The end of the Cold War promised a safer time, but our planet has become more perilous. Why?
Recently Newsweek observed that "Suddenly the world looks like a troubled, dangerous place again." Apparently the American public agrees. In a relatively up-to-date Newsweek poll, 39 percent of the respondents believe that our planet is a more perilous place than it was during the period of the Cold War. Only 18 percent thought it safer.
Columnist Paul Reyes of The Fort Worth Star-Telegram recently wrote: "I don't hear the sound of people beating swords into plowshares. I hear only sounds of war echoing from the four corners of the earth." He pointed out that conflagrations have flared up between the two Koreas, India and Pakistan and that there are now accusations between Iraq and Iran. Of course, there are myriad, low-grade ongoing battles all around the world. Not a nice way to round the corner into a new millennium.
A War in Sub-Saharan Africa
While the troubles in Kosovo have settled somewhat, other less publicized areas continue in crisis. Take Ethiopia and Eritrea. Though far away from the current attention of most of the world's media, these two African countries have been fighting the globe's biggest war. And it is spreading. Many thousands have been killed, wounded or taken captive on both sides. China, Bulgaria, Romania and Russia are supplying fighter aircraft to these two opposing countries.
Both Ethiopia and Eritrea are currently mobilizing vast armies of 250,000 men. Each has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars on modern weaponry. Already poor countries, they are foolishly misspending their national substance at the expense of their citizenry.
Nearly half are illiterate, live on less than a dollar a day, lack safe drinking water and have very low worker productivity. Although these estimates are for the whole of the Sub-Saharan region, they would not be found that far wrong when applied to individual countries.
Surely national health and economics should be an important priority, but as Foreign Affairs stated, "A rising trend is the propensity of African states to invade each other."
The Refugee Problem in Africa
Recently much has been written and publicized about refugees in the Balkans. And rightly so. However, Africa is plagued by a major problem of some 5 million such people. For instance, tens of thousands have fled the Eastern Congo because of the war against President Laurent Kabila. Political unrest in Burundi has caused hundreds of thousands to seek refuge elsewhere, principally in Tanzania.
According to U.N. statistics, the African total represents about one-third of the world's 16.8 million refugees and displaced people.
Shifting the scene to Asia, the simmering, potentially explosive conflict between India and Pakistan over Kashmir continues to worry world leaders. Irresponsible nuclear threats from both sides have made observers wonder if a substantial war, should it ever break out, can be kept within the bounds of conventional arms.
Broadening out this problem, the potential threat of a rogue, long-range missile attack from any of two dozen Third World states is a major problem for future Western security. As a feature article in The Washington Times advises: "Prudence dictates that we deploy a national missile defense, before, not after, rogue states acquire missiles capable of destroying American cities." Many are the problems that confront the United States.
The Legacies of Kosovo
Independent journalist Mark Almond tells us that global paranoia and anti-Americanism are two legacies of Kosovo. NATO's firepower coupled with the unlimited possibilities for so-called humanitarian intervention in our imperfect world should set us to thinking. This is utopian globalism before Jesus Christ's coming millennial reign. Any attempt at world government now during man's age promises to be a false utopia.
Mark Almond writes: "Ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, a phenomenon is rapidly developing which hardly existed behind the Iron Curtain before [the] then-popular anti-Americanism. Decades of Communist propaganda from [East] Berlin to Peking failed to produce any genuine hostility to Americans, but today on my travels around the ex-Soviet bloc, to meet it is routine. Suspicion, indeed downright disbelief, of American political motives is now widespread."
Although Americans know this concept isn't true, "Bombing Belgrade confirmed for umpteen millions of people the idea that Washington seeks world domination," the article continued.
Why Such a Troubled World?
Space prevents us from a comprehensive panoramic picture of the world in this article. For example, China, South Africa and the Middle East have not been addressed. Yet all three are very topical today.
But we have selected sufficient events and trends to suggest that today we still inhabit a troubled and dangerous age. But why?
The biblical book of Revelation has been written with the world stage clearly in mind. One passage is particularly relevant. "So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world" (Revelation 12:9). We live in an age that has been very seriously misled by Satan. He is ultimately responsible for our troubled world.
Jesus Christ clearly warned us that "in the world you will have tribulation" (John 16:33). Though He spoke these words to His original disciples, they manifestly apply to our age as well. Christ called His own generation "adulterous and sinful" (Mark 8:38), and the expression fits our own modern world all too well.
The testimony of the New Testament is consistent. The apostle Paul described it as "this present evil age" (Galatians 1:4). Also John wrote that "The whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one" (1 John 5:19), reminding us again who is ultimately responsible for the human condition.
To those who have set themselves to faithfully carry out Christ's commission, persevering to the end, He promises to keep them from "the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world to test those who dwell on the earth" (Revelation 3:10; compare Luke 21:36). Today we are on a vast world stage, anticipating events to come together that will finally produce the great "crisis at the close."
But in the meantime, one great responsibility we have is to watch and analyze world trends and events-and warn the people of a great time of trouble-unprecedented in world history (Matthew 24:14, 21-22; 28:18-20; Jeremiah 30:7; Daniel 12:1). WNP
Sources: Newsweek (Atlantic edition), May 24, 1999; The Independent (Britain), June 6 & 22, 1999; The Washington Times June 7-13, 1999; Foreign Affairs, March-April 1998; Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 21, 1999.
