes' "The Sling and the Stone" and though I'm not totally convinced that you can define warfare through generational parameters (nod to Clausewitz's idea of "war's inherent chaos") I certainly agree that the prevalence of state-v-non-state wars since WWII is a significant change.

The way warfare is waged is certainly changing and key to discussions on modern warfare (I find myself in agreement with Hammes on this) is the rise of the non-state actor as a result of globalisation and expanding networks of communication.

On the issue of the rise of non-state actors, I'm wondering how far along this phenomenon is going to develop. Are we going to see states completely usurped from their position of primacy in the international system? Will they continue to have a monopoly over violence? Is conflict going to continue to de-centralise wherein mankind returns to pre-Westphalian conflicts of multiple warring gangs and factions?

Combine this with increased climate and resource pressures. Will increased desertification exacerbate the risk of ethnic conflict within states as we have seen in Darfur? Will so-called "climate refugees" and the movements of climate-affected peoples across porous globalised borders create factionalised conflicts over resources and land? How is all this going to fit into a world that is running out of oil?
It's never a good idea to get your Zen out of Hollywood but is "Mad Max" what we're going to see once we run out of oil?

If we go off the generational model (which I still have issues with anyway) is 5th generation warfare going to be wars of climate and resources fought between powerful sub-national factions within post-globalised "token states".
What will the role of state militaries be in the milieu of this? Peacekeeping? Fighting the "Three Block War".

Doesn't sound like much fun for anyone. Thankfully these are all extreme hypotheticals.

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Originally Posted by AusPTE

The way warfare is waged is certainly changing and key to discussions on modern warfare (I find myself in agreement with Hammes on this) is the rise of the non-state actor as a result of globalisation and expanding networks of communication.

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War cannot change and warfare does not change quickly or in ways we cannot comprehend. Almost nothing seen in warfare today is really new.

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On the issue of the rise of non-state actors, I'm wondering how far along this phenomenon is going to develop. Are we going to see states completely usurped from their position of primacy in the international system? Will they continue to have a monopoly over violence? Is conflict going to continue to de-centralise wherein mankind returns to pre-Westphalian conflicts of multiple warring gangs and factions?

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So you think there is something to 4GW. I think 4GW is without evidence and poorly reasons. I know TX and we have agreed to disagree.

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Combine this with increased climate and resource pressures.

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Wars are created by politics. Nothing else. No climate, not religion or globalisation. Clausewitz explains it all very well. Nothing about War has changed in 3,000 years.

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Originally Posted by William F. Owen

Wars are created by politics. Nothing else. No climate, not religion or globalisation. Clausewitz explains it all very well. Nothing about War has changed in 3,000 years.

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I think they are more expensive today than they used to be.

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Originally Posted by William F. Owen
Wars are created by politics. Nothing else. No climate, not religion or globalisation. Clausewitz explains it all very well. Nothing about War has changed in 3,000 years.

I think they are more expensive today than they used to be.

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If you look at the money: yes. if you look at the gross national cost, may be not.

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Originally Posted by M-A Lagrange

If you look at the money: yes. if you look at the gross national cost, may be not.

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...and that is potentially dangerous.

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Wars are created by politics. Nothing else. No climate, not religion or globalisation. Clausewitz explains it all very well.

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I'd agree with Clausewitz in that war is politics by other means. But what is politics? It is certainly not a free-standing bloc detached from everything around it. War might be shaped by politics but the political environment is shaped by social, economic, cultural and environmental events that are taking place simultaneously.

Eg: If a society can no longer grow crops because of increasing desertification the people will migrate in search of arable land. The areas they move into then become overpopulated, which in turn exacerbates pre-existing political tensions and ethnic pressures.

Yes, it was the pre-existing political and ethnic pressures (politics) that were the ultimate cause of the conflict but it was the other factors (overpopulation, economic stress, loss of agriculture) that forced the political problems past the tipping point and made war inevitable.

"Other phenomenon" (eg: globalisation, climate, religion) drives politics which creates conflict.

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Nothing about War has changed in 3,000 years.

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I would say the advent of gunpowder (which is not a political but a technological event) has changed the way war is waged. Nuclear energy (another technological advance) certainly deterred state-state wars between countries with nuclear weapons. The Internet (one aspect of globalisation) has given a larger voice to individuals and allowed violent non-state actors to add new dimensions to war other than the purely physical (social, psychological).

The fundamental purpose of war has not changed. The way it is waged certainly has. I think you may be confusing "method" with "purpose".

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Originally Posted by AusPTE

I'd agree with Clausewitz in that war is politics by other means. But what is politics? It is certainly not a free-standing bloc detached from everything around it. War might be shaped by politics but the political environment is shaped by social, economic, cultural and environmental events that are taking place simultaneously.

