Financial Experts: World War Looms … Unless We Stop It
The Economist argues that there are ominous parallels between the conditions which led to the first world war and today:
The United States is Britain, the superpower on the wane, unable to guarantee global security. Its main trading partner, China, plays the part of Germany, a new economic power bristling with nationalist indignation and building up its armed forces rapidly. Modern Japan is France, an ally of the retreating hegemon and a declining regional power. The parallels
A Foreign Policy of Fr... Best Price: $0.25 Buy New $8.85 (as of 06:20 UTC - Details)
are not exact—China lacks the Kaiser’s territorial ambitions and America’s defence budget is far more impressive than imperial Britain’s—but they are close enough for the world to be on its guard.
Which, by and large, it is not. The most troubling similarity between 1914 and now is complacency. Businesspeople today are like businesspeople then: too busy making money to notice the serpents flickering at the bottom of their trading screens. Politicians are playing with nationalism just as they did 100 years ago. China’s leaders whip up Japanophobia, using it as cover for economic reforms, while Shinzo Abe stirs Japanese nationalism for similar reasons.
The New Republic points out that global downturns can lead to war:
As the experience of the 1930s testified, a prolonged global downturn can have profound political and geopolitical repercussions. In the U.S. and Europe, the downturn has already
End the Fed Best Price: $1.12 Buy New $8.53 (as of 10:10 UTC - Details)
The Telegraph notes that the economic crisis in Europe is increasing tensions:
Tensions between European countries unseen in decades are emerging.
(Indeed, Europe is stuck in a downturn worse than the Great Depression.)
The Revolution: A Mani...
Best Price: $1.99
Buy New $6.99
(as of 11:00 UTC - Details)
Well-known economist Nouriel Roubini tweeted from the gathering of the rich and powerful at the World Economic Forum in Davos last year:
Many speakers compare 2014 to 1914 when WWI broke out & no one expected it. A black swan in the form of a war between China & Japan?
And:
Both Abe and an influential Chinese analyst don’t rule out a military confrontation between China and Japan. Memories of 1914?
Paul Craig Roberts – former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury under President Reagan, former editor of the Wall Street Journal, listed by Who’s Who in America as one of the 1,000 most influential political thinkers in the world, PhD economist – wrote an article about the build up of hostilities between the U.S. and Russia titled, simply: “War Is Coming”.
Similarly, Ronald Reagan’s head of the Office of Management and Budget – David Stockman – is posting pieces warning of the dispute between the U.S. and Russia leading to World War 3.
Liberty Defined: 50 Es...
Best Price: $1.27
Buy New $6.79
(as of 07:10 UTC - Details)
Trend forecaster Gerald Celente – who has been making some accurate financial and geopolitical predictions for decades – says WW3 will start soon.
Investment fund manager and adviser Martin Armstrong has charted the “cycles of war” back to 600 BC … and says that we’ll have major wars between now and 2020. He has written pieces recently entitled, “Why We will Go to War with Russia“, and another one saying, “Prepare for World War III“.
Investment adviser Larry Edelson – who has long studied the “cycles of war” – wrote last month:
This year … we will also be hit by another ramping up of the related war cycles.
The Case for Gold Best Price: $3.55 Buy New $24.95 (as of 01:00 UTC - Details)
All part and parcel of the rising war cycles that I’ve been warning you about, conditions that will not abate until at least the year 2020.
Former Goldman Sachs technical analyst Charles Nenner – who has made some big accurate calls, and counts major hedge funds, banks, brokerage houses, and high net worth individuals as clients – says there will be “a major war”, which will drive the Dow to 5,000.
Veteran investor adviser James Dines forecast a war as epochal as World Wars I and II, starting in the Middle East.
Bad Economic Theories
What’s causing the slide towards war? We discuss several causes below.
Initially, believe it or not, one cause is that many influential economists and talking heads hold the discredited belief that war is good for the economy.
Therefore, many are overtly or more subtly pushing for war.
Challengers Give Declining Empires “Itchy Fingers”
Moreover, historians say that declining empires tend to attack their rising rivals … so the risk of world war is rising because the U.S. feels threatened by the rising empire of China.
The U.S. government considers economic rivalry to be a basis for war. Therefore, the U.S. is systematically using the military to contain China’s growing economic influence.
