Economic Wars of Today and Tomorrow

Tomahawk cruise missiles cost more than a million dollars apiece. When hundreds are launched at nations such a Libya that stimulates the economy of defense contractors. Questions about the relation of economics to modern war may abound, though I will speculate about just a few parameters of the phenomena.
For North Sea oil fields running low and world oil reserves probably having already reached peak production while global demand and population is increasing, securing Libyan oil fields for England, France and Europe’s benefit might seem a poetic bargain since Moamar Kaddafi led invention of the 1972 Arab oil embargo against the west.

If the world has a few developing major economic blocks and ideas about economic and moral correctness-perhaps the Market of the west, Islam and a Chinese block-these major blocks seems to have plate tectonic boundary conflicts that can lead to military conflicts of limited nature.

A Chinese government that would attack Taiwan with high tech weapons and a million man army would risk counter-punching with cruise missiles from Taiwan on it economic infrastructure such as dams and sensitive production facilities. If even 30% of the Chinese infrastructure was halted for some time a popular revolution might transpire. Alternatively if China attacked Taiwan other players might find it a good time to attack China from another direction. Modern games theory seems to be behind several potential conflicts today, especially as economic calculations of the value of targets, weapons and economic losses to rivals and increased economic power to winners seem to have returned to the phenomena of war.

When the Bush II administration choose to accept Kaddafi’s normalization feelers seven years ago much of the American right was discomfited with letting the well known terrorist off the hook. One must wonder if G.W. Bush was setting up a rope-a-dope for a foot in the door to let another administration deliver the knock out punch to the terrorist dictator bring in oil reserves and better contracts with a different post-Kaddafi government?

Moamar Kaddafi long ago was a revolutionary leader receiving support fro the world leftist war against the ‘free world’. He was a radical Islamist as well seeking gains against the ‘Crusader-Colonialists’ in a protracted war of Muslims against the dar al harb. With the end f the cold war the dictator realized in time that he was over-exposed without a K.G.B. backup and Soviet military existential ally I suppose-he sought to renormalize relations with the west after 9-11 in order not to become a target for a Bush II invasion force. Moamar Khadafy was buying time, yet the post 9-11 west placed more demands upon Liberalization than the dictator was willing to afford.

Moamar Kaddafi had order the Pan American airlines flight that flew from the U.S.A. to London t be blown up over Lockerbie Scotland in 1988. I remember the year because I had flown on a similar Pan Am flight the year before close to winter solstice. Eventually some terrorist named Abdel Basset Mohamed al-Megrahi was convicted, Kaddafi implicated yet with the help of BP eventually Scotland released the terrorist for ‘humanitarian reasons’ as he was believed dying of terminal cancer to the tender ministrations of Kaddafi and celebration. Under the current sentiments and spookish planning seem possibly to exist in the phenomena.

With unknown intelligence elements encouraging organization, public Internet twittering and demonstration in Libya led to demands that the dictator resign and his condign response. Thus the U.N. Security Council voted to provide air cover for whatever civilian led military actions against the forces of Kaddafi might follow. One anticipates that the cost benefits to the oil and military industrial elements of interested parties will also bring a future of uncertainty to the nature and cost of support for a post Kaddafi government for the United States.

In a world with increasing population and military capability economic conflicts that stimulate respective power blocks military industrial conflicts will empty their arsenals of weapons that become shelved to long allowing a restocking with new weapons. If weapons are not used the weapons industry cannot perpetuate business activity obviously. The cost of war upon the destruction of particular economic infrastructure may also produce political candidates that represent economic interests wishing to have their global interests protracted from military destruction. Wars and war targets may thus become selected by omission from politically protected status as well as for commission of direct attacks or threats to antagonist military forces.

In a world with increasing military power, reducing number of political power blocks, increasing population and far higher structuring of mass economic subsistence and global trade the occurrence of war will obviously present an increasing danger to collateral global economic continuity, therein creating diamond-cutting quality specialized military assault potential to alter economic balances globally. Such a human social criterion for modern war highlights in failure of human society commonly to pursue the good for-itself instead of the stupid.

In a nation with decreasing use of capital punishment, U.S. annual homicide through war rates have increased markedly since 9-11 when the era of post-cold war peace besides Kosovo or wherever was an era of simple government greed without violence as an economic device. This seems to be an era of increasing government killing cliques of murdering monkeys lusting for economic power and market profit. Alternative development of a more human kind would eliminate fossil fuels from the transportation equation and continue human expansion of the High Frontier on non-biologically populated worlds with peaceful global participation. Humanity can only climb as far as its leaders are allowed to go.