In my opinion the time period of roughly 1910-1991 can be considered to be one continuous war. The begining resulted from the transition from one form of the state to another. The time period before 1910 (back until about 1776) was dominated by the "state-nation". The time period 1910-present is dominated by the "nation-state". All the conflicts from WWII to the end of the Cold War were to decide which form of the nation-state would dominate. The three different models of the "nation-state" are Communism, Facism, and of course Parliamentary government.

The question for debate is this: Do you support this theory? If not why do you believe that it is not a valid arguement?

*Note this is not my personal theory, I just support it.

I think we can call the Cold War a period of time with mini-wars that had related to the threat that was precieved during the Cold War, which was communism.

The Korean war, the Vietnam war, the Afghan conflict...they were all small wars within a tense period that had to do with the spread of communism.

If we assume the Cold War was one big war, then there would ahve been more than just conventional warfare that was experienced.

BTW: I don't think you can include WWII as part of the Cold War because the threat during WWII was the spread of facists (nazis and japanese militarists)

I said the theory of one "Long War" was based on the conflict for the best form of the "nation-state". One of those forms was Facism, so yes I think WWII can be combined. WWII was a direct result of the horrible peace treaty that followed WWI. The Versailles Treaty did not settle anything and many knew that it was only a matter of time before that "peace" broke down.

I really hate generalizing. To take a century of conflict and view it as one extended conflict is an extreme. You would have a very hard time getting any pol-mil analyst to accept that premise. If this is not your personal theory, what is the source? Link please.

You start from 1910, but if you're stepping out along that path, it should really be 1912, with the 1st Balkan War. Or why not further back, to the 1870 Franco-Prussian War - the German victory eventually led to the establishment of the various treaties of alliance and support that ended up dragging Europe into WWI. Perhaps because the '04-'05 Russo-Japanese War doesn't fit too well into the suggested framework.

On that note, how do the various banana republic interventions by the US up through the 1930's work themselves into the picture?

And, sure, WWI set the stage for WWII, but it was a very distinct conflict. As WWII was distinct from the Cold War. And I much prefer viewing the myriad conflicts that occurred within the context of the Cold War - both overt shooting wars and covert interventions - each in their own, unique, perspective. Then we have the conflicts that occurred outside the frame of US-USSR confrontation; i.e. the Indo-Pakistani wars. And since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the emergence of the US as a super-hegemon, the framework for viewing conflict around the world has changed yet again....

An interesting idea to see all the major conflicts of the 20th century as part of a continuum of cause and effect with an underlying struggle over the nature and limitations of the nation state underpinning everything.

In fact, I'd say the main flaw with this approach are the start and end dates and the definitions of "nation-state". For example, the Napoleonic Wars were mainly conducted between an Imperial France and a Britain that was, in all major aspects, identical to modern Britain (parliamentary constitutional monarchy dominated by elected politicians), yet predate your defined period by almost a century.

Similarly, the roots in the current "war on terror" (as it is applied in practice against Islamic militancy) are mostly in the outside imposition of particular models of nation state following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire on peoples that weren't ready, or didn't support the imposed model, or on diverse groups that didn't sit well together.

If you narrow your definition to describe the dominance of liberal democracy (a necessary distinction, since German fascism acheived power through democratic means) over fascism and Communism, and exclude other forms of the nation state (Islamic theocracy, for instance), some that have yet-to-be defined (what the EU might turn into? a more democratic China?), then I think your analysis stands up well.

I think your definition also leaves out a few continents, like Africa and South America. Africa is still a continuous battle, usually tribal or racist in nature. South American countries, for the most part, have lurched from one dictatorship to another until very recently. Both seemed apart from the "world wars" and the "cold war", except where they could benefit by playing one party off the other.

Sort of. I see it as a two sided conflict, not three. It looks to me like a protracted conflict between "the democracies" and totalitarianism, of which Communism and Naziism are only different flavors, and Naziism was defeated quickly, making it a short but ugly episode. I wouldn't put the beginning as early as 1910 because I see Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm as imperialistic but not totalitarian. I think 1921 or thereabouts fits better, when Lenin was firmly in control of Russia.

