World War III?

[Xavier]

This is what i think WWIII would look like:

China has growing middle class and the masses decide that they want more freedom, do avoid loseing power China decides they need a war to destract the people they can attack: India, some of the Stans or Russia. taking India would make there problem worse and the Stans could result in a Iraq-type conflict - a bad thing - but Russia is big, not Islamic, and has a lot of minerals and oil! So China attacks Russia

THE WAR: China vs Russia

Russia is taken by surprise and loses a lot of land before it can mobilize its troops and move them to the East, the EU - who gets most of it energy from Russia - panics and declares war on China

THE WAR: China vs Russia + EU

The US stays neutral because it needs (wants) Chinese goods but the EU was its ally in WWII. The Russian/EU troops are pushing back the Chinese. Iran, hoping to get international status and nuclear tech declares war on China.

THE WAR: China vs Russia + EU + Iran

Pushed by Iran joining Russia and the EU against China added to the hunger for Chinas goods - which have been increasingly sent to the sea floor by Russian subs - the USA joins the war on Chinas side, evacuating Iraq to get the troops needed.

THE WAR: China + USA vs Russia + EU + Iran

Israel seeing a chance to get rid of the Iran threat and get more military supplies joins the China/USA side. The rest of the Mid East, including Iraq join the Russia/EU/Iran side to get the extra mussel to destroy Israel

THE WAR: China + USA + Israel vs Russia + EU + Iran + Mid East (excluding Israel)

Because of political pressure the Commonwealth joins in on Russia's side and Mexico sides with the USA. Chinese destroyers pursuing Russian warships miss-identify Japanese fishing ships and sink them with all hands, Japan, out raged at this joins the War on Russia's side, depriving the USN of bases.

THE WAR: China + USA + Israel + Mexico vs Russia + EU + Iran + Mid East (excluding Israel) + Japan + British Commonwealth

The US despite for bases for the USN gets the Philippines to join in the war. Because of the war all US troops in South Korea have left so North Korea invades, South Korea tries to get help by joining on the USA/China side. North Korea counters by joining in on the Russia/EU side.

THE WAR: China + USA + Israel + Mexico + Philippines + South Korea vs Russia + EU + Iran + Mid East (excluding Israel) + Japan + British Commonwealth + North Korea

The new Pakistani government see a chance to gain popularity gives in to public pressure and declares war on Israel, India sees a opportunity in this and attack Pakistan. Both latter join in the larger war.

THE WAR: China + USA + Israel + Mexico + Philippines + South Korea + India vs Russia + EU + Iran + Mid East (excluding Israel) + Japan + British Commonwealth + North Korea + Pakistan

stay of those paddo's mate

the EU, which still consists of 27 sovereign countries, may declare war on China but not immediately and I really don't see the USA on China's side anywhere this century

Iran vs China!? take a look at a map dude, both political and geographic

Israel would to join a war against anyone who is fighting along the EU would be suicidal, even the USN couldn't stop the Med from turning into EU-lake (Gibraltar remember)

In your scenario the Canucks would probably stay out of it or cease to exist as they border the US, an enemy in your scenario, besides the fact that the commonwealth isn't the monolithic block it once was anymore

There's more of your scenario(all of it really) which won't fly but I don't have time for it all

[Tomas Hoting]

I don't see China going into a civil war - not without some kind of catastrophic external event. Again, they have too much money to lose if things go sour. People don't want democracy like in '89 anymore when they've still got stability and economic growth from a one-party system. Right now they've got a lot of the benefits of a western democracy (i.e. cash in their pockets) and very little of the associated responsibility. It works for them.

 

IMHO, when I look at the ecological disasters, the environmental polution and the resulting diseases among the population, and the fact that most of the people don't have "cash in their pockets" in China right now, this might also trigger some form of civil war, or widespread civil unrest in the future.

 

BTW: I still kinda hope Taiwan declares its independence right before the beginning of the Olympic Games in 2008, just to seriously p**s off the ChiComs!

 

Seriously, though, another worst-case scenario:

Who knows what kind of consequences the current credit crisis might bring in the future? A new conomic downfall and depression, a return of political radicalists?

 

Like other posters already said before me:

Oil, water, overpopulation, climate change and desertification, the fight for natural resources in general might all be reasons for WW3. The PR-gag when the Russians used a small manned submersible to plant their national flag on the seafloor at the position of the North Pole might be part of this fight, which IMHO already has begun.

[Guest Bob II]

stay of those paddo's mate

the EU, which still consists of 27 sovereign countries, may declare war on China but not immediately and I really don't see the USA on China's side anywhere this century

Iran vs China!? take a look at a map dude, both political and geographic

Israel would to join a war against anyone who is fighting along the EU would be suicidal, even the USN couldn't stop the Med from turning into EU-lake (Gibraltar remember)

In your scenario the Canucks would probably stay out of it or cease to exist as they border the US, an enemy in your scenario, besides the fact that the commonwealth isn't the monolithic block it once was anymore

There's more of your scenario(all of it really) which won't fly but I don't have time for it all

The EU didn't declare war immediately, only after Russia lost a lot of land, as for Iran vs China the political situation would change because of the war and they only have to DECALRE war and send a few planes to fight. As for Israel, think about it: the RN is a mere shadow of its former self and the USA has all those wonderful planes at AMARC that need pilots and as for Gibraltar, its not British anymore, and anyway, i wanted to get all the nuclear armed nations involved. yes the commonwealth is not what it once was and thats why it took so long for them to declare war although i probably should have had the join before the USA enters, thus removing that factor. and yes it isn't perfect

[Mk 1]

This is what i think WWIII would look like:

...

Well, I suppose a thread as hypothetical as this is bound to generate all sorts of silliness, but this idea truly plumbs the depths of theater of the absurd.

 

The notion that dozens of nations around the world would see a world war as so irresistable ... such an opportunity ... that they would discard decades-old alliances and attack important and even vital trade partners is just a bit more than might warrant serious consideration.

 

There is no valid thesis underlying the escalations in this scenario.

 

When, in the post WW2 era, have we seen nations piling-on to a war because it looked like a "good opportunity"? How many nations jumped in during the many years that Iran and Iraq were pounding each other? How active were China or the Soviet Union in capitalizing on the Indo-Pakistani conflicts? How many South American nations seized the day to grab resources and land while the Argenines were tied-up with the Brits over the Falklands/Malvinas. How aggressively did Finland move when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan? Did the US really have trouble with Mexico during the Korean war? The Vietnam war? During Desert Shield / Desert Storm? Since 9/11?

 

Yeah, a nation getting involved in a fight, and looking like it is taking the worse for it, might encourage a radical element somewhere. A guerrila or terrorist organization, or an isolated rogue state. But very few national leaders see war as a positive opportunity anymore. Modern weapons are too expensive, and too destructive, to generate a positive economic impact. Today the vast majority of nations, large and small, developed, developing and un-developed, seek to dampen or limit open warfare when it errupts in their neighborhood.

 

Many interesting potentials have been raised in this thread. Civil wars ... resource wars ... racial/ideological wars ... even accidental or deceptively-initiated wars. But a world war because well gee it looks like a great opportunity and who can resist jumping in? Our time would be better invested considering giant carnivorous earthworms.

 

-Mark 1

[SCFalken]

Antarctica?

[Bluelight]

Well, I suppose a thread as hypothetical as this is bound to generate all sorts of silliness, but this idea truly plumbs the depths of theater of the absurd.

 

The problem with all WWIII ideas is they are absurd. But since when has absurd stopped a massive bloodshedding for seemingly no point whatsoever? For example, there is WWI, which for all intents and purpases I still havn't figured out why they decided to kill each other by the millions.

[swerve]

The EU didn't declare war immediately, only after Russia lost a lot of land, as for Iran vs China the political situation would change because of the war and they only have to DECALRE war and send a few planes to fight. As for Israel, think about it: the RN is a mere shadow of its former self and the USA has all those wonderful planes at AMARC that need pilots and as for Gibraltar, its not British anymore, and anyway, i wanted to get all the nuclear armed nations involved. yes the commonwealth is not what it once was and thats why it took so long for them to declare war although i probably should have had the join before the USA enters, thus removing that factor. and yes it isn't perfect

 

Apart from the above rather lacking in coherence - Gibraltar is still British.

[SCFalken]

Apart from the above rather lacking in coherence - Gibraltar is still British.

 

 

Overwhelmingly so, according to the last polls I saw.