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Politics is how people live. It is the order imposed on their lives. Sure, resources and religion all impact politics, but without politics you cannot have war. All war is "80% political." We fight it to redistribute or reshape political power.

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"Other phenomenon" (eg: globalisation, climate, religion) drives politics which creates conflict.

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True. Many things drive politics, but "globalisation" does not create, in an of itself, "conflicts." Globalisation is a "so what" proposition.

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I would say the advent of gunpowder (which is not a political but a technological event) has changed the way war is waged. Nuclear energy (another technological advance) certainly deterred state-state wars between countries with nuclear weapons. The Internet (one aspect of globalisation) has given a larger voice to individuals and allowed violent non-state actors to add new dimensions to war other than the purely physical (social, psychological).

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So Warfare has changed, not War. The Internet is nothing to do with "Globalisation," more than the air travel and the telephone.

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So Warfare has changed, not War.

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I don't think Hammes is arguing that war has changed, in the sense that the fundamental purpose of war has changed. Of course, war is always about winning the big game of politics and killing is killing.
Despite this, I think he's arguing exactly what you just stated - that "warfare" (the way in which war is waged) has changed. It has evolved with changes in society since WWII.
Globalisation, so the argument goes, is one of these important changes that has enabled "warfare" to evolve.

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The Internet is nothing to do with "Globalisation," more than the air travel and the telephone

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I'm interested, then, to know your views on globalisation? What is "globalisation"? Do you think it has been a catalyst of change?

"Globalisation" to me is an ongoing set of processes defined by the integration of national economies through an increase in trade and the homogeneous interaction of the world’s cultures through the expansion of mass-media communications and information technology.
I think the Internet is probably one of the most important facets of globalisation. Without the Internet and other communicative levellers we (2 people on opposite sides of the world - assuming you're not currently in the pit of despair that is Australia's frost-bitten capital) would not be having this discussion. To me, globalisation represents the essential shrinking of the world wherein mass media communications have enabled us to find out what is happening on the other side of the world at the same time as events occur.

Applied to global conflict it has provided a forum for non-state actors to disseminate their views and export violence around the world without actually sending minions from Afghanistan into America to blow up buildings.

Eg: Al-Qaeda can post an internet video on how to make a bomb accompanied with some well-written propaganda and encourage Canadian students to blow up the CSIS office as happened in 2006.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_To...terrorism_case

I completely agree with your central argument that war is fundamentally about politics but I think that these traditional Clausewitzian arguments can still co-exist with Hammes' arguments about changes in warfare. To me, they're not mutually-exclusive but rather mutually-reinforcing.

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Originally Posted by AusPTE

Despite this, I think he's arguing exactly what you just stated - that "warfare" (the way in which war is waged) has changed. It has evolved with changes in society since WWII.
Globalisation, so the argument goes, is one of these important changes that has enabled "warfare" to evolve.

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Knowing TX as I do, I am pretty familiar with his argument and his book. The problem is evidence. There simply isn't any to support the contention that there is something called "4GW" or that warfare has evolved in the ways he says.

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I'm interested, then, to know your views on globalisation? What is "globalisation"? Do you think it has been a catalyst of change?

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I think "globalisation" is baby talk. Does it really just mean "communication?"

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To me, globalisation represents the essential shrinking of the world wherein mass media communications have enabled us to find out what is happening on the other side of the world at the same time as events occur.

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Again, so what? The sole import of any event is its actual outcome or result. How quickly it is reported is pretty un-important. The "CNN effect" is not decisive or game changing in and of itself.

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Applied to global conflict it has provided a forum for non-state actors to disseminate their views and export violence around the world without actually sending minions from Afghanistan into America to blow up buildings.

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So what? What "global conflict"? There is simply no such thing.

We have massive confusion over the difference between "Warfare" and "War", Combat and diplomacy, plus a widespread in ability to tell the difference between Policy and Strategy. The only real theory of war that withstands rigour is Clausewitz.
Who fights and why has not changed. How they fight has not really changed either in the last 40 years.
The only thing confusing me is how and why everyone seems so confused.

Ken,
I fully agree with you. When war becomes affordable, there is a danger.

AusPTE,

Well, the concept of climat refugee over Darfur is a simplistic interpretation of a really complexe political struggle between several ethnic groups over political representation, access to development benefits and military support from SPLA to various armed groups to destabilise SAF and extend the front line...
I really do not like the climat refugee term as it is one more time a pity tool used to disqualify the political dimension of a war in Africa.

Saying so, yes ecological problematics are rising into the diplomatic relations between States. But, if the Starwar project did bring USSR to its knees, its the USSR dependancy on US animal food import that really broke it.
War over food is a story which is older than mankind.

And to the Madmax referal, please rewatch the 1st one. You will see that max is a state servant. ;)