World War III: will there ever be one?

CPicard wrote: Sean Trane wrote: The T wrote: Simple question. Just out of curiosity. I really think it's highly unlikely, at least not one centered on US-Europe as in the past two... Opinions?   WWII was definitely more global, with the Pacific being a huge theatre     Actually, ever since I was old enough to realize that the cold war was a non-issue (even if you threw first your nuke missile, you automatically lost, since the other side would do it too almost instantly, therefore creating two losers and no winners), I came to realize that the next war would be the muslim world against the occidental-christian world Oh, Good Lord, again...It's not even sure that one side or the other would be united! In the Muslim world, there are two countries which are not from Arabic culture and could fight each other for the domination of the Middle East: Turkey and Iran. - Turkey is often seen by Arabic countries as the Ottoman empire - the former "oppressor" (and the former military alliance with Israël wasn't a good promotion for Turkey as leader of the muslim world).  It would have hard times to lead an united "Muslim world". - Iran? Since it's suspected to develop nuclear weapons, the other muslim countries could chose to ally with the Occidental-Christian to be protected.Anyway, the two countries want to the local powers - and this may lead them to create a muslim federation turned against them.Thinking about it, France is beginning to have a good reputation in Tunisia and Lybia, not to mention the links with Lebanon, Algeria and Morocco. Maybe not all christian nations would be at bad terms with the muslim world...And for this "Occidental-Christian" world... I'm not even sure the European Union would stand united before the next decade!

Depends how you define united. If the politicians go to the bother of standing shoulder to shoulder in photo shoots, outside the EU Parliament declaring 'we are united' then there is good cause to suspect they are not.

The EU in its current form is doomed, imo, but it's not the end of the world. In fact, it's a very positive opportunity - once the dust of economic ruin has settled - countries can start to claw back some control over their own laws and their own soveriegn currencies.