When I was a kid, I used to have nightmares about war. I remember this distinct moment where I see the tank turn the corner into our street and my heart just starts racing, and I could feel the hope just draining away from me. There’s another where I’m older and I’m trying to escape but I don’t have a visa so I don’t know how I’m supposed to get out. In these nightmares, it’s always the Chinese invading us – although their tanks and uniform are strangely American. I guess that’s what I get for reading too much Anne Frank and being so obsessed with the Spratlys issue.
Of course, back then it was easy to write off my war fears to an overactive imagination and my need for some drama in my life. Apparently, it isn’t as easy now. Aside from my mom’s constant belief that we might eventually end up in the middle of a US-China confrontation, no thanks to Spratlys, now I’ve read a column in the Star* that oddly shares her sentiments. A conflict of any sort is the last anybody needs these days – with the economic downturn, the greenhouse effect and what not – and I wonder if people in the days before WW2 had the same thoughts. I mean, would anyone really know if we stand at the cusps of a world war? The thought itself is overwhelming and almost too impossible, especially when one has more pressing problems right in front of you like no food or loosing a job. It’s hard enough to get by everyday; people can’t afford to be Chicken Littles and live the rest of our lives with our eyes glued to the sky, worried that it might fall any day.
But, then again, if I were planning something, that’s exactly what I’d be waiting for: a decoy. America isn’t really in great shape now and Obama has problems left and right, internal and external to the country: the economic slump, problems in Afghanistan, Iraq, problems in his own cabinet. The country is essentially vulnerable now, fighting a battle in different fronts. And certainly, other countries have been using this slump as a way to assert themselves against not just against US, but some of it allies like the EU, who is suffering from the same recession that has hit US. Countries like Russia and Venezuela have both subtlety and publicly undermined the US within the last year, and though it’s not as frightening as the Taliban threat, the climate has already been primed. All that may be needed is a compelling reason (say Oil) to start the spark, so the idea is plausible.
Just how plausible? I hope we never find out.
*Star Article:
William Esposo, As I Wreck This Chair. “How what we don’t know will kill us”
The Philippine Star 2009-04-05
Of course, back then it was easy to write off my war fears to an overactive imagination and my need for some drama in my life. Apparently, it isn’t as easy now. Aside from my mom’s constant belief that we might eventually end up in the middle of a US-China confrontation, no thanks to Spratlys, now I’ve read a column in the Star* that oddly shares her sentiments. A conflict of any sort is the last anybody needs these days – with the economic downturn, the greenhouse effect and what not – and I wonder if people in the days before WW2 had the same thoughts. I mean, would anyone really know if we stand at the cusps of a world war? The thought itself is overwhelming and almost too impossible, especially when one has more pressing problems right in front of you like no food or loosing a job. It’s hard enough to get by everyday; people can’t afford to be Chicken Littles and live the rest of our lives with our eyes glued to the sky, worried that it might fall any day.
But, then again, if I were planning something, that’s exactly what I’d be waiting for: a decoy. America isn’t really in great shape now and Obama has problems left and right, internal and external to the country: the economic slump, problems in Afghanistan, Iraq, problems in his own cabinet. The country is essentially vulnerable now, fighting a battle in different fronts. And certainly, other countries have been using this slump as a way to assert themselves against not just against US, but some of it allies like the EU, who is suffering from the same recession that has hit US. Countries like Russia and Venezuela have both subtlety and publicly undermined the US within the last year, and though it’s not as frightening as the Taliban threat, the climate has already been primed. All that may be needed is a compelling reason (say Oil) to start the spark, so the idea is plausible.
Just how plausible? I hope we never find out.
*Star Article:
William Esposo, As I Wreck This Chair. “How what we don’t know will kill us”
The Philippine Star 2009-04-05
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