When a loose cannon like Donald Trump bellows at campaign rallies that “the world is on fire” and that we are “on the verge of World War III,” it is easy to dismiss his hot spew as more lava from a verbal volcano.
But when an authentic conservative elder like George F. Will objectively opines that this very war is already underway, it is worth considering his intellectual take with some serious thought — as well as fear for what is to come.
Israel’s air attack on Iran over the weekend brought this thought into sharp, troubling focus. If Will’s analysis is prescient, what sort of American passion would be whipped up in a new world war under either President Donald Trump or President Kamala Harris?
One will win the election on Nov. 5; consequences will follow; Will worries.
“From Russia’s western border, to the waters where China is aggressively encroaching on Philippine sovereignty, the theater of today’s wars and almost war episodes spans six of the globe’s 24 time zones,” Will writes.
Then he echoes the last world war by alluding to the written words of Winston Churchill.
“This is what the gathering storm . . . of a world war looks like,” Will writes. “What gathering storms gather is strength. Then they expend their stored violence.”
For an historical frame, Will writes that World War II began not with the German invasion of Poland in 1939 but rather with Japan’s 1931 occupation of Manchuria, in China. As hostilities spread in Europe and Asia, Pearl Harbor brought the United States into the fray on Dec. 7, 1941.
In comparison, Will references Russia’s incursion into Crimea in 2014 and he cites a new “axis” power alliance of Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea — analogous to Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan in that long struggle that didn’t end until 1945 with millions dead and maimed.
Among those time zones of current violence are places like Gaza, Lebanon, Israel, Ukraine, and Iran, where bullets and bombs already fly. Last weekend’s hits by Israel against Iran pits an American ally against an American enemy.
If hostilities escalate from there, how would American citizens — particularly young ones — react if the current little wars spread and merged into a global bonfire and everyone had to take sides?
Such a war would be bigger than any American military involvement since World War II, including Korea, Vietnam, Kuwait, Afghanistan, and Iraq. If called upon, would young adults rush to enlist for the armed forces in an initial surge of patriotism, as “the Greatest Generation” did in the 1940s?
Would athletes and entertainers sign up, too, or get drafted? And would citizen soldiers have second thoughts about obligatory military service, maybe the way a different generation did in a different era? It might depend on who wins the election and how the losing side accepts the result, or not.
Consider what might occur if Trump wins and sides with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Putin’s war against Ukraine. Or, imagine what it might be like if Harris were to slow the flow of military hardware to Israel in a bid to leverage peace in the Middle East.
Will insists neither candidate is paying enough attention to the growing fires abroad.
“The U.S. presidential campaign is what reckless disregard looks like,” Will writes. “Neither nominee has given any evidence of awareness of, let alone serious thinking about, the growing global conflagration.”
Regarding war, Harris speaks in generalities and voters are rightly skeptical — or at least curious — about her deeper thoughts. The vice president says in her vague way that she is a candidate of peace; but Trump, a former president, says the same thing.
On the campaign trail, he brags that neither Putin’s invasion of Ukraine nor the Hamas terrorism in Israel would have occurred if he had defeated President Joe Biden in the 2020 election. Trump also says other things about war and armed forces.
He mocked Republican presidential candidate and senator John McCain for getting captured as a pilot in North Vietnam; he called dead soldiers in World War I “suckers” and “losers”; he uses military grave sites for grinning photo-ops; he vows to deport millions of immigrants with the help of the armed forces; he has threatened to use the military to round up his domestic enemies and foes; he recently second-guessed Abraham Lincoln for not preventing the Civil War; and he’s wished aloud that “his” generals would be more like those of Adolf Hitler.
In the spirit of Will, we will delve deeper into speculation of what is to come. It’s more than a scary story for Halloween.
If Trump were to lose, remember that many of his most ardent supporters are gun-groomers brainwashed into thinking Trump, a draft-dodger and convicted felon, is a victim of government persecution and was cheated of the White House four years ago. Even then, they rioted.
Should his goons get, literally, up in arms after another Trump defeat, would local police and federal armed forces put down such a rebellion? Or might some zealots in uniform — whipped up by crackpots in the right-wing media silo — decide to side with the MAGAts in a new American Civil War?
Wars — even that “good war” under Franklin D. Roosevelt — bring severe domestic changes, including incarceration of innocent people and strict censorship. Oh, and rationing, too. As for Detroit, we might once again become the “Arsenal of Democracy,” building tanks and planes. More jobs for us. Wouldn’t that be a Pyrrhic victory?
