Deja Vu

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I've been much exercised of late with looking into - as I think I've mentioned before - my great-uncle Frank's short WWI tour in the Gallipoli Campaign, which of course centred around the shipping lanes and supply routes of North Africa and the Mediterranean, etc. It would seem that, yet again, we are moving into a phase of world history which might just push us into yet another European/World War, with many of the more serious of the commentariat agreeing with the idea that the multiple wars and territorial instabilities we are seeing from Ukraine to the Middle East and Palestine could prove to be a collective tipping point for another global conflict. That the very same trade routes, shipping lanes and ports would yet again be the epicentre of such a war would not have surprised my relative, as he also witnessed WWII and the Suez crisis within his lifetime.

Suez was a harbinger of the current state of play in the region: add into the mix what's happening in Ukraine and The Black Sea, Yemen and Palestine/Gaza/Israel, and the question becomes just how long the power centres of Europe and the East will put up with the levels of disruption to trade and supply. The word on the block is that tempers are fraying badly all 'round as we speak. My great-uncle's war was short and painful, but he survived. The campaign he was unfortunate enough to be involved in was a military and human disaster, but what could follow in the same region in the near future could be worse. We've long held the view that the next global conflict would actually be a land war centred around the Middle East, but, for the last fifty-odd years it has simmered rather than boiled. This time 'round, the various belligerents and their economic supporters are many, more various and much more powerful: the unthinkable may yet happen again. 

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