War and peace

 Its epic the grand old man of msia politics said

To japan foreign correspondent club that the world is integrated as one.so because of interdependence,war will not be limited to one nation but have massive devastation on a global scale.

 Now thats the man that pushed modernization of msian industries and infrastructure but at the same time masterminded divide and rule politics of ethnic exclusiveness and racial superiority,the rise of cronyism and nepotism,use of draconian laws to jail political dissidents to his dictatorial ways,suppress free press and rise of massive political corruption thats become endemic in public sectors.

Rereading will durants the lessons of history is mind blowing foresight into future.a debate between a philosopher n a general goes:

Yes and the devastating results will be in accord with history,except that they will be multiplied in proportion to the increased no and mobility of the engaged forces and the unparallelled destructiveness of the weapons used.there is something greater than history.somewhere,sometime in the name of humanitywe must challenge 1,000 evil precedents and dare to apply the Golden rule to nations,as the buddhist king asoka did in 162 bc or at least what Augustus did when he bade Tiberius desist from further invasion of germany in ad.9 Let us refuse,at whatever cost to ourselves,to make 100 Hiroshimas in China

Magnanimity in politics said edward burke is not seldom the truest wisdom and a great empire and little minds go ill together.imagine an american president saying to the leaders of China and Russia..

"If we should follow the usual course of history,we should make war with you for fear of what you may do a generation hence.or we should follow the dismal precedent of the holy alliance of 1815,and dedicate our wealth and our soundest youths to suppressing any revolt against the existing order anywhere.but we are willing to try a new approach.we respect your people and your civilization as among the most creative in history.we shall try to understand your feelings and your desire to develop your own institutions without fear of attack.we must not allow our mutual fears to lead us into war for the unparalleled murderousness of our weapons and yours brings into the situation an element un familiar in history.

Let us open our doors to each other and organize cultural exchanges that will promote mutual understanding.we are not afraid that your economics system will replace ours nor need you fear that ours will displace yours.we believe each system will learn from the other and be able to live with it in cooperation and peace.

If you and we succeed,we shall merit a place for centuries to come in the grateful memory of mankind.

The general smiles,

Such interludes of widespread peace are unnatural and exceptional.they will soon be ended by changes in the distribution of military power.

Man is a competitive animal,that his states must so be like himself and that natural selection now operates on an international plane.

States will unite in basic cooperation only when they are in common attacked from without.we may make contact in future with ambitious species on other planets,soon tbereafter there will be interplanetary war.then and only then,will we of this earth be one.

So when the Martians come will we set aside our differences and behave like humans.humans vs aliens.cool .will durant is a historian.if we want to understand the present,look at the past precedents.if you want to look to the future,look at our present trajectory.man is wired for mutual destruction and the biggest existential risk is self made either the climate change destroys human species or a nuclear apocalypse nuke us all to bits and peaces.