My immersion in the study of globalization, a vague term that as Thomas Friedman had said some time ago, can be used as a "theory of everything," has yielded at least one certainty: There is little likelihood of a Third World War, in the shadows of a First and a Second, in a globalized world, even if the reason is as simple as greater global desire for cooperation and peace.
Thus the Russian engineering of Crimea's secession from Ukraine's and Ukraine's resentment of Russia's of a 20th century style imperial muscle-flexing, isn't going to lead to a consortium of global powers starting a Third World War against Russia.
The above would have been possible in the 20th century. Not any more as veteran journalist, Roger Cohen observes:
It could not happen. Of course, it could not happen. The institutions and alliances of a connected world ensure the worst cannot happen again. The price would be too high, no less than nuclear annihilation. Civilization is strong, humanity wise, safeguards secure.
Cohen writes of the anger of an anonymous 19 year old Ukranian farm boy, who feels the same way about Russian imperialism today as the young Gavrillo Princip, the 19 year old Bosnian Serb Nationalist whose assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo triggered off the First World War.
Today's angry teenagers would rather flock to a radical student circle and communicate their disenchantment with the political system through Social Media, than commit an act of violence to start a war.
In a globalized world everybody wants peace. Violence has dwindled from a public affair to being limited to privatized zones within smaller nations.
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