Dilrook Kannangara

The world is heading into WW3. It is a matter of when. The only way it can be avoided is if the debt trap trounces them first. It is not the fault of an individual, a nation or a few of them. It is a clash of competing priorities, access to scarce resources, changing world order and resistance to change and the continuation of same old European colonialism. And it did not happen suddenly. It gradually grew into this situation.

Despite the end of the Cold War, the world was not peaceful. In fact, the world was far more violent after the Cold War. Instead of the Soviet Union, the West found new enemies in China, Muslim majority nations/territories and in each other. Despite USA promising not an inch forward” referring to the threat of NATO expansion where this promise was given to the Soviet Union during discussions to unify Germany, this promise was never kept. Nuclear armed NATO has crept to the doorstep of Russia and looks to expand even further. US military bases have encircled China. Russia has also indulged in territorial ambitions in Georgia and Ukraine and did not keep its promise to respect their sovereignty. Belarus, Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Georgia gave up their nuclear weapons in exchange of a guarantee from Russia and others to respect their borders but the promise fell apart. South Africa also gave up their nuclear weapons as a mark of peace and symbolizing the fall of Apartheid but western meddling in South Africa only grew worse following the giving up of nuclear weapons. All these countries that gave up nuclear weapons now regret the decision.

Meanwhile France and the UK are rapidly expanding their nuclear weapons targeting Russia. USA, Israel, Australia, Poland, Turkey are either expanding their own or proliferating US nuclear weapons beyond what was deployed a few years ago. In response China is rapidly adding new nuclear warheads to its arsenal which stood at just less than 300 five years ago and is now racing to match USA in active nuclear warheads of 1,500 by 2035. North Korea and Iran are also pursuing nuclear weapons. If the trend continues both will have deployed nuclear weapons within the next 5 years capable of causing destruction in pro-US countries in their vicinity. India and Pakistan despite being 30 of the world’s poorest countries by per capita income spend enormous amounts of money in weapons and they too expand their nuclear weapons. India has become the world’s largest weapons importer of all time.

At the same time previous weapons reduction treaties are collapsing. USA and Europe have gone back on conventions that banned cluster munitions and anti-personnel mines. Other weapons conventions are also almost in tatters including the convention against biological weapons, intermediate range nuclear missiles, laws governing nuclear power plants, reciprocal weapons inspection and a few more. Biological weapons capable laboratories have grown by 7 times since the turn of the century as biological weapons are now very attractive after COVID-19 and is now seen as poor man’s nuclear weapons. Its other attraction is it causes no environmental destruction compared to nuclear and conventional weapons. In fact, biological weapons usage can save the environment from its biggest polluters. It’s a matter of time since aggrieved people in the middle east and their sympathizers elsewhere laid their hands on biological weapons and the consequences will be catastrophic.

Proliferation of drones is another major security threat to all nations. They are individual weapons capable of causing national level tragedies.

All pro-US military allies are trying to increase their defense spending by up to 5% of the GDP. This is more than double their current average of 2%. Almost all pro-US military allies are in debt traps. Their debt is more than 100% of their economy. Debt interest payments are either their largest government expenditure or will soon be the largest. Debt is another indicator of excessive greed where nations consume far more they can afford. They all have a fast-ageing population and have cut down their welfare schemes under austerity measures. This massive expansion of military spend is unsustainable for their debt-ridden economies. Their relative spend on education and healthcare systems is crashing. For the first time in history infant mortality of USA, UK and France rose a couple of years ago indicating the deterioration of their healthcare systems.

Climate change is another casualty of this weapons craze. Out of 194 countries that agreed to the Paris Convention on climate change only 15 countries (mostly very small countries) have submitted concrete plans to reduce emissions from their 2005 levels. As military expenditure increases, there is no way a country can meet climate change demands.

Blaming one another is not going to fix any problem. It is part of the problem. Instead, every nation should recognize the right of others to develop peacefully and respect existing borders whether they are acceptable or not. However, war is a better approach for superpowers as they are confident of prevailing over others in a major war. After such a war they will divide the rest of the world between them and enjoy their resources and slave labor at will. As the universal law goes, the fittest survives better and at the expense of weaker ones. Effects of ageing population, climate change, hunger, poverty and mental health of the population will further worsen if actual war occurs. Every country should have a plan to survive WW3 as much as they can. Superpower clashes will lead to clashes everywhere as regional powers will do the same to their weaker neighbors.