Should we be worried about war

[Seasidesand76]

Seen a lot in the news about Ukraine using USA missiles against Russia. I've been thinking more along the lines that it won't start a WW3 and will resolve at some point without the UK getting directly involved in war. But there seems to be more and more tension and threats of an all out war recently.

Should we be worried about WW3? I haven't been prepping or anything but does make me wonder if I should start getting a few days worth of food in case. At the same time I don't want to go down the prepper hole and start getting over the top.

Sadly what will be will be. I think the constant news doesn’t help - I’ve not stopped watching rolling news does nothing good for the headspace!

I think our infrastructure (internet etc) is always under attack from a security aspect - I do worry if that got in the wrong hands. The control of power and information is a massive risk - more than on the ground war fair,

Hopefully it won’t escalate but I think say a nuclear war happens all the prep won’t make much difference!

War may happen, of course, but that doesn't mean we should be worried about it. There is absolutely no point in worrying about things outside our control - it just uses up unnecessary energy. Concentrate on your own life, OP, and what will be, will be.

Don't really see the point getting excited about it.

I don’t feel completely comfortable in saying ‘of course we won’t have war, it’ll all be fine’. I think it’s a very real possibility.

What I will say is that if it’s occupying a large proportion of your thoughts, step away from the news for a while. There is absolutely nothing you can do to change what may or may not happen, and there’s also every chance that nothing at all will happen and it will all die down. If you suddenly go bonkers and start panic digging a bunker in the back garden and spending your pension on bottled water and tins of beans, it is not going to be the best use of your time or have the best outcome for you. You will achieve precisely nothing except torturing yourself if you start worrying about it.

I think all you can do, where you can afford to, is take small and sensible precautions, batteries, a torch, a small amount of cash, some tinned goods and long life stuff. Keep ID documents all together in one place. Keep medication all together in one place. If you have family living a long way away, make sure they know you love them whenever you speak to them. None of this is going to help you if we get to the nuclear stage, but if we have power cuts etc for any reason, it’s sensible stuff that will help you out in most occasions. And then live your life and enjoy it as much as you can.

I think a world war would look and be fought very differently nowadays, particularly I think it would be more based around a war of economics, stuff like energy and food security rather . Tbh I think we're in a sort of digital world war as it is, with bad actors, misinformation, radicalisation.

I think nuclear war on any grand scale is unlikely, however.

However as I write this, BBC has just popped up that the first US-supplied missiles have hit Russia, so another phase begins.

There's a school of thought which holds that WW3 has already started - it's just that it's started slowly. I'm tending to agree with that.

What I think in this current situation is that Putin knows that it's the end of Biden's administration and that Trump is going to withdraw US support anyway – whether that's the right thing to do or not, in of itself that will be a deescalation. Russia can't afford a WW3, nor can it's allies, and China has tiptoed away.

I’m not so concerned how you see it as how the rest of the world powers see it.

NATO has been fighting Russia by proxy thus far. If American ATACMS are used inside Russia away from border areas then effectively the proxy part of the equation falls away and the real protagonists become more apparent. Very dangerous.

Quite possibly. It will be more apparent with hindsight, as everything always is.

Many other world powers have been pushing to allow attacks further into Russian territory.

I'm not convinced. There are too many billionaires who would lose out, noone to fund pensions if the youth are sent off to war.

I think its more likely governments will just restrict businesses and countries via heavy trade restrictions and revert the progress of global trade with a view to fucking off citizens of opposing counties until they pressure their own governments to capsize. An example might be making business choose between selling in Russia/Russian supporting countries or trading wothin Europe and the States. It will escalate until someone loses. Yes, there will ne heavy costs, but I don't think the costs will be as much human life as in the past and I think businesses will have a greater role in politics which is an interesting step change.

Not really.

I can't do anything about it so why worry about it.

Maybe put a couple of extra tins of beans in the cupboard.

I find the daily updates by Alexander Mercouris absolutely fascinating.
here’s yesterday’s

There's a hard core on MN who have been worried about war every day since 9/11.

Russia has imported and used foreign weaponry (Iranian drones and short range ballistic missiles) and used them against targets in the Sovereign state of Ukraine for some time now, causing a very large number of civilian casualties…

Russia is also quite happy to import and deploy foreign troops (North Korean) to go into battle against Ukrainian forces.

Ukraine has been used foreign supplied ordnance, including US ordnance for some time, now, roughly 1000 days…I guess few people noticed…..

Yet now the Ukrainians get permission to perhaps use ATACMs against targets in a, limited, defined part of Russia and suddenly people are concerned about one side in the conflict escalating things???

Some here may have good intentions but frankly there’s also some bias showing..

Putin only needs to intercept as many as possible till January then I expect Trump will put an end to using them and it will all die down . Might not be a safe or stable region for a very long time but it won’t escalate further

There are too many variables involved, which I actually view as quite comforting. A lot needs to line up in exactly the right way to lead to world war. And what do we mean by war? Arguably, we've been in the midst of a worldwide information war for a few years now.

If we take it we mean all out nuclear war, then I believe we are marginally closer to it than we've been for several decades. But who does it benefit? You can dismiss Putin as a dangerous madman if you like, but the reality is that he likes power and the riches it brings. His oligarchs, too. Even if we thought Putin was crazy enough to nuke the world, don't you think that people in his own administration would have something to say about that? Even in Russia, there's a chain of command. Oligarchs like their money and lifestyle too much to risk it. Putin would be dead within minutes of giving the order, and he knows it - it's why he's so paranoid.

I despise Trump. But I can see how it plays to his vision of his own grandeur to de-escalate the situation. Meanwhile, our PM is cosying up to China, who, despite having a similar ideology to Russia, stands to lose too much. Where are they in this equation?

And finally, if the stars (and personalities involved) align to draw us into nuclear war, then what good is preparation? I've watched Threads and if the four minite warning sounded, I'd be leading my nearest and dearest to the closest likely detonation zone and hope that it's over quickly. But there are a lot of far cleverer people than us working with their respective governments to prevent an escalation of the most serious nature.

I am concerned about war but I am genuinely not sure what to do with that concern...

I’ve thought since Russia first invaded that this would lead to a world war, and I hope I’m wrong. If you look into what’s happening geopolitically (e.g. Sweden & Finland joining NATO) it’s all pretty terrifying. I can’t give it too much head space, it’ll make my life worse while changing nothing.

I think the newspapers are not reporting this properly. Mark Urban, who is a very experienced and serious defence journalist (ex Newsnight and now Sunday Times) reported yesterday that Biden is only allowing Ukraine to use the weapons in areas where North Korean soldiers are deployed. The Us is providing the coordinates of these areas. Ukraine cannot use them anywhere else. While disagreeably self interested, I don't think it is a significant step. The Russians are sabre rattling as usual.

Urban also observed that it is important the Russians don't succeed in winning this war through brandishing their nuclear weapons, or more countries will see it as a means of protecting themselves and we'll have several more states with nuclear weapons in the future.

@GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing

"Our best chance of avoiding a WW3 in which the UK is a direct combatant is to arm Ukraine to win as quickly as possible. We should have done it 1000 days ago."

The reality is that both Russia and Ukraine are both too weak to win a war against each other but both are too strong to lose the war. So we are in some of WW1 type conflict of attrition.

There are very few American ATACM in Ukraine anyway then their actual military contribution to the outcome of the conflict is minimal. But what it does do is represent a very large escalation of involvement of the US in the conflict with Russia for very little military benefit.

@sweetgingercat

Agreed, and very much agree with your last paragraph.

Where are you? 😳

Yes yes yes to this