Jerry Pournelle likes to call it the Seventy Years War. He is better known as a sci-fi writer, but he's also a political scientist, space scientist and co-author of The Strategy of Technology, a classic of Cold War strategy, the full text of which is legally available for free at that link. I read it long ago and highly recommend it.

I will make a few points later (as I have to get back to work) but the main source of this theory is "The Sheild of Achilles: War, Peace, and the Course of History". This books was written by Philip Bobbitt who is currently a constitutional law professor at the University of Texas. He is the former Anderson Senior Research Fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford University. He also held various intelligence, amd national security positions in the United States.

It is an interesting view to look at the period as one of conflict over the nature of the nation-state, but I would not agree with it. I would say that above being a conflict for the dominance a particular system of government it was a conflict for the global dominance of an economic system.

This analysis would explain why during this period you have the U.S. supporting non-democratic regimes which embraced Capitalism (and crushed Communist opposition) in areas of economic and geo-political importance. And also cover the anomaly that there were (although I admit very, very few) elected Communist governments, showing that it can not be plainly seen as democratic against non-democratic nation states. It is true that it is not completely accurate to put it purely in terms of communist vs. capitalist, there were also conflicts within these categories, but this was the fundamental source of conflict during this period.

Using this analysis the period before would be described as conflict for global economic dominance in the form of Imperial power. Obviously the two periods overlap as the European Empires struggle to hold on to their formal empires, but slowly the old Imperial systems fell at the knees of new American and Soviet campaigns for economic dominance.

I do not believe that the First World War was a a competition for global power because it grew from one fateful event of a wholly insignificant nature - The assasination of Franz Ferdinand, the heir the the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

It was a bizarre chain of events that grew out of a unfortunate set of treaties, that forced Russia and Germany into direct conflict through the Proxies of Serbia and Austro-Hungary respectively. What followed was even more ludicrous, France got into the mix because of their alliance with Russia and Britain did the same due to their alliance with France.
It was only really allowed to escalate the way it did because the Western Nations thought it would be over quickly. To us it presented a holiday and the opportunity to test some weapons of modernity - most notably the machine gun. There was no grand scheme and no intention of global dominance, economic or otherwise. Britain and America, following their Liberal tradition wanted to remain isolationist and preserve some sense of status quo - a balance of power. IN laymans terms, the incident in Serbia was not an excuse for intervention as it was the antithesis of our traditional foreign policy. The First World War was a indication of the fear and trepidation arising from the new and alien international system, shown in the seemingly unexplainable escalation of war.

Some historians describe the post war period as a twenty year armistice, but the argument is weak as it is places too much weight on hindsight. The role of Hitler cannot be over-estimated. The Second World War was unlikely to have occurred had it not been for him. Hitler's individual skill, timing and astuteness was able to legally turn a democratic (though weak and failing) country into a xenophobic, crazed a highlynationlistic totalitarian system where even small innocent girls turned in those who were contrary to the wider aim of German dominance. He whipped people into a frezny and he gained their support at the very base of their hearts. His talent had so many dimensions it would seem very unlikely that any other candidate would have been able to achieve such success. The aggression of Germany required a dictatorship since it was unlikely a democratic nation would disregard the treaty of Westphalia. The establishment of a dictatorship (of the nature required) was wholly dependent on Hitler's emergence

Your argument is stronger in reference to the post 1944 period, since there was a obvious clash of idealogies - however it was political as well as economic. Yes America did support un-democratic nations, but that shows more about the nature of the International system and of realist theory than it does America's obsession with economic dominance. Supporting nations that are weak but contrary to your idealogy in order to defeat a strong nation with an equally undesirable idealogy is entirely rational and does not disprove the wider aim of democracy, since a stronger nation poses a much greater challenge. In the immediate aftermath Communism was a real threat to Europe, she occupied Berlin and was in a very powerful position. For this reason the establishment of democracy, or at the very least, some degree of stability in Europe was of crucial importance in stemming the spread of Communism, and thus an inherent interest to America for maintaining the Peace she had just created. Communism wanted to overturn everything that America stood for. She and the Western world had just defeated Fascism and protected Europe from being engulfed by Evil. They were hardly likely to let another totalitarian shadow spread across Europe as the holocaust showed the true evils of ill-legitimate dictatorships and we cannot blame the West for extending(perhaps wrongly) the evils of Nazism with that of Communism


