The Excerpt podcast: World War III - are we at risk for a global war?
On Sunday's episode of The Excerpt podcast: Political, military and economic pressures along with global alliances and territorial disputes were all factors that led to World War I in 1914 and a second world war that began in 1939. With those same pressures evident today, is WW III a possibility? What might be the tipping point in the spread of regional conflicts that could set off a global war? Paste BN World Affairs Correspondent Kim Hjelmgaard joins The Excerpt to discuss current wars and what a world war looks like in the 21st century.
Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.
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Dana Taylor:
Hello and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Sunday, January 21st, 2024. Political, military and economic pressures, along with global alliances and territorial disputes were all factors that led to World War I in 1914 and a second World War that began in 1939. With those same pressures evident today, is World War III a possibility, what might be the tipping point in the spread of regional conflicts that could set off a global war? We're joined now by USA Today world affairs correspondent, Kim Hjelmgaard. Kim, thanks for being on The Excerpt.
Kim Hjelmgaard:
Thanks for having me.
Dana Taylor:
Let's start with one of the bigger conflicts, the Israel Hamas war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that Israel will continue the war with Hamas until it's been completely eradicated. How will Israel and the world know when that's been achieved?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
That's a very good question. I think the answer to that depends a little bit on where you're sitting. They've been saying this over and over for months that the war will end when they have all their hostages back and when Hamas has been eradicated. Now, what that looks like in actuality is, of course, quite difficult for many people to understand. Hamas is a physical presence on the ground. It's also an idea, and it's harder to kill ideas. And we've been seeing that in some of the connective tissue to other theaters in the Middle East, between basically metastasizing events where other militant groups in the region that back Hamas have been wadding into this war in different ways. I think there's a lot of concern about if Israel's goal is to get rid of Hamas.
What does that mean for the almost 2 million people that have been living in Gaza? They've been dying in huge numbers. And it's been extremely difficult for other countries in the Middle East to accept, and of course, around the world. And so, when Israel talks about its end game, the other side of that equation is, well, there's all these civilians, are they going to get pushed out to other countries? Are they going to have to live in a place that is completely destroyed?
Dana Taylor:
Well, the conflict's already spread in the region. What's happening at the northern border in Lebanon with Iranian-backed Hezbollah,
Kim Hjelmgaard:
Hezbollah, it's a militant group based in Lebanon that is supported by Iran, financially, also helps train fighters. And Israel has long been in a very low simmering war with Hezbollah in some way. Hezbollah, and the question of whether it actually joins this war in a more full throated manner is something that is of deep concern to the Israelis. Hezbollah is better funded, it's more well-trained. It's got a lot more fighters than Hamas. These are battle hardened militants who've also been fighting in Syria over the years. They pose quite a big threat.
Dana Taylor:
Well, now, Iran has launched attacks on what it calls militant bases in Pakistan. The Pakistani government called it an unprovoked violation of their airspace. Iran also recently launched missile strikes in Northern Iraq and Syria. What's going on there?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
I'm glad you brought that up. These are tit for tat attacks that have been taking place on either side of the Iran-Pakistan border. It's a good reminder that not all of the conflict and war in that region directly involves the west. And so, basically, over the last couple of days, Pakistan and Iran have been trading what they've both described as retaliatory airstrikes, that have been targeting different militant hideouts on either side of that border. And essentially, the two countries have accused each other of providing safe haven to groups in their respective countries. Iran and Pakistan, these are complicated countries. They each face their own internal political pressures.
Dana Taylor:
Before we pivot from the Middle East, I'd like to talk about what's going on with Yemen's Houthi rebels. The US and UK carried out strikes against the rebels several times over the past week or so. What are the Houthi's goals here and has the US allied response been effective?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
So, the Houthi goals are... The overarching goal is to disrupt commercial shipping in the Red Sea. Red Sea, as many people may know, it's a huge conduit to getting goods more easily, more cheaply shipped to places in Europe and North America and so on, without having to go around the Horn of Africa. In an act of solidarity, when the Israel Hamas war broke out, the Houthis wanted to demonstrate that they were concerned about everything that was happening in Gaza and the scale of this Israeli bombing campaign there. And so, these targeting chips in the Red Sea was one way that they could do it. That, of course, has brought a response from the US and the UK, who've been trying to locate and bomb some of the Houthi logistics hubs, missile launchers, drone sites, and all sorts of things that are based in Yemen.