 

 

Falken

[TheSilentType]

I can't really picture any major powers going to war over water. Desalinisation may not be cheap, but it's got to be less expensive than a war.

[LeoTanker]

I can't really picture any major powers going to war over water. Desalinisation may not be cheap, but it's got to be less expensive than a war.

 

Wasnt the acess to (or rather lack there of) fresh water the major reason for Syrias attack on Israel in 1967? But I agree it seems unlikely any major powers wold go to war over water anytime soon...

 

edit: I have to correct my self (must have been sleeping when I wrote that post). Syria never attacked Israel in 1967, it was the other way around. But still -as the history book tell- Syria was on the verge of an attack in 67, and I belive I have heard it was because of lack of fresh water in southern Syria after Israel diverted some river in the border area.

Edited December 3, 2007 by LeoTanker

[Xavier]

Apart from the above rather lacking in coherence - Gibraltar is still British.

Not that Bob II seems to have realised it but that wouldn't even matter for the point I was making, where Gibraltar meant not just The Rock, but also the Street itself whose northern shoreline still is Spanish last I checked and they are part of the EU...

[Sailor Lars]

Achtung verboten! Himmel sukeltakaa!

 

Considering from various internet sites that have different nationalities interacting with each other, my bet would be on Pakistan-India relationships and inflating from there

[konev]

Gents,

 

Just to add a wood to the fire, supposedly one of Czar Vladimir [Putin] goals when he becomes Prime Minister is to attempt to get Belarus to re-unite with Mother Russia.

Combine that with Russia withdrawing from the CFE Treaty and having a stranglehold on the natural gas pipelines going into Europe, Cold War II might start up again, this time just a wee bit further east.

 

I can now see S&T coming out with a game called "North Polish Plain".

 

Seriously, I can see a larger Russia putting pressure in three directions: the Baltic States, central Europe and the Ukraine in within 10 years.

 

konev

[Sikkiyn]

I created a scenario based around that 9 years ago for 'The operational art of war 2' which proposes a Russian invasion of the Baltc states. Nato predictably doest stand much of a chance of getting enough boots on the ground in time to stop it, and all the lightweight brigades that get airlifted in get swiftly overrun. In the end it was only the Polish Brigades (and a quickly arriving British 7th Armoured Brigade) that were able to stop the massed Russian units at the Polish border.

 

Not that I think for one moment Russia would be daft enough to do it. But it does suggest Nato ought to be smarter than to gain far flung dependencies at the edges of Europe that if push come to shove it would be unable to defend. That is the cornerstone of a military alliance really, isnt it?

 

Realizing that the above is based on ficticious scenario, what timeline were you attempting to simulate this event?

Edited January 1, 2008 by Sikkiyn

[swerve]

...

If anyone wants to try and find it you may still be able to find it online by searching for the name 'Baltic tempest'. ...

 

 

http://www.geocities.com/taow_vol2/

[Tomas Hoting]

2006. Please bear in mind that I wrote this around the time Yeltsin developed some funny ideas about Kosovo.....

 

If anyone wants to try and find it you may still be able to find it online by searching for the name 'Baltic tempest'. If anyone finds it please let me know, I wouldnt mind doing an updated version with Stryker Brigades. The framework was realistic for the time, but in the light of Iraq I would have to greatly downgrade the amount of light infantry available to Britain and the US.

 

Hmmm, such a scenario about a Russian invasion of the Baltic states kinda reminds me of Tom Clancy's original "Ghost Recon" computer game!

[BansheeOne]

I wouldnt mind doing an updated version with Stryker Brigades. The framework was realistic for the time, but in the light of Iraq I would have to greatly downgrade the amount of light infantry available to Britain and the US.

 

You want to look at these guys.

 

http://www.mncne.pl/

 

 

(Strike 14th PzGrenDiv from the above, set 13th.)

[A2Keltainen]

You want to look at these guys.

 

http://www.mncne.pl/

 

 

(Strike 14th PzGrenDiv from the above, set 13th.)

