Has World War III Started?

DDP Newsletter September 2014 Vol. XXXII, No. 5
[Published November 2014]

Americans may think that World War II started with the attack on Pearl Harbor, Dec 7, 1941. But others would give a different date, writes Andrei Navrozov (Chronicles, August 2014). For example, Mikhail Meltyukhov, in Stalin’s Missed Chance, concludes that the war in Europe became a world war in October 1939, when the general staff of the Soviet Army began developing the plan for a lightning strike against Germany. Had Hitler not preempted Stalin on Jun 22, 1941, the war might have ended, with Western Europe Sovietized, before it ever became a world war.

If we can’t even date the onset of the last war, who is to say we are not in a world war now? If so, who are the combatants? Who is our enemy?

Is Russia a threat? Nicholas Eberstadt calls it a failed state: Its international sales of goods and services were dwarfed by those of the Netherlands. It has European, below-replacement fertility and Third World mortality. Its performance in knowledge-based services is slightly better than that of the Philippines. (WSJ 5/7/14).

But the danger of underestimating Russia is plain to those familiar with history. In a recorded conversation with Baron Mannerheim in 1942, Hitler said: “If someone had told me that a nation could start with 35,000 tanks, then I’d have said ‘You are crazy.’” Yet the Germans had destroyed more tanks than they thought could possibly exist. Russia inherited the massive Soviet apparatus of deception, notes J.R. Nyquist, who lists organized crime, drug trafficking, international terrorism, national liberation movements, revolutionary Islam, free trade, feminism, global warming, the homosexual movement, gun control, and multiculturalism as “ideological sub-weapons” (http://tinyurl.com/ojdbwcb).

Nyquist also points out that cyber attacks on U.S. banks are thought to originate in Russia and that a leading ISIL commander was born in the Soviet Union (ibid.).

Vladimir Putin has reminded the world that Russia is a foremost nuclear power, and a senior Russian general called on the nation to revamp its military doctrine to spell out the conditions for a preemptive nuclear strike against NATO. Russia is trying to expand its buffer zones, including the Baltic states, which are now NATO members. In early September, NATO General Secretary Anders Fough Rasmussen announced the formation of a multinational reaction force. He warned Russia, “Should you even think of attacking one ally, you will be facing the whole alliance” (Threat J 9/6/14, www.threatjournal.com).

What is the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL)? Contrary to the assertions of Barack Obama, it is Islamic, as it is true to the principles and practices of historic Islam. It is also a state. It enjoys a monopoly on coercive measures over the 10 million persons within its domain. It has an army. With no debts or liabilities, plus substantial cash and ongoing cash flow, it is more solvent than many nations represented in the UN. , “indeed to a third world war, one being fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction Al-Baghdadi’s budding state is in much better financial shape, on a per capita basis, than Egypt or Yemen. It has enough oil and derivatives to earn enough foreign exchange to provide for all of its needs. Srdja Trifkovic states that the new caliphate is a viable entity because the U.S. is its “objective ally” by aiding Assad’s Islamic foes in Syria (Chronicles, September 2014). And the U.S. abandoned a lot of usable military equipment.

IS might be the spearpoint for the new SCO, suggests Richard Maybury. The Shanghai Co-operation Organization includes Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Rulers of India and Pakistan are expected to join in 2015. Five of the eight are, like IS, predominantly Sunni Muslim. SCO has been conducting military exercises. Maybury concludes that there is a breakout by Moscow and Beijing, and a NN-GeoMil—a new normal in geopolitics and military events (EWR, Nov-Dec 2014).

The professed goal of the Islamic State is to kill as many nonbelievers as possible and to disrupt the economy through attacks on the infrastructure. ISIS fighters captured in Iraq purportedly said attacks on U.S. and Paris subways were planned (Threat J 9/27/14).  In late August, Judicial Watch reported that Islamic terrorist groups are operating in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez and planning to attack the United States with car bombs or other vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (VBIED). High-level federal law enforcement, intelligence, and other sources confirmed to JW that a warning bulletin for an imminent terrorist attack on the border has been issued (http://tinyurl.com/lvrjfbu). Members of various terror groups have been apprehended by the Border Patrol.

The IS “theater of jihad” is media-savvy. The horror videos are “professional, pitch-perfect,” writes Hugh Prysor-Jones (Chronicles, November 2014). In the world of what the Kremlin calls “dramaturgies,” it is “hopeless to try to follow the factions, their paymasters, their apparent goals, their alliances.” In September, Prysor-Jones writes, Pope Francis spoke of interests that have already led to open conflict, “indeed to a third world war, one being fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction.”

This year, Maybury writes, will someday be seen like 1914, or 1939, only more chaotic. Instead of two sides, there are dozens of sides (EWR, September 2014).

With IS at the gates of Baghdad, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel wants to “retool the military so stop glaciers from melting” (WSJ 10/14/15).

THE THOUSAND-YEAR WAR

The world has been fighting a war against Islam for more than 1,000 years. One of the motivations for Christopher Columbus’s explorations was that Islamists controlled the land routes to Asia. Columbus was present at the siege of Granada, the last Moorish stronghold to fall to Spain on Jan 2, 1492 (Encyclopaedia Britannica 3/21/14).

The 1,200-year-old Sunni-Shia conflict is “the world’s largest theater of war, that knows no boundaries, and no stopping point” (Jim Powell’s GCOR, August 2014).

 THE SWISS STRATEGY

DDP has frequently praised the Swiss civil defense program, which is part of its overall strategy for remaining at peace—a strategy that enabled Switzerland to avoid all 143 European wars that have occurred since 1815. Under pressure from surrounding regimes and the U.S., its security has deteriorated, but remains the most effective in the world. Richard Maybury describes some key features (Early Warning Report, June-July 2014): 1. neutrality; 2. a militia of citizen soldiers; 3. marksmanship (“sniper grandmothers”); 4. dedication to travel and free trade (William Tells all around the world).

A fifth leg of the system, financial privacy (EWR, August 2014), has been greatly undermined in the interest of catching tax evaders. Every regime in the world probably had money stashed in Switzerland, and did not want to bomb its own money. This secrecy likely saved thousands of lives, as by enabling Jews to escape the Nazis.

Swiss tradition is to never surrender, but to survive and to target the tyrants. The enemy’s population or its troops are not the cause of the war; they have simply bought into the lies of their leaders, Maybury writes. See www.chaostan.com.