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Comment by the-dude | Hacker News Reader

We already have global conflict. Multiple.

True. I can't help but wonder when/if WWIII will begin or if it already has...

It almost feels inevitable to be honest. Am I wrong?

WWIII already began. Using carefully-cut video clips, intentionally misleading articles, and social media platforms increasingly encouraging unrest to pad their bottom line, decreasing their users' attention span, and spying into their users' devices, the factions only need to fight for public opinion in this day in age.

You can convince someone to surrender to you out of spite for their own country, long before you have to point a gun at them nowadays.

This gave me chills. Sometimes California feels more pro-China than pro-US. “But man, China is so impressive. They’re so good at governance.” - verbatim quote from a professor I met at UC Berkeley.

I've long felt that WWIII will not be fought (initially, anyway) with tanks and bombs and such, but with computers.

What could be more effective for your enemy than taking out all your power stations and plunging your country into total darkness and chaos? Everything would run out in short order and people would turn on each other.

Saves having to mess the place up with bombs and you have plausible deniability within the international community.

You aren't necessarily wrong, but IMHO maybe too pessimistic. I don't see a global conflict starting anytime soon due to MAD. Baring another Trump-like person with zero regard for international norms, relations and basically anything, most world leaders at the highest level aren't complete idiots and understand the risks involved.

There are and will still be many localised conflicts, even some which might impact lots of people ( e.g. if the US does end up attacking Iran, it will be a bloodbath with consequences through Europe, Asia and Africa at the very least). Ukraine-Russia, and everyone around ( Belarus, Baltics, Poland) will probably turn out to be an even nastier affair. Israel's apartheid will probably also result in another war.

But a global war is highly unlikely, at least until climate change and other ongoing environmental disasters wipe out too much resources and people ( e.g. poor communities relying on fishing for sustenance being decimated by dropping fish populations and/or deforestation draining major rivers and lakes).

I would counter that a Trump like person would lead to less chance of war. Countries tend to toe the line better if there is a measuarble chance at retaliation. A Biden like person who's demonstrated incompetance (Afghanistan pullout) and placation (weak stance on China relations) would lead to contries rolling the dice on whether we would retaliate or not. We'll see what happens with China and Taiwan or Russia and Ukraine.

I would also counter that the response to alleged climate change could also spark conflicts which could lead to more encompassing war for example some greenie gets elected to power in Russia and decimates their ability to export energy (similar to current U.S. situation). That would leave many angry people in the cold in the E.U. and lead to unrest and potentially war. That's kind of out there but still within the realm.

1) The afghanistan pullout is the country keeping a promise that Trump failed to keep that was made long before either Trump or Biden, and it would have been a quagmire to whoever had the guts to actually follow through on it

2) People keep repeating this weak-on-China meme but Biden seems a lot more hawkish on them than people seem to be giving him credit for

I don’t disagree with keeping the promise at all. Where he completely demonstrated his competence was in the implementation. I am an IT guy and I would have done a much better job.

We’ll see on China. Proof is in action not talk.

> I am an IT guy and I would have done a much better job.

I'm sure you're a very nice and competent person, but that's a quote for the ages.

Or - Dammit Jim I’m an IT guy not Military Strategist! Lol

You’d have done a better job? How so? You have expertise in strategic retreats after 20 years of war?

My point being that the bar was so low on the implementation that anyone with a shred of intellect could have done a better job. But for the sake of discussion I would have for starters left the military on site until the civilian component was safely out of the country. Don’t need a diploma in strategic retreats to see that.

I don't think it takes a military strategic expert to say get civilians out first, then the military and equipment. If you can't take the equipment, destroy it.

As far as I can remember - one thing that our military personnel are taught, especially in the field, is how to render equipment inoperable. Which in fact is one of the things we've done with left over equipment there. Source: family of veterans.

The Taliban paraded driving US military vehicles through the streets, so I don't think we did that. I am sure it is normal procedure to disable equipment in this situation, but nothing about that exit was normal.

Those vehicles were left behind by the Afghani armed forces and were no longer US assets.

Of course, our failure to predict the afghani military's collapse is a huge error but that just proves that even world's best and most well-funded intelligence agency is not foolproof.

You can’t tell me with a straight face though that there wasn’t a report on someone’s desk that predicted exactly that - the Afghani military collapse. It was likely buried because it didn’t support whatever narrative was required at the time. So.. well funded? Absolutely and with a cherry on the top. Best? Nope. Way too infused with agendas and politics. No offense to the great people who work there.

They knew it would collapse, just not so quickly.

>Of course, our failure to predict the afghani military's collapse...

It was obvious to people who had any inkling of Afghanistan.

First, the US created an Afghani army that was dependent on US weapons and logistics, but stopped helping to maintain it even before the withdrawal was done. What does one expect to happen to an airforce when one stops maintance?

Second, every intelligence estimate predicted the Taliban would eventually win post-withdrawal (since they still got a state to support them), and the Afghanis knew about those estimates. Why should a sane Afghani keep fighting, when they could switch sides and live? To make Biden look better?

Ultimately, there was a political decision to leave Afghanistan, and the intel was adjusted to the decision rather than the other way around.

>Second, every intelligence estimate predicted the Taliban would eventually win post-withdrawal (since they still got a state to support them)

Which state would that be?

Pakistan, duh. Pakistan-Taliban links were widely known for decades.

Every non ideological person would have done a better job. There wouldn't have been a hasty evacuation or the bombing in Kabul, if the army kept Bagram until the withdrawal was done, or if the US had accepted the Taliban's offer to retain Kabul until the withdrawal was done - and that's just the smallest of the tactical failures...

Those are both poison pills. The army didn't want to be responsible for the security of the entire Kabul area and Bagram to Kabul is not a next door situation.

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