Thoughts after listening to Sir Richard Dearlove: Former Head of MI6

Mr. Dearlove's speech focused on the new threats that emerged in the late 90's and early 2000's. He spoke particularly about the threats posed by things other than normal states and great powers. Topping his list of future and current National Security threats are: Pandemics, Failing/Failed states, the Non-State Actors and quasi-state actors that form in these regions (i.e. Hamas, Hezbollah, and The Taliban), Militant Islam in particular and the spread of Political Islam in general (although he did say that moderate versions of Political Islam, like that found in Turkey, could be useful at bridging the gap between Europe and the Muslim world) and particularly Political Islam being used as a rallying point for disaffected immigrants.

He said that these threats are a combination of a rise in the absolute threat they pose, caused by the increased globalization of the world and the resulatant capablities to do harm that a fairly small group can aquire and a decline in the realative threat's posed by great power conflict.

I feel that this second point is worth discussing further. Nuclear weapons are the great equilizer in military competion. A nation may have almost overwhelming superiority over another, but if that other nation poses nuclear weapons war becoms a lossing propositon. A nation that poses nuclear weapons is almost completly immune from conventional military attack because any rational nation will realize that to attack them is suicidal, that even if the otherside cannot win it sure as hell can make sure that you lose. This has pretty much put an end to great power war (despite the some what circular logic of it, i define a great power as any nation that poses or has the ablity to rapidly come to pose nuclear weapons, I add this second clause so as to include nations like Japan and S. Korea, nations that could quite easily obtain them but do not do so for political or social resaons). Any nation strong enough to be labeled a great power is able to swiftly aquire nuclear weapons or already posses them and thus it makes any direct conflict between two great powers incredibly unlikely becuase there is no way to win decisivly. A furher factor that may have limited even great power competion is the current hegemonic power of the United States. Because no nation can credibly think to, in the medium to near-long term, overtake the untied states militarily very few nations are trying to compete, leaving the global order more affected by the failed states then the stable ones.