Conflict that has made the largest impact on the world we know today.

[Trooth]

WWI - it converted the US from an insular and neutral nation to one that looked outside the "50" states for trade. When WWII came along the nation with the mighty industry but an army the size of Austria had only one direction to go. We, and all our descendants, live in that post WWII world.

You could make some argument for a "classical" war, but none of us would be arguing beyond text books.

[HistoricalDavid]

i select WWI. had europe not turned on flamethrowers at two paces, many of the nasty "isms" (communism, fascism, nazism) of the 20th century would not have exploded across the world.

I agree. Even where the nasty 'isms did not take root, the dreams of classical liberalism and its notions of civilisation - not only liberalism in an economic and political sense, but idealism, personal responsibility, rationality and so on - were mortally wounded.

To an extent I think this decline was already occurring, but WWI certainly provides a savage symbol of its self-destruction.

WWI - it converted the US from an insular and neutral nation to one that looked outside the "50" states for trade. When WWII came along the nation with the mighty industry but an army the size of Austria had only one direction to go. We, and all our descendants, live in that post WWII world.

You could make some argument for a "classical" war, but none of us would be arguing beyond text books.

WWI? It still retreated somewhat into isolationism after it. I'd say the breakdown of the seal from the outside world was a process starting in the 1898 Spanish-American War, which, looking at the timeline, was America's first major engagement involving a foreign power for quite some time, and finishing conclusively in 1945, with obvious reasons.

[Trooth]

WWI? It still retreated somewhat into isolationism after it. I'd say the breakdown of the seal from the outside world was a process starting in the 1898 Spanish-American War, which, looking at the timeline, was America's first major engagement involving a foreign power for quite some time, and finishing conclusively in 1945, with obvious reasons.

It retreated somewhat, but the seeds were sown. The original question was about the world we live in today. WWI provided the US with an opportunity to fight in the old world and the "luxury" of making the mistake of using non-mechanised tactics without the corresponding catestrophic failure. Also at the time of WWI it wasn't clear cut which side the US would enter the war on. It wasn't beyond the realms of political opinion of the time that supporting the Kaiser's forces was a wrong option for the US. Should the US have entered the war on the side of the opposition then, whilst unlikely it would have materially changed the shape of Europe, it certainly would have changed the conditions and shape of WWII. WWII is the mould by which the modern world is shaped, but of course that mould itself was created by the conditions of WWI.

[Vinod2070]

I am not sure Mesopotamia had a distinct and seperate civilization when Islam invaded.

I am not fully aware of Mesopotomia's history during the early Islamic period. I thought that their old civilization was destroyed by early Muslims as for Persia. If someone knows better, pl. enlighten.

[Kansas Bear]

I am not sure Mesopotamia had a distinct and seperate civilization when Islam invaded.

By this you mean people were living there? I'd say, yes.

From the wiki source(so please refer to other sources) :)

The first encounter between Sassanids and Muslim Arabs was in the Battle of the Bridge in 634 which resulted in a Sassanid victory, however the Arab threat did not stop there and reappeared shortly from the disciplined armies of Khalid ibn Walid, once one of Muhammad's chosen companions-in-arms and leader of the Arab army. Under the Caliph `Umar ibn al-Khattāb, a Muslim army defeated a larger Persian force lead by general Rostam Farrokhzad at the plains of al-Qādisiyyah in 637 and besieged Ctesiphon. Ctesiphon fell after a prolonged siege. Yazdgerd fled eastward from Ctesiphon, leaving behind him most of the Empire's vast treasury. The Arabs captured Ctesiphon shortly afterward, leaving the Sassanid government strapped for funds and acquiring a powerful financial resource for their own use. A number of Sassanid governors attempted to combine their forces to throw back the invaders, but the effort was crippled by the lack of a strong central authority, and the governors were defeated at the Battle of Nihawānd; the empire, with its military command structure non-existent, its non-noble troop levies decimated, its financial resources effectively destroyed, and the Asawaran (Azatan) knightly caste destroyed piecemeal, was now utterly helpless in the face of the invaders.

Upon hearing the defeat in Nihawānd, Yazdgerd along with most of Persian nobilities fled further inland to the northern province of Khorasan. He was assassinated by a miller in Merv in late 651 while the rest of the nobles settled in central Asia where they contributed greatly in spreading Persian culture and language in those regions and the establishment of the first native Iranian Islamic dynasty, the Samanid dynasty, which sought to revive and ressuscitate Sassanid traditions and culture after the invasion of Islam.

The abrupt fall of Sassanid Empire was completed in a period of five years, and most of its territory was absorbed into the Islamic caliphate; however, many Iranian cities resisted and fought against the invaders several times. Cities such as Rayy, Isfahan and Hamadan were exterminated thrice by Islamic caliphates in order to suppress revolts and to terrify Iranian people.

I'm surprised you don't know this Xerxes! This is an Iranian Empire!:P

[Guest]

By this you mean people were living there? I'd say, yes.

From the wiki source(so please refer to other sources) :)



I'm surprised you don't know this Xerxes! This is an Iranian Empire!:P

Hi KB,

I meant that it did not have a seperate distinct Mesapotamian civilization at that time when Islam invaded. In other words, Persians were living there on its eastern side while the subject of the Byzantines were on its western side.

I do know about the battle of bridge and Quadasia, about Ctisphone and its heir Baghdad: after all the Abbasside caliphate was a neo-Sassanian empire, just like Umayyed caliphate followed Greek traditions. I remember reading that when the cronies of caliph Muwaiye complained that why he is dresses up with the splendor and pomp of Caesars of Rome, he complained that he is living like that because in Damascus, the only way to be taken seriously by the Greeks is to live and act like a Caesar.

About battle of bridge and Quadasia, I always wonder how the much numerous host of Rustam was routed at Quadasia while a smaller Persian army succeded at the battle of bridