Homeles

Thanks! I've known Belesarius for 7 years now. Scary to think it's been that long.

Great, and I am sure you are not stupid enough to believe that the economic sanctions have had zero impact on Russia, so I am not sure what your point is there. I understand the situation fairly well, but if the best rebuttal that you can come up with is "you're wrong," then I have better ways of spending my time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_financial_crisis_%282014%E2%80%93present%29 At any rate, I do not expect annexation/imperialism to have the same violent face it had in the past. As societies become more educated, they'll become more homogeneous. War is an economically inefficient way of achieving economic progress... and it's largely becoming irrelevant. I do worry a bit about the radicalization going on in Europe, though.

Yay for reverse image lookups. I am getting too good at this whole google thing... sometimes I scare myself with how easily I can find information on someone or something: http://vtdigger.org/2016/02/18/entergy-stores-contaminated-vermont-yankee-water-in-swimming-pools/

Allahu akbar! *boom*

This might just be me, but I don't see the world stomaching another truly global-scale conflict. I just think we'll have some extremists we need to squash every once in a while. The economies of nations are just too dependent on each other... too dependent on the US in particular. Economic sanctions from the US are a death sentence to a country's standards of living. Imperialism isn't really a valid strategy in today's world. Russia got fucked hard for sticking their dick in Ukraine... I don't think you'll see them try that shit again. Nukes are basically just there at this point to maintain peace, and continue the promotion of extensive global trade. We could be having them sitting out on public display, e.g. on rooftops in major cities, and the only real added risk would be a terrorism one.