How to avoid World War III: A plea for world peace

By Hang Nguyen and Jamal Qaiser

Authors Hang Nguyen and Jamal Qaiser state their plea for world peace in this comprehensive and thought-provoking book.

Following World War I, with its devastating death toll of 20 million, the international community established the League of Nations with a single goal: to prevent another war. Unfortunately, they failed miserably. Only 20 years later, preparations began for World War II, which claimed over 60 million lives. In 1945 the United Nations Organization (UNO) was formed in order to prevent a third world war.

The authors Hang Nguyen and Jamal Qaiser have successfully created an intriguing and historically well-founded book, in which they examine the question of how the UN can succeed in preventing a third world war. They shed light on all current sources of danger and outline viable solutions in great detail. By deep diving into the causes and correlations, they explore the dangers of war and reveal the opportunities for a peaceful world.

A vast array of subjects is scrutinised under their lens, with no stone left unturned. The global power centres and nuclear arsenals, the Security Council and the UN Blue Helmets, the power and impotence of international institutions, cyber war, biological weapons, war propaganda, asocial media, terrorism, killer robots and the space race are all discussed, as are developments in Afghanistan, Syria and Ukraine, and the escalating global conflict between the USA and China. A separate chapter is dedicated to the question of where Europe stands in this global conflict. Throughout the book, the authors not only explain how the levers of power behind all these developments work, but go far beyond that to outline paths to world peace.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Diplomatic Council e.V.
• Release date: Nov 24, 2021
• ISBN: 9783947818747

Hang Nguyen

Hang Nguyen came to Germany as a child seeking refuge from the Vietnam War. She has experienced first-hand the misery of a war that only erupted because the superpowers sought war and the United Nations could not find a way to peace. Today she says about her escape: "I only survived because complete strangers took care of me". From this experience, she has developed an ardent desire to help other people, as she was once helped. As Secretary General of the Diplomatic Council, she is the face and the heart of the organisation that published this work. She would like nothing better than a perfectly functioning UN that brings peace to humanity everywhere. But in her work at the Diplomatic Council, she has had to learn that the United Nations still has a long road ahead. This book is her reminder to the world's largest supranational organisation to prevent World War III at all costs.

Book preview

A ple a for peace

The authors of this book have deliberately chosen a provocative title to give us a wake-up call. But in fact, this book represents a plea for peace. It is about doing everything possible to prevent the unthinkable, World War III. The authors urge the United Nations to play a stronger role, a better UN that has a stronger peace-building effect than it has so far been able to do.

The authors unreservedly stand up for the United Nations. To put it in the words of former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan: The United Nations must be transformed into the effective instrument for preventing conflict that it was always meant to be. The authors applaud the United Nations' tireless efforts to improve our world, and they support all UN resolutions in this regard. To quote Kofi Annan again: Without action, promises are meaningless.

This book is therefore an invitation to the United Nations to act and at the same time an appeal to the community of states to grant the UN the power to act effectively in the interests of humanity. To quote Kofi Annan one last time: The world must move from an era of legislation to implementation.

The Diplomatic Council, in whose publishing house this book is appearing, is one of the United Nations' closest advisors. The Diplomatic Council expressly supports the concept of multilateralism, i.e. the concerted action of nations for the benefit of humanity.

Dedicated to the next generation

This work is dedicated to our children, nephews and nieces.

They all represent the next generation. May they grow up in peace and freedom and, as adults, ensure that successive generations can also thrive in peace and freedom.

Hang Nguyen, Jamal Qaiser

Content

Preface

First and Second World Wars

The high death tolls

Innumerable wars

People’s right to peace

Failure of the League of Nations

The beginnings of the UN

Basis for a better world

Marginal note: Germany is an enemy state

The UN headquarters in New York

Security Council: procrastination and hesitation

The Security Council

The power to veto

The General Assembly

The UN war

No topic without the UN

The Secretariat

Back-room diplomacy

The International Court of Justice

For states only

USA ignores international justice

ICJ and ICC

Judgements for human rights

USA has international judges prosecuted

Basic right to well-being

The successes of the UN

Successes without peace

The wars of the UN

The decisive test of the Korean War

The joint US/UN war

China versus US/UN pact

The longest war on earth

Vietnam followed Korea

UN bans biological and chemical weapons

Reorganisation within the Security Council

Peacekeepers: the Blue Helmets

UN missions between success and failure

Blue Helmets under attack

Dubious reputation of the Blue Helmets

Blue Helmets and trafficking in women

Nuclear control

Cuban Missile Crisis – the world on the brink

Exit from disarmament

Destruction of the earth

Abuse of the UN

The impotence of international organisations

China no longer rules out a first strike

Global power centres

The end of multilateralism

The US turns its back on international organisations

Angela Merkel's new world order

The new Silk Road

China remains true to the ideals of Karl Marx

Russia on the fence

US soldiers expect war

USA falls behind militarily

Hypothetical attack on Europe

Economic warfare has long been in full swing

Cyberwar – the war on the Internet

Only the tip of an iceberg

Warning to the digital society

Secret services make the cyber world unsafe

Attack on the vaccines

Biological weapons

WHO experts in China

China is responsible

The US military is responsible

Genetically engineered virus

Perfect weapon for violent groups

War propaganda and asocial media

Wilhelm Tell, Che Guevara and Jesus Christ

Is there such a thing as a good dictator?

Victims and aggressors exchange roles

Critical reading requested

Russia and the axis of evil

World War III begins on social media

The storyteller's finest hour

Dunning-Kruger and social bots

Seen with my own eyes

Syria – the small world war

Four decades of Assad

The UN plan

The new proxy war

Private mercenaries on the rise

The UN dilemma

Ukraine – the new Cold War

Not a day without concern

Rapprochement with the EU fails

UN appeals to the OSCE remain futile

Crimea belonged to Russia since Catherine the Great

North Korea and NAZI Germany

The origins of North Korea

The Korean War

North Korea today

How dangerous is North Korea really?

USA versus North Korea

The spiral of conflict continues

Hydrogen bomb threat

A surprising climate change

The next Cold War

Sanctions rarely work

The Treaty of Versailles: war instead of peace

Sanctions as a germ cell for new wars

Failure in Afghanistan

Nine-Eleven

War on Terror (WoT)

Unconditional surrender

Afghanistan 2021 was like Saigon 1975

USA as largest arms supplier to terrorists

Russia and China speak out on Afghanistan

New refugee waves to Europe

The Third World War

The War triumvirate

The Thucydides trap

Europe versus America

NATO shifts perspective

Nine-Eleven – the first case of alliance

European army faces huge hurdles

The Arab atom

Global rearmament

Flash war – the killer robots are coming

Arms race in space

Paths to Peace

Small world war, new world war, Cold War 2.0

Happy place and non-place Utopia

About the authors

Hang Nguyen

Jamal Qaiser

Other books published by the authors

About the Diplomatic Council

References and Notes

Preface

After the First World War with 20 million losses, the international community founded the League of Nations with a single goal: to prevent a Second World War. The League of Nations fails. Around 20 years later, preparations began for the Second World War, which cost over 60 million lives. The United Nations Organisation was set up to prevent a Third World War. Has it succeeded so far? That is debatable. In fact, no one has yet declared a Third World War.

Yet war has long since not just been in progress. Worse yet, it has been on the verge of breaking out. Today more wars are raging around the world than ever before. War is rampant on five out of seven continents. The global number of military conflicts has been rising steadily for years, as has the number of victims and refugees who want to escape the wars and save their lives. Even in the biggest global catastrophe of the 21st century to date, the worldwide spread of the coronavirus, the UN has been unable to pass even a binding resolution on a global ceasefire for several months; not to mention the frequently criticised action taken by the World Health Organization (WHO), which is part of the UN, in view of the pandemic. On the contrary, the idea of multilateralism, i.e. coordinated joint action by the community of states, has been more in question since the beginning of the 2020s than during the Cold War.

Let us all keep our fingers crossed that the UN would succeed in securing world peace in the long term. But from all we see as we enter the 2020s, the United Nations will fail just like its predecessor. The next catastrophe or even the Third World War seems inevitable. In view of 500 people dying in wars per day (!) one must ask oneself whether it has not actually erupted a long time ago, even if no one announced it.

Anyone who draws the conclusion that the United Nations is superfluous is, however, vastly mistaken. As weak as the UN is in its political work in many respects, its assistance for people in need is just as strong. Millions of people in many parts of the world are only alive because they received help from the refugee or children's aid organisation, the World Food programme or the United Nations World Health Organization

The UN may fail to save the world, but for those who are saved, it means the world. That is why the United Nations is indispensable, despite all its weaknesses and even if it cannot prevent the next catastrophe or even the Third World War.

Hang Nguyen, Jamal Qaiser

First and Second World Wars

Wars have existed since time immemorial. But never have so many people died in such a brief time as in World War I and World War II. It is not least a terrifying prospect that in a Third World War even more people would lose their lives in an even shorter period, which is what drives peace activists as well as responsible politicians all over the world to try to prevent a third recurrence.

The high death tolls

Almost 20 million people lost their lives in the First World War, including around 9.7 million soldiers and around 10 million civilians. The losses came from many countries: Australia (61,900 dead), Belgium (104,900), Bulgaria (187,500), the German Empire (2.46 million), Denmark (720), Canada (66,900), the Republic of France (1.697 million), Kingdom of Greece (176,000), United Kingdom (994,100), British India (74,000), the Kingdom of Italy (1.24 million), Japan (415), Montenegro (3,000), Austria-Hungary (1.567 million), Ottoman Empire (5 million), New Zealand (18,000), Newfoundland (1,200), Norway (1890), Portugal (89. 200), Kingdom of Romania (680,000), Russian Empire (3.311 million), Kingdom of Serbia (725,000), Sweden (870), South African Union (9,400), United States of America (117,400). In addition, an estimated 21 million people were injured as a result of the war.¹

In World War II everything got much worse. The fighting began, apart from a few skirmishes on the German-Polish border, on 1 September 1939, when the liner Schleswig-Holstein opened fire on the Westerplatte near Danzig, and ended on 8 May 1945 at 11:01 p m. That is 2077 days or 49,842 hours and 16 minutes. During this time, around 1,000 people died every hour. Overall, World War II claimed the lives of 60-70 million people, including 26.9 million soldiers and around 39 million civilians. Other estimates even assume around 60 to 80 million deaths in World War II.²

The victims came from numerous countries: Australia (30,000 deaths), Belgium (60,000), Bulgaria (32,000), China (13.5 million), Germany (6.355 million), Finland (91,700), France (360,000), Greece (180,000), the United Kingdom (332, 825), India (3.024 million), Italy (300,000), Japan (3.76 million), Yugoslavia (1.69 million), Canada (43,190), New Zealand (10,000), Netherlands (220,000), Norway (10,000), South Africa (9,000), Philippines (100,000), Poland (6 million), Romania (378,000), Soviet Union (27 million), Czechoslovakia (90,000), Hungary (950,000), USA (407,316).³

Well over 100 million dead and injured in two world wars within around 30 years. Soldiers, civilians, men, women, children, destroyed lives, extinguished hopes, indescribable horrors, infinite suffering – in the face of this gigantic destructiveness, the world community wanted to do everything possible with a global peace organisation to prevent or at least contain further killing. After the First World War with 20 million losses, the international community of states founded the League of Nations with a single goal: to prevent the Second World War. Unfortunately, the League of Nations failed. Around 20 years later, preparations began for the Second World War, which cost over 60 million lives.

The United Nations Organisation was set up to prevent a Third World War.

Has it succeeded so far? Yes, as far as no one has yet declared World War III. No, as far as more wars are raging in the world today than ever before. The global number of military conflicts has been rising steadily for years, as has the number of victims and refugees who want to escape the wars and save their lives.⁴

Innumerable wars

The counts by the Heidelberg Institute for International Conflict Research showed an average of 18 wars between 2011 and 2019 that took place around the globe every year.⁵ Thereby, the Institute referred only to real wars, not to mere military confrontations or conflicts in which violence is occasionally deployed. The institute counted 21 wars in 2020, 15 in 2019, 16 in 2018, 20 in 2017, 18 in 2016, 19 in 2015, 21 in 2014, 18 in 2012 and 20 in 2011. Before 2011 it looked much better: In 2010 there were only six wars, in the year before that there were only seven wars. In addition to these real wars, the Heidelberg Institute also recorded so-called limited wars, which should be added to the real ones. Here the numbers were similarly high: 19 limited wars in 2020, 23 in 2019, 25 in 2018, 20 in 2017 and 2016, 24 in 2015, 25 in 2013 and 2012, 18 in 2011, 22 in 2010 and 24 in 2009. An order of magnitude higher by a factor of ten is obtained if one also considers conflicts in the world. The Heidelberg Institute named 319 conflicts in 2020, of which more than half – 180 – were classified as violent.⁶

