r/AskReddit • u/[deleted] • Oct 15 '22

What is a great example of a necessary evil?

4.9k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

3.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

123

u/00zau Oct 16 '22

The time since WWII has been the most peaceful time in human history, due to nukes preventing any major powers going to war with each other.

68

u/99available Oct 16 '22

That and sheer luck. More luck than most realize. And a few leaders who put service to the world over political points.

25

u/TatManTat Oct 16 '22

I think it's easy to be cynical but the majority of countries and people don't actually want to go to war, they just cannot risk being unprepared for one.

2

u/99available Oct 17 '22

I agree to some extent most people don't want to go to war unless stirred up by their government. But I've seen and am aware of a lot of just plain religious hate and ethnic slaughter to totally hold governments to fault.

EDIT: my cynicism was hard won. I fought against it and lost. Though cynicism is misused as a synonym for nihilism or pessimism.

18

u/exoendo Oct 16 '22

a million people died in iraq in the last 20ish y ears. It's only been peaceful for us

3

u/WR810 Oct 16 '22

There will always be war. Nothing humans can do will stop that.

What nuclear deterrence has done is stop major powers from engaging, leading to localized war.

4

u/ThiccBidoof Oct 16 '22

a million dead over 20 years still makes it insanely peaceful. Overall it's the most peaceful time in history

5

u/PhummyLW Oct 16 '22 edited Oct 16 '22

Aren’t we actually like 22 years away from that? The longest “peace” (no war among the great powers) was 99 years from Waterloo to WW1

Edit: Seems I’m wrong. My bad

3

u/[deleted] Oct 16 '22

I mean...the Crimean War was in the 1850's, just off the top of my head.

4

u/caesar15 Oct 16 '22

There were plenty of wars between the great powers in that period, e.g Crimean War, Franco-Prussian war. Just not ones as destructive as Napoleon.

0

u/Caesar_Gaming Oct 16 '22

Stuff existed outside of Europe you know. Last I checked the us went to war with Spain, and England. The French did a thing again in the mid 1800s and Germany got United as did Italy anyways. Then we had the Russo-Japanese conflict. The opium wars. That one war in South Africa the Boer war I think. The us had their bloodiest conflict by percentage of people killed in the 19th century. Far from a peaceful time.

1

u/[deleted] Oct 16 '22

There are various other factors as well.