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Global Disorder – Are we already fighting the next world war?

Robert Harvey was introduced to me largely by accident, a year and a half ago.  I was looking for books on the American revolution for an Alternate History that never really got off the drawing board (although Scott did something similer with his Brooklyn Redone) and I came across a new book by Harvey on the subject – called ‘A Few Bloody Noses’, which at first impressed me as a particularly bloody-minded book on the same lines as Mud, Blood and Poppycock, but slowly grew on me.  However, I did feel that Harvey was not the best historian of the past world and this was confirmed, in my eyes at least, by his book ‘The Return of the Strong’, which was updated, modified and reissued under the title ‘Global Disorder’.  These books were far easier to read and read much better than his history books.  

Harvey begins his analysis with a short description of the final events of the twentieth century, beginning with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1990 and the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union.  As he notes, the economic and political analysts saw the world as a much safer place after the demise of the USSR, which had made an uncomfortable neighbour to many states in Eastern Europe, Asia and China.  Robert Harvey, a political journalist and former member of the House of Commons, had different ideas and in The Return of the Strong, Harvey published his fear that on the tides of ethnic nationalism and economic globalisation the world was drifting toward a new crisis.

The attack on the World Trade Center in New York City on September 11, 2001, justified Harvey’s alarm and prompted him to extensively revise and update his analysis of the profound dangers facing western democracy today.

After describing the emergence of the United States as the world’s first ‘megapower’ in part one of Global Disorder, Harvey explores the sources of global instability and international tension in part two, and then in part three lays out the perils inherent in the globalisation of capitalism without political control.  Finally, in part four, he presents the necessary short- and long-term reforms in policy and action that the West, especially the United States, must undertake to restore stability around the world and to truly ensure international security.

Harvey is oddly dismissive of the threat from China, believing that the nation has too many problems to sustain an offensive against the US or its other possible foes.  However, the pacific is turning into a dangerous place, with a possible alliance of convenience between Japan, South Korea and Taiwan looming.  Taiwan is determined to avoid reabsorbing into the mainland on communist terms – seeing the fate of Hong Kong as a rehearsal for the fate of Taiwan – and is apparently considering counter attacks on the mainland in the event of a Chinese invasion. 

Harvey sees Japan as the major national-scale threat, although perhaps more to China than America.  Japan, unlike Iraq (formerly, but Harvey wrote before the fall of Iraq) has the ability to develop both nuclear weapons and the ability to build up a sizable deterrent force swiftly (which is beyond the capability of most states we spend time worrying about), as well as expanding the Japanese military.  He sees Japan as preparing to repeat the mistakes of the past. 

Harvey sometimes loses track of his realism to take a non-existent moral high ground.  In several places, he criticises US intervention and/or non-intervention (noting contemptibly that it took the media to push the US and NATO into conducting air strikes to force the Serbs to retreat in the Bosnian crises), which suggests that the US is going to have trouble whatever it does.  He also puts forward the theory – as subscribed to by Hitler – that the US has no staying power (unlike Hitler, he puts forward good illustrations of that suggestion) and that the US will withdraw as quickly as possible before they take too many casualties.  Like Gordon Corrigan on the British troops in the First World War, one might expect US servicemen to be understandably annoyed at what is basically a suggestion of cowardice on the part of the US troops.  Harvey does emprise the effects of the media in US society, but I suspect that he exaggerates its effects.  Considerable media coverage was given to attempts to prevent the recent fall of Iraq, but the invasion went ahead regardless.

Harvey tries to put the September 11 attack in perspective.  Although he says it was the worst single act of terrorism in human history, it was not disastrous when put beside of the vast number of people terrorists killed over a long period; in fact it was tiny compared to that, the number of civilians killed in Dresden, Tokyo and Hiroshima during WWII and the massive numbers of people who die everyday from lack of health care, food, supplies or fighting.  However, most of those deaths happened as the result of a long-term problem/conflict - September 11th came out of nowhere to a population that believed itself safe. 

Harvey puts forward too many problem areas for a single book to examine.  Nationalism, terrorism, corporate polices and globalisation, and well as many others.  This sometimes makes the book confusing, but, as a introduction to the problems of the new century, its not a bad read.   

Some Important Points:

  • Saudi Arabia is heading for disaster.  The royal family has managed to alienate most sections of the nation, the religious establishment and the west.  Unfortunately, without the religious establishment (discredited because of collaboration) to bind the nation in the absence of the royals, Saudi will revert to tribal status after a bloodbath
  • The US has largely decided to write Saudi off in the event of that happening.  While it would be damaging to US interests, there are few measures the US can take to save Saudi. 
  • The development of Russian nationalism has started in the Balkans a process that looks uncomfortably like the run-up to world war one. 
  • Germany has been taking a stronger role in European politics and may act to reduce French influence. 
  • For the present, America is unchallengeable.  However, the possibility of fighting several conflicts at once will force American power into decline. 
  • It is difficult (if not impossible) for any government to control the workings of the international economy. 

Christopher Nuttall

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