DBWI: Were the three World Wars Really Inevitable?

A relatively common assertion I hear both here and in the mainstream are that the three world wars were an unavoidable result of the geopolitics of their era. The first being the result of years of imperialism, militarism, and nationalism among the European powers finally coming to a head; the second being a result of the failures of Versailles, the Great Depression, and the rise of Fascism in Germany, Italy, and Japan; and the third being the result of the inherent conflict between capitalism and communism and years of military buildup by both NATO and the Warsaw Pact.

Is there really any truth to these assertions, or is it all just pop-history nonsense? I tend to lean toward the latter myself. The European nations were able to coexist relatively well before WW1 (discounting events like Crimea or the Franco-Prussian war). Meanwhile, I feel that while some sort of conflict in the post-WW1 world was probably bound to happen, a Second World War was far from a sure thing, and any variety of plausible PoDs could have prevented that: someone less crazy than Hitler as head of the NDSAP, Italy and Japan choosing to remain British allies, etc. And the United States and the Soviet Union had been able to coexist in relative peace (proxy wars in Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan notwithstanding) for decades after the end of WW2 before the outbreak of the Spring Crisis in 1989; less hardline leadership (particularly on the part of the Russians) could have mediated the crisis peacefully rather than the out-of-control brinkmanship that ultimately resulted in WW3 and N-Day.

Main reason I’m asking is because the numerous talking heads have been going on about how war between the South American power blocs is “inevitable” and drawing parallels to Europe in 1914. I think it’s all hyperbolic bullshit myself, but still.
 
Last edited:
World War I was practically inevitable-the Second and Third weren't. Heck, with the right divergences, the communist-capitalist conflict of WWIII could have been an alt-Second World War. Aside from that, had you removed Hitler from the picture or limited the period of appeasement, you could have staved off World War II. And with no or a significantly different World War II, you can avoid World War III.

However, once you enter the post-World War II period, some sort of conflict was probably inevitable. Major world powers always want to be dominant and don't just peaceably cede their dominance. The US and USSR would have come to blows sooner or later. We're just lucky the conflict wasn't apocalyptic like most people assumed.
 
Avoiding the coup of hardliners in March of 1989 in the USSR is a good start. As far as the First and Second ones go, I sort of think the were inevitable lest you could break up Germany completely following WWI, though I don't know if anyone at the time wanted that.

I think it’s all hyperbolic bullshit myself, but still.

You sure? A lot of bad blood still exists between Bolivia and Chile what with the Pacific War in the 1800s still being remembered, and Bolivia still wants that sea access, and it's willing to drag their Brazilian and Colombian allies with them. Just one more border skirmish like what happened in July of last year and it could be just enough to push South America into war.
 
Last edited:
The first and third World Wars could have been prevented. The Second? I'm not really so sure once you get OTL's end to the first one. Fundimentally, both the 1st and 2nd Wars were the result of a "New Power" problem: namely how Germany, as the most populous and economically powerful nation on the continent, which had sprung into existance almost overnight was going to be integrated into the center of global power without overly displacing the position of the previous hegemons to the point they would react forcefully to defend their privlaged position. Versailles did nothing to fundimentally change this, and so long as Europe remained the center of global power politics Germany would either need to be beaten down every time it got back up or destroyed entirely. By the end of WW II and decolonization though, the "New Power" problem diden't really exist: anybody who wasen't the US or USSR, who already had established spheres, was on the decline as power was defused among newly independent nations rather than getting further and further concentrated in growing and consolidating Empires,
 
We're just lucky the conflict wasn't apocalyptic like most people assumed.

Came pretty damn close, though. IIRC the reason the Russians didn’t get all their missiles in the air after the fall of Poland was because there was some sort of communications malfunction in actually transmitting the launch orders to their silos, and by the time they had gotten things straightened outs our Peacekeepers had already taken out their missile fields. They still had enough surviving loyal bombers, boomers, and mobile ICBMs to slag Western Europe and China and cripple the US.

You sure? A lot of bad blood still exists between Bolivia and Chile what with the Pacific War in the 1800s still being remembered, and Bolivia still wants that sea access, and it's willing to drag their Brazilian and Colombian allies with them. Just one more border skirmish like what happened in July of last year and it could be just enough to push South America into war.

The OSCSA has done a lot to address conflicts between the South American states since the Beagle War. You’ll have border skirmishes every so often, sure, but they’ve done a good job at mediating conflict peacefully.
 
Last edited:
OOC: the men with the fingers on the button en masse not pressing the button in a situation where the balloon has dropped is near-ASB, and this goes for every nuclear armed nation - they're selected specifically for the absolute willingness to nuke whoever their superiors tell them to.
 
OOC: the men with the fingers on the button en masse not pressing the button in a situation where the balloon has dropped is near-ASB, and this goes for every nuclear armed nation - they're selected specifically for the absolute willingness to nuke whoever their superiors tell them to.

OOC: Felt iffy about that myself. Edited accordingly.
 
First World War was totally inevitable. Two others weren't. Between WW2 and WW3 was many seriious incidents which almost led to third global conflict but leaders had always enough sense that not go to war. Fortunately WP was already so weak that it couldn't cause extremely serious damage and so WW3 wasn't such disaster what it could had been even if it would had begun due Able Archer Crisis.
 
Top