 

I'm currently rereading the first two parts of the excellent Swedish Operation GARBO late Cold War trilogy. In it, Soviet attacks Finland and Sweden, and soon after, Denmark declares itself neutral and throws out all non-Danish NATO forces in order to try to save itself from trouble. Might be something to consider when looking at your picture above. It's a pity the trilogy hasn't been translated to English. I imagine a lot of people here on TankNet in particular would enjoy the scorn being delivered to, leftist in particular, weak minded defense hating politicians in it. I find the two first parts a lot better in general than both Clancy's Red Storm Rising and Peters' Red Storm, which are the other main books in the genre I've read (I'm planning to at least read Hacket's books).

[A2Keltainen]

I do know that Sweden had some plans on the shelf in case of an invasion to work to some degree with Nato. There was apparently some informal understandings between Norway and Sweden on cooperating in defence.

 

There has been some published research about these things after the end of the Cold War, and I've read most of it. There have been, and still are, several substantial problems with the research efforts, such as:

 

1. There was a major effort made to keep the number of people involved in the preparation activities as small as possible.

 

2. The people involved are/were good at keeping their mouths shut, and several of them are also dead now.

 

3. There was a major effort made to write down as little information as possible about it on paper.

 

4. There has been substantial "cleaning" in the Swedish archives and personal papers, in order to try to hide the activities. For example, Bengt Nordenskiöld, chief of the air force 1942-1954, is known to have both burned his personal papers and done a lot of "cleaning" in various official archives. In addition, the archives are hard to navigate as they are, and especially since a lot of things have been reorganized and moved during the years.

 

5. Some of the research has been done by politically assigned research groups, with the highly questionable loyalties and will to discover and publish any really "dirty stuff" that comes with that territory. How many would trust an investigation about CIA atrocities, if the investigation was done by the CIA? So how much can you trust an investigation about dirty things the Swedish Social Democratic party has done, when the people doing the investigation have heavy ties to the mentioned party.

 

One of the more interesting things that have been discovered is that what was known as "aviation safety cooperation" between Sweden and Norway and Denmark, also served as a cover for preparations to share air picture data between Sweden and the other two countries during times of war. For example, the communication links that were prepared were a lot more capable than needed for the official cover work.

 

Overall, the cooperation/preparation work was more between Sweden and individual NATO countries, than between Sweden and NATO as an organization. One could even go one step further, and say that a lot of the cooperation/preparation work was between individuals in Sweden and individuals in individual NATO countries, and along the lines of "let's get to know each other a bit now, in case we have to work together some time in the future". There also was, and probably still is, a substantial amount of exchange of information between the Swedish intelligence services and their NATO counterparts. For example, Sweden had a very good location for doing a lot of interesting SIGINT against the WP.

 

Unfortunately, very little of the research has been published in English.

[Hellfish6]

http://www.geocities.com/taow_vol2/

 

Ahahahaha.. my old "Invasion Russia 1992" scenario is there! I thought I'd lost it forever. I think I made that scenario in college... cripes... almost 10 years ago now.

 

And it still works in TOAW3. Word.

[Hans Engstrom]

Re intelligence, I was greatly surprised to discover the Swedish airforce postwar acquired a lot of ex RAF Recce Spitfires. I gather they even did overflights of the Soviet union with them.

'You might think that; I couldn't possibly comment.'

 

[Sven Arvidsson]

Unfortunately, very little of the research has been published in English.

One interesting theses came out last year, Robert Dalsjö's PhD thesis named "Life-Line Lost - the Rise and Fall of 'Neutral' Sweden's Secret Reserve Option of Wartime Help from the West" (ISBN 978-91-7335-003-7). Very interesting reading. Dr Dalsjö makes the point that because of the rather neurotic "for your eyes only" and mouth-by-mouth nature of the relationship, it suffered badly when the personal links became severed by people retiring or changing posts. Or getting shot.

[A2Keltainen]

Ive visions of lots of Swedish fighter pilots growing handlebar moustaches, and memorising such choice English phrases as 'Toodle pip old man' and 'wizard prang old chap' in case they were forced down in Soviet territory.

 

Here's an excellent training course in RAF banter:

 

 

[Hans Engstrom]

You want to look at these guys.

 

http://www.mncne.pl/

 

 

(Strike 14th PzGrenDiv from the above, set 13th.)

 

You know, the mind boggles at what a German PSYOPS unit must be like...

[A2Keltainen]

You know, the mind boggles at what a German PSYOPS unit must be like...

 

What are you thinking about? Something like a mix of these?