[118720] in Cypherpunks
IP: Editorial: Apocalypse Soon
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Robert Hettinga)
Wed Oct 6 13:47:26 1999
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Date: Wed, 6 Oct 1999 13:19:11 -0400
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From: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
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From: believer@telepath.com
Date: Wed, 06 Oct 1999 09:11:07 -0500
To: ignition-point@precision-d.com
Subject: IP: Editorial: Apocalypse Soon
Sender: owner-ignition-point@precision-d.com
Reply-To: believer@telepath.com
Source: Washington Times
http://www.WashTimes.com/opinion/ed3.html
Apocalypse soon
----------
By Tony Blankley
----------
Presidential campaigns are useful for determining: whether a vice president
looks more presidential in a brown gabardine or a blue worsted suit while
announcing a change of address for his campaign headquarters; whether a
Christian gentleman should share an office with a Christian lady -- and
whether an aging left-wing movie star can add as much to presidential
politics as an atheist former professional wrestler-cum-governor who dreams
of coming back in another life as a brassiere for a large woman. And it's
only October. We have 13 more months to enlighten, further, the electorate.
Meanwhile, the secretary of defense receives the first report from his
United States Commission on National Security in the 21st Century, which I
read with deepening fear for my dear little daughter Ana, who was sitting
on my lap while I looked at the report this weekend. The commission,
co-chaired by former Sens. Warren Rudman and Gary Hart, and composed of
leading military, diplomatic, political, academic, and business elder
statesmen is as sober in its makeup as it is flamboyantly nightmarish in
its predictions for the next 25 years.
So, sit back, ingest your calming substance or liquid of preference
and behold the near future, just as it has been reported to Secretary of
Defense William Cohen two weeks ago.
Weapons of mass nuclear, chemical and biological destruction will
proliferate. We should expect conflicts in which our adversaries, because
of "cultural affinities different from our own, will resort to forms and
levels of violence shocking to our sensibilities." The United States will
often be dependent on allies, "but it will find reliable alliances more
difficult to establish and sustain."
The report goes on to conclude that despite the fact that the United
States will be, both absolutely and relatively, the most powerful nation on
Earth, and despite the lack of a global competitor, we will be "limited in
our ability to impose our will, and we will be vulnerable to an increasing
range of threats."
"States, terrorists, and other disaffected groups will acquire weapons
of mass destruction and mass disruption, and some will use them. Americans
will likely die on American soil, possibly in large numbers."
"When he opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth
living creature call out, 'Come!' I looked and there was a pale green
horse! Its rider's name was Death, and Hades followed with him; they were
given authority over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, famine, and
pestilence, and by the wild animals of the earth." This last quote is from
John's Revelations, not the U.S. Commission on National Security in the
21st Century, But, giving allowance for a writing style gap of 2,000 years,
it is a sequitur to the report findings immediately above it.
Visions of doom led men to religion and a search for God's grace.
Today, I fear, the main reaction, if any, is to look for a stock with
upside potential if there is increased demand for toxic cleanup and mass
contaminated corpse disposal.
The faith of our fathers abides, and I hope that the stock market does
too. But, in a presidential and congressional election period, shouldn't
there also be a vigorous debate on the policies necessary to avoid or
minimize the calamity of mass death of Americans from nuclear or biological
attack?
The report goes on to describe a world in which U.S. intelligence and
diplomacy will be inadequate to protect our interests and security. The
continued advance of the global economy and technology will destabilize
nations and cultures, resulting in anti-technology backlashes. Those same
forces will "batter the concept of national sovereignty." Some important
nations "will not be able to manage these challenges and could fragment and
fail." Nationalism, ethnic and religious violence will rise, creating
"humanitarian disasters, major catalytic regional crises and the spread of
dangerous weapons."
"Big ideas" will spread quickly around the globe, and the "stage will
be set for mass action to have social impact beyond the borders and control
of existing political structures." The United States will "increasingly
find itself wishing to form coalitions but increasingly unable to find
partners willing and able to carry out combined military operations."
In other words, according to the 14 sober and serious-minded
commissioners who filed this report --and represent the very heart of our
political-business-military-foreign policy establishment -- the world is
going to become unhinged in the next 25 years. They judge that we will
neither be able to manage the global chaos abroad, nor stop it from reaping
its terrible harvest here on the soil and in the flesh of our heartland.
But, awash as we are in our technology's unending flood of information
-- and with no one place left to gather as a nation to think about our
collective future -- we ignore these warnings, even as we are thrilled by
Mr. Gore's change-of-address announcement.
Tony Blankley's column for The Washington Times appears on Wednesdays.
Copyright © 1999 News World Communications, Inc.
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-----------------
Robert A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
