Is No War Possible?

[RBW1]

On Wed, 2004-12-01 at 04:05, boblq wrote:

[Snip]

> > I make the argument that the essence of the problem of war is how to
> > eliminate war. All other discussions are internal to the care and
> > maintenance of war.
> 
> OK. Let's start that discussion. How do you propose to eliminate War? 

Before I tell you what I think should be done, let me cite why it can't
happen...
http://healthandenergy.com/dwindling_oil_and_9_11.htm

So is this guy the nut case or is the closed door Cheney energy
commission from early 2001 the nut case crowd? Hmmmmm...

> I don't think that ignoring the Geneva Conventions is a good start. 
> Do you? 

If I implied that Geneva wasn't a "good" thing then I misconveyed what I
think. Anyone who abhors brutality against helpless individuals supports
Geneva. Geneva is a "Good" thing but only has meaning for captives from
your own country and for your own country with respect to enemy
countries that have prisoners from your country and also that have the
same distaste and horror at/for brutality against individuals that you
do. That's why the signers signed up. It is good in a recipricol manner
where you can get it and it is good in a unilateral manner if you are
decent enough to do so. But Geneva itself does not restrain War in
anyway since it is not relevant outside the context of war.

Enough of Geneva...

As usual you ask a good question "How do you eliminate war?".

Like I said there are powers in the world that don't want that to happen
but the model would have to be a federalized global government based on
regions with equal rights to impact the governing legislation for the
federation. 

There would be a lot more but I can stop there because governments do
not exist in the abstract or outside of the context of commerce within
and between societies. Given that reality and the fact that we live in a
world oil/energy commerce/economy the end of war is not possible since
one of the tools of the oil/energy world economy is in fact war, THAT"S
why the issue of war is not on the table and for all reasonable
probabilities won't be...

But that doesn't mean you don't try to talk about what a world with no
war looks like and how it functions. You never know what unusual
opportunities beyond the obvious train wreck that is currently occuring
might pop up.

Instead we generally get into simple minded pissin' matches about bit
players like Kerry and Bush when they are racing down the same current
of history we are (just in bigger boats).

RBW