[1] Do you think a Third World War would be plausible?
[2] Humanity seemed to have learnt little from the Great War "The war to end all wars". With the obvious destruction that came with nuclear warfare during World War II you would assume that another war would be completely out of the question.
This war is anticipated and planned for by military and civil authorities, and explored in fiction in many countries. Concepts range from limited use of nuclear weapons to the complete destruction of the planet.
[3] What would you expect of another World War?
[4] Would you enlist?
[5] Do you think conscription would be put into place?
Give me your thoughts.
[1] Public opinion of war is very low, so a government waging a war for the sake of it would see their downfall either at the polling booths or on the burning streets. Only small countries with stupid leaders would do something silly like wage a real war, but then they'd run out of food and after about an hour's marching their army would be running back home. Even if they make it over their border, there'd have to be other political tensions to usher in the big players and make it a global event, but then you'd need a crazy fella in charge of a superpower for them to rock the boat. So to answer the question, no I don't think it'd be plausible in the current world, mainly due to the social pressure on governments to maintain peace rather than buttfucking their opponents.
[2] Personally I think it is a stretch to call it 'nuclear warfare', more 'industrialised warfare' if anything. Nuclear warfare has the connotation of masses of ICBMs hurtling indiscriminately from the skies on defence facilities and suburbs. I know what you mean though, with the first A-bombs dropped on Japan and before that both Germany and America working towards using nuclear reactions to power explosives.
But more to answer the question, humanity forgets somewhat easily from past mistakes but conveniently learns from past technological improvements. I doubt humanity as a whole will learn from past wars, that is looking back at them and seeing that the political dummy spits of old grey men brought about the deaths of millions of young fellas.
[3] Personally another world war seems to be more of an imaginary threat to me.
If another world war were to occur, I would think it more likely to be corporation against state rather than state vs state. There are some safeguards in place to prevent countries from resorting to guns to solve dispute, UN I'm sure does its best. But theoretically there's nothing stopping an engineering firm that produces armaments from becoming a powerhouse similar in size to a state. How it would get there I don't know, and I'm sure it'd be stopped before anything actually happened. The thing is that corporations essentially are morally accountable to nobody, the law is there to keep them in line (at least in theory). Western states are largely responsible to their people, so it would be more difficult for them to mow down people than for a corporation. Of course this is assuming that employees of a company have no morals, which is a stretch from the truth really, but there are some funny people out their in positions of financial power and people do fall for the promise of money.
Coming back to the land of the half-sane, I'd say another world war (if it happens) would largely be using conventional weapons for a couple of years then resources would dwindle and one side would be resorting to drastic measures to cover costs before the other. Nukes, I reckon, would be fired only as a last resort (most likely as part of a scorched earth policy), going by the doctrine of mutually assured destruction. That is of course that both parties to the war are nuclear states. If only one was nuclear-capable and it was winning, it'd be bad policy and plain stupid to nuke a potential asset after you remove the military threat.
[4] Depends who I'd be fighting for. If I lose my mind and conveniently become super fit, I'd do some sort of special forces gig. If I remain sane I'd go for a role on the home front. If I was told I was gonna die a miserable death in a pointless battle then I'd go AWOL.
[5] It depends on the scale of the war and the position the standing forces are in. I don't know about other countries, but I'm sure Australia's constitution allows for conscription when their territory is directly under threat, might only be for the mainland (can't remember how conscription for 'nam got worked in, unless they used 'domino theory' as an excuse?). Doubt it'd be like Vietnam War with a lotto machine picking random birthdays, and I definitely don't think universal conscription would ever come in.
tl;dr no I don't think WWIII will happen, "war never changes" (guess the game
), I doubt there'd be nukes dominating it, no I wouldn't enlist for the fun of it, and I don't think universal conscription will be introduced ever.
(I'm taking potshots with the general ideas I'm presenting lol)
