{"id":149,"date":"2020-04-09T16:08:41","date_gmt":"2020-04-09T16:08:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/?p=149"},"modified":"2020-04-09T16:08:41","modified_gmt":"2020-04-09T16:08:41","slug":"world-war-v","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/2020\/04\/09\/world-war-v\/","title":{"rendered":"World War V"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span>\n<\/i><\/a><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is, World War V; V for Virus, not World War V; V for Roman numeral “5”. It’s only the third world war but make no mistake, it is a world war. I justify this assertion, thusly:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world has not seen such widespread cooperative action\nagainst a single enemy since World War II (both Axis and Allied), nor more\npeople directly or indirectly influenced by it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All wars carry a civilian death toll. Healthcare workers –\nthe soldiers on the front lines – are particularly susceptible to injury or\ndeath but the civilian count is higher with Covid because, unlike the previous\nwars almost all Covid victims are civilians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every day there is a mounting death toll and casualty count,\nrising inexorably in a battle fought in inches with little or no victory in\nimmediate sight. We are frantically working on the superweapon that, definitively\nwill tip the balance but until such time we’re knee deep in the trenches and\nthere’s no Lusitania or Pearl Harbour to prompt America’s saving grace into the\nwar; they’re already here and as deep in it as anyone else. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As with during the world wars the world has shifted gears\ntowards production to support the troops – munitions during I and II, medical\nequipment in III. While we haven’t reached the stage of severe, government enforced\nrationing, at least around where I live the supermarkets have started to put a\nlimit on the sale of certain products. If production continues to be strained governments\nmay step in. People had to get used to the change in lifestyle caused by this\ndisruption to the supply chain (perhaps not as much of an adjustment for the World\nWar II generation, having just come off of the Great Depression).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, paranoia takes center stage – loose lips used\nto sink ships, now they spread a toxic poison. I’ve already spoken of the psychological\nramifications of the Covid Pandemic – already we see people with Cabin Fever\n(that exact term being bandied about by the media) and when it’s over we will\nsee a chronic agoraphobia epidemic. Survivors of wars suffer “shell\nshock” or PTSD; a condition not limited to wartime and one we can expect\nto rear its ugly head during this war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just like I and II we don’t know what the landscape will\nlook like when it’s all over. I have no doubt that we will overcome our foe –\nit’s in our nature to survive – just as we overcame our foes during I and II. Had\nthe opposition won either world war I would have said exactly the same thing.\nWith all due respect to T.S. Eliot, the world ends with neither a bang nor a\nwhimper (a conclusion he was later to admit, himself). Someone has to win and it\nisn’t going to be SARS CoV-2. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But how will things look afterwards? No doubt the economy\nwill spring back with a vengeance but the psychological damage will be severe,\nand the political damage. China is already being viewed askance with Xi Jinping\nfacing criticism for his skepticism and coverup attempt that allowed the virus\nto spread beyond Wuhan Provence and, subsequently past Chinese borders into the\ninternational community. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

An already traditionally xenophobic America, pushed further\nby Donald Trump’s border policies (incidentally, as far as border security is\nconcerned, this crisis must be Trump’s wet dream as it allows a further justification\nfor his border walls) may be sent over the edge, becoming even more\ninternalized and recalcitrant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s inevitable that the international landscape will shift\nas happens after every war but how? Attitudes will change and habits of\nparanoid hygiene will probably last and the Covid Generation (Covidgen? Coronagen?\nGeneration V?) will, like the Baby Boomers, be defined heavily by a major event\nand the subsequent attitudes of the generation before them – an event that will\ninfluence every generation with a living memory and beyond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reference:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

T. S. Eliot at\nSeventy<\/em>, and An\nInterview with Eliot<\/em> in Saturday Review<\/em>. Henry Hewes. 13\nSeptember 1958 in Grant<\/em> p. 705.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

That is, World War V; V for Virus, not World War V; V for Roman numeral “5”. It’s only the third world war but make no mistake, it is a world war. I justify this assertion, thusly: The world has not seen such widespread cooperative action against a single enemy since World War II (both…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":150,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/149\/revisions\/150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=149"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journal.rexthestrange.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}