Hezbollah and the Houthis in particular are dissatisfied with Israel's connections to the US and how that impacts the Middle East. They feel that the US backs Israeli policy in many different ways, not just against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and elsewhere, but that it essentially is a bad influence on the region. And so, therefore, they've been expressing that and striking back in any way that they can.
Dana Taylor:
Let's move on to the other big global conflict that we've been following, Russia's nearly two year invasion of Ukraine. Following Russia's incursion, Ukraine hoped to fast track a membership into NATO, essentially forcing members of the alliance into joining the conflict. One of the key doctrine states that an attack on one is an attack on all, but there still is a strong alliance of western nations supporting Ukraine. At what point are other countries considered to be directly involved in the conflict?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
Yeah. Just to give folks a little bit of context about what's happening in Ukraine at the start. I mean, there's an effective deadlock along the whole of Ukraine's eastern front with Russia. Ukraine is not part of NATO. This is the military organization that is one of the peacekeepers in Europe since the end of the second World War. Neither is Russia for that matter. But Ukraine, of course, is located in a neighborhood where there are a lot of NATO countries. And there's been a few close calls. About 18 months ago, it seemed like a Russian missile had flown into Poland and killed a couple of farmers. It turned out once an investigation took place that it was actually debris from a Ukrainian anti-Russian missile that had dropped into Polish territory.
But that, of course, this idea that the war or Russia's invasion of Ukraine would eventually somehow spill out outside of that immediate geographic location. Biden administration, Republican lawmakers are in a deadlock over whether to send billions more military assistance to Ukraine. The various EU countries have been complaining, pointing the finger at each other, actually saying that not enough weapons are being sent there.
Dana Taylor:
What's the significance of the US choosing sides in some of these conflicts, namely Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan? And by choosing sides, I mean supplying arms. How many of our allies are doing the same?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
It depends on where you're looking. I mean, certainly, if you look at countries like Germany, France, the UK, they've all got their private arms companies that supply weapons to different conflicts and theaters around the world, the Russians as well. Nobody does it, as far as I'm aware, to the extent that the US does it. So, I think in terms of the significance of it, the countries that need those weapons certainly cry out for them. Is it always helpful? It's unclear. But I have to say, other countries are catching up. Now you're starting to see countries that didn't manufacture weapons get into the game, because they feel that it's a way to make money, have influence and also project power in different ways, and also help.
Dana Taylor:
How might we define a world war this time around? What would be the irrefutable signs that we're moving in that direction?
Kim Hjelmgaard:
I just want to say, I'm going to knock on some wood in my office while we're chatting, because I don't want to sound too bullish on the idea that there is no World War III out there. Because when you say those things, they tend to come back on you quite quickly. But this is a great question. Warfare looks so different now than it did compared to the middle of the 20th century or earlier, where you had to have so many troops physically in a place. But now that we have all this technology, now that we have all these kinds of tools and ways to precisely kill people from a computer screen, there is an argument maybe to say that when there are these limited strikes, that really that's just how world wars in our time, what they look like.
So, that may be oversimplifying it. To try to get at your question a little more head on. How can we be confident that we're in a third world war? I think that when you will have lots of countries at scale involved, coalescing around certain ideas and certain rationales, and that there's clearly drawn battle lines. I don't mean that just militarily, but also morally. And I think it'll be easier for a lot of us to understand whether we're in another great war. But maybe that's just an old-fashioned way of thinking about what war is, as I was saying earlier.
Dana Taylor:
I hope we don't see that scale. I think scale is the word. Kim, thank you so much for joining us on The Excerpt.
Kim Hjelmgaard:
Thank you for having me.
Dana Taylor:
Thanks to our senior producer, Shannon Rae Green, for her production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts@usatoday.com. Thanks for listening. I'm Dana Taylor. Taylor Wilson will be back tomorrow morning with another episode of The Excerpt.