The figures were similarly high in previous years: 385 conflicts in 2019, of which 196 were violent, 374 conflicts in 2018, of which 214 were violent, 385 conflicts in 2017, of which 222 were violent, 402 conflicts in 2016, of which 226 were violent, 409 conflicts in 2015, of these again 223 were violent, 424 conflicts in 2014, of which 223 were violent, 414 conflicts in 2014, of which 221 were violent.

Was it better in the past? The analyses by the Heidelberg Institute for International Conflict Research say yes. In 1992, the first year the institute started the research series, the report at the time showed over 100 conflicts and five wars. In 1993 there were already 119 conflicts and 23 wars. Without presenting the Institute's methodology in detail here or discussing the question of defining the differences between real wars, limited wars and violent conflicts in detail, one thing is certain: violence is increasing worldwide, not decreasing. People are uprooted, injured, killed. Every day 500 people are killed on average in violent conflicts, that is 182,000 war deaths per annum. Together that is well over 12 million deaths since the end of World War II.⁷

These numbers could even be too conservative. A study by Global Research suggests that at least 20 million people in 37 states have died in combat operations that can be traced back directly to the United States since the end of World War II. The countries were either attacked directly or driven into civil wars by US intelligence activities.⁸ All these figures are based on estimates, are subject to questions of definition and are often politically motivated. The crucial question in relation to the subject of this book is, however, simple: will it be possible to prevent another really great war, a world war. One may rightly complain about the multitude of conflicts around the globe, but how much greater would the suffering of a Third World War in which nuclear weapons were used. In the Cold War between the Western nations under the leadership of the USA and the Eastern Bloc of the Soviet Union under the leadership of Russia, a nuclear conflict was successfully prevented. But there is no guarantee that in the conflict between China and the USA, for example, it will again be possible to avoid the fight with nuclear weapons. In addition, there are completely new forms of attack, for example using biological weapons – the coronavirus pandemic since 2020/21/22 has adequately shown how devastating these could be – killer robots and swarms of drones as well as the new armies for combat in space. All these developments, which will be presented in detail on the following pages, make our world less secure.

The question arises whether it is possible to defuse this potential for conflict through international institutions such as the UN. – an institution that emerged from the awareness that it is always better to resolve conflicts peacefully than to allow them to spiral into war. The idea is that the law of the peoples should apply, a kind of international law, not the law of the mightiest.

People’s right to peace

The idea of a community of states is not new. The term international law was first mentioned in 1625 in the book On the Law of War and Peace by the Dutch legal scholar Hugo Grotius. In 1795, the philosopher Immanuel Kant, in his book Perpetual Peace, described in detail the idea of a consistently peaceful community of peoples. The Enlightenment brought about the first international peace movement in the 19th century, which led to the Hague Peace Conferences in 1899 and 1907.

The aim was to develop principles for the peaceful settlement of international conflicts. The idea behind it is great: the abolition of war as a means of dispute between peoples and instead the establishment of a legal process to resolve conflicts. It did not work back then, the League of Nations failed, and with around 20 wars a year today, it is difficult to argue that the UN is more successful. But in spite of all the criticism, one should pause for a moment to appreciate the greatness of the idea of legal process instead of war on which all these efforts are more or less based.

At the first Hague Peace Conference in 1899, 26 states met, and at the second conference in 1907, 44 countries came together to work out an international legal order. It was agreed to set up a court of arbitration in The Hague, but they were not able to establish any binding force for the court rulings of the newly created institution. As early as then, the core question became clear: how much sovereignty do states want to give up in order to submit to a kind of supranational world order? The possibilities of enforcing court judgements have already also been discussed, that is to say, the question of an international executive, as represented by the UN's Blue Helmets today.

At that time, the binding force was to be determined at a third peace conference, initially planned for 1914 and then 1915, and was institutionalised in the League of Nations as collective security.⁹ The International Court of Justice (ICJ), which is now part of the UN,