Regardless of which view one would take, the political and economic are so inextricably linked it would be very difficulty to subjugate one to the other as part of a wider scheme to emphasis economics to fit into a grander scheme of Marxism. The conflict was too complex, and too variant in its nature, motivation and pace to generalize with one principal reason. In the end, it was an actual war where the original aim was disregarded in favor of a determined effort to defeat the other, based on the antagonation between the two - and not exclusive to the cold war. This is particularly true after the Vietnam war, the bloody minded tenacity here alone shows that this conflict had a deeper more egotistical and nationalistic tendency that lost sight of the ideological dimension in favour a classical conflict between two nations, where the ultimate aim was victory at whatever cost.

The 20th Century wasrs therefore, whilst linked, are not one conflict. It is far too complex to simplify to this degree. Furthermore the methodological implications of the first post suggest that they are interconnected as a result of the nation state, when in reality it existed prior to the date mentioned.

Conflict was destined to happen in the 20th century, new weapons provided far too much temptation for mass destruction for the evils of the world to resist. We have seen many incidents of ethnic cleansing on a huge scale and wars of a scale previously conceived as impossible. The 20th Century conflicts are rooted in a long chain of development culminating in a explosive release of beliefs motivated by a clash of ideas, perpetuated not by nationalism or economics but by incompatible world views, morals and political conceptions fueled by technology that no one knew how to control or use. Most of the 20th Century is 65 year battle principally between the evil and the just. The true democracies versus the un-modern nations.

The war on terror continues this tradition, and September 11th was a non-modern backlash against a liberal world where the beauty of equality, freedom and prosperity has emerged on a large scale for the first time in human history.

Because the difference in fundamental beliefs continues, conflict will also.

Imperial France and Britian at that time were "state-nations" not "nation-states". The distinction is that a "state-nation" is a form by which the nation works for the good of the state. It was during this time that states used their own people as soldiers rather than hiring mercinaries. Napoleonic France, with incorporated many nationalities suppressed nationalism and instead convinced thousands to fight for the state. This success gave them armies of the size not seen before. A "nation-state" is where the state works for the good of the nation. The rise of the nation state and gave nationalities the right to govern their own state.



WWI resulted from nationalism (the rise of the nation-state). Austria-Hungary was a mass of different, and conflicting nationalities. Countries took sides, and created alliances in anticipation of war. War was inevitable. The assasination of Ferdinand was only a small factor in the puzzle.

Again I have run out of time but have more to add. For now here is a link to Philip Bobbitt and his works.

Philip Chase Bobbitt

I was hoping someone was going to respond to my essay

Venom, I wonder if you could enlarge on your belief that Britain in the Napoleonic era was a "state-nation" as distinct from a "nation-state".

As things stand at the moment, it looks a little like a self-defining, circular theory - i.e. "if you accept Bobbit's definitions, do you agree that the theory that gives rise to these definitions is correct".

Also, I wonder why you don't see the current struggle between militant Islam and corporatist democracies is not a continuation of the effort to define the dominant form that the nation-state willl take. Although I suspect this goes back to my lack of understanding of precisely what you mean by "nation-state" and "state-nation".

Capitalist states, whether they're Fascist, liberal, or monarchist, go to war if they need to to protect their vital state interests, or when they can get away with it to expand their sphere of economic influence

Socialist states also go to war to protect their vital state interests but not to expand their sphere of economic influence, since they don't have the type of organization that allows them to invest abroad.

Its extremely rare that a country would go to war simply because they want to reproduce their goverment structure. The US will trade with monarchies (Saudi Arabia), fascist regimes (Colombia), socialist republics (Vietnam) and of course liberal republics, it really doesn't care. If the United States can benefit from invading any type of nation-state and get away with it, it will do so.

In other words, countries go to war for their own interests, not to decide other countries goverments, thats just a byproduct.

This may be an argument you could use for todays states, but not the period I am talking about. Did we goto Korea and Vietnam for economic gain? No we went to try and prevent the spread of communism.

Whilst what you are saying isnt wrong, however the political and economic sphere are inherently interconnected. You have to look at the US motive for wanting to stop the spread of communism. I would contend that they were worried about the safety of Europe, since they had just sacrifriced many of its own people to defend it. However, the spread of communism was a fear not just in a political sense, the spread of communism meant the spread of command economies too. If Communism spread, the foreign US markets would shrink. Communism was the antithesis to to the free market system, a system very benefical to the US. So it wasnt just about the style of government, it was the style of econmics that came with it too.

So in other words, it was a threat to our way of life.

I understand where you are getting. Communism would have damaged the US severely and might have kept us from trying to keep it in check.

So, in a sense, there was a purpose for Vietnam, the Korean war, etc.

I agree, it was a threat to America, the revionsist historians who claim otherwise are wrong. The Truman doctrine undoubtedly had ulterior motives, but it wrong to say that the Americans merely pursued a conflict with Russia to improve her economic strength. As you say, there were legtimate security concerns.

FAO: Venom, when are you going to give us your promised post?

I totally agree and economic systems are part of the theory. I guess I assumed everyone would put the two together. Just to clear something else up, according to Bobbitt we are in a transition phase from "nation-states" to what he calls the "market-state". The way the government and economy worked in the "Long War" period (1914-1991.....I said 1910 earlier but meant 1914) has changed.

In the introduction to the book Bobbitt states that law, strategy, and history while taught as separte disciplines are in actuality very much related. They all influence one another. The three together make legitimate governing institutions possible.

From the book:




During the Napolenic era Britain did not work to better the lives of its people, it worked to better the states position in relation to the community of states. Britian's main goal (along with other countries) was to gain more territory. In that territory were many nationalies (nations). These nations did not practice nationalism (that was suppressed) they worked for the betterment of the state. These people fought in wars for the state, not for individual freedoms, rights, etc but for the sole purpose of colonization.

"Nation-states" brought about the decline and eventual end to colonization and imperialism. The state now focused on improving the material welfare of the nation.



This is a conflict between existing "nation-states" and the emerging "market-state". Globalization is the movement towards this type of state and its well known that militant Islam is fighting this. Bobbitt sees the United States leading the way into this form and this is evident in the way the US is viewed buy the Islamic militants.

Bobbitts definition of the market-state is:


The market state is emerging because of the many failures of the nation-state. Strategic innovations such as nuclear weapons, international communications advancement, as well as the technology of rapid mathematical computation has compromised the nation-states abilities to fulfill its responsibilites. All of these innovations has brought about a drastic change in the military, cultural, and economic challenges facing the state. These innovations will bring about the fall of many nation-states.

There is SO much more to this but its hard to put everything that is in this 900 page book into small posts. Does anything here clarify things better? I encourage more questions as well as anyone interested to pick up this book.

I have found the book:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...=books&n=507846

I must say, I have a great deal of enthusiasm to read this now, because it has a foreword by Michael Howard, and he is a historian I really love.(though it seems that may only be the english version)

It seems to be an extrodinaryly long thesis, I can only assume there will be a torrent of academic debate regarding this in the frothcomingmonths. I will keep an eye on the journals to see if anything interesting emerges.

What he is essentially suggesting though is not completely new. Poltical Scientists and other academics have been musing over the decline of the nation state for some time now. Many have also concluded that the Nation State whilst different, is a long way from disapearing to the forces of globalisation.

I have done a little work myself on the future of Global poltics:

http://server4.uploadit.org/files2/141203-globfrag.doc

This as far as I remember was the penultimate draft, since I cannot seem to find the final version at this stage.