Looking Forward - Global Stability

Today is the fourth installment of my Looking Forward series, where I make wild-ass guesses semi-educated predictions about our future based on today's global situation. This is my last planned installment, unless anyone has something else they'd like me to predict. As indicated by the title, I am going to wax philosophical on global security, referring to foreign and domestic governments and the military. I see three primary issues facing the world -- global warming, energy (primarily oil), and instability in the Middle East, which partially relates to the energy issue but merits discussion in its own right.

Global warming is a fact of life, and it's here to stay. The result that I predict is that some countries with plenty of food and/or water will find a chronic shortage of life's basic necessities. In other areas where food and water are in short supply, this shortage will disappear. This will cause political unrest, and I predict that many countries will find themselves utilizing their military for solutions. Those losing resources will attempt to expand into countries gaining resources. The U.N. will attempt to intervene, but will be unsuccessful. In fact, the U.N. as we now know it will likely cease to exist and several regional treaties will rise in its place. I suspect these regional agreements will be based on ethnic or religious similarities.

The next American election cycle will bring the Democratic party to power, and the Democrats will take this as a mandate to pull out of Iraq. As we begin our withdrawal, Iraq will become more unstable than it is now. There will be a short period of complete anarchy in Iraq as the Saudi and Iranian government both attempt to take advantage of the situation. The American government will see that complete withdrawal is not an option, but will be unwilling to re-increase our military commitment. The U.N. will step in, which will delay their demise, but their intervention will have limited success as regional fragmentation kicks in, caused by global warming.

Saudi and Iranian involvement in Iraq may temporarily cause crude oil prices to decline as they try to amass wealth for military incursions in Iraq. This will postpone our transition to alternate forms of energy (because it will seem less economically urgent to do so) but will also cause the supply to run short more quickly. From a governmental standpoint, this will cause further unrest in the Middle East. Sunnis and Shiites will fight for dominance. The U.N. will demand cessations to hostilities, but neither side will listen and the rest of the world will stand by and let them fight it out.

In other words, I see a decrease in global stability and an overall increase in fighting for a perpetually tight supply of natural resources. I don't see another world war, but things are going to get worse before they get better.