I took a walk this evening and was reminded again that few things look sadder than vestiges of snow, and for some reason the vestiges on display tonight seemed emblematic of the era we are living in. Both the 19th century and the 20th began with war. In fact, this year is the centenary of what has come to be known as the Great War, which destroyed the stability the Victorian period seemed to have settled into. It had been a fragile stability built upon a colonialism that in some places was scarcely different from the slavery that dishonored the United States and that in all cases was premised upon dominating the peoples of seized lands. Small wonder that, by the time 1900 arrived, there was a good deal dissatisfaction seething throughout Europe. The war that inaugurated the 20th century was managed by lesser, grayer figures than those of the Napoleonic era and their resolution of the conflict quickly proved inept, marked by economic collapse and yet another war, this time on a truly global scale. The resolution of that war began with a nuclear standoff and seems to be drifting into nuclear Balkanization. The breakdown of such stability as prevailed in the Middle East may well have placed the world in its greatest danger since the Cuban missile crisis. The diplomatic ineptitude on display lately makes Neville Chamberlain look good in comparison. Maybe that is the pattern of centuries — a collapse into war followed by a period of recovery that prepares the way for a recrudescence of combat.
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