Contours of Conflict in the 21st Century

ANNEx A – QUOTES DRIVERS‘The proliferation of information, while increasing knowledge and understandingamong nations, also galvanizes ethnic groups and contributes to cultural frictionwithin troubled regions. Some states may disintegrate into smaller, ethnically basedunits. This fragmentation will cause both inter-state and intra-state conflict’. 286‘The new type of war economy is almost totally the opposite. The new wars are‘globalized’ wars. They involve the fragmentation and decentralization of the state.Participation is low relative to the population both because of lack of pay andbecause of lack of legitimacy on the part of the warring parties. There is very littledomestic production, so the war effort is heavily dependent on local predation andexternal support. Battles are rare, most violence is directed against civilians, andcooperation between warring factions is common’. 287‘Far from moving towards a few large blocs, however loose, the trend in theworld seems to be towards more fragmentation, not less. Some post-colonial andpost-Cold War frontiers are increasingly under threat as rival ethnic, tribal andreligious communities challenge the existence of ‘artificial’ states. This is evident inmuch of Asia (Central Asian border disputes, Kashmir, Indonesian and Sri Lankanseparatists, for example) and Africa (Eritrea’s escape from and subsequent war withEthiopia, separatist movements in Nigeria and Sudan for instance). Even Europehas seen the bloody break up of former Yugoslavia, a trend which has probably notrun its course, Armenia’s seizure of Nagorno-Karabakh and Russia’s struggle withChechen rebels. There are likely to be more than the current 190 states in 2020’. 288International Arms Control‘The prospects for proliferation in the post–Cold War era create a highlyappropriate issue area for the application of netwar techniques, since suasion willbe much preferred to the use of preventive force in dealing with most nation-stateactors (including Germany and Japan, should either ever desire its own nuclearweapons)’. 289286 Karp, Karp, and Terriff, Global Insurgency and the Future of Armed Conflict Debating Fourth-Generation Warfare.287 C. J. Dick, The Future of Conflict: Looking Out to 2020, Research & Assessment Branch SpecialSeries (Swindon, UK: Research & Assessment Branch (R&AB), 2003), 95, http://www.isn.ethz.ch/isn/Digital-Library/Publications/Detail/?ots591=0C54E3B3-1E9C-BE1E-2C24-A6A8C7060233&lng=en&id=43802.288 John Arquilla and David Ronfeld, ‘Cyberwar is Coming!,’ Comparative Strategy 12, no. 2(1993): 141-165.289 Gray, ‘The 21st Century Security Environment and the Future of War.’208 Contours of Conflict in the 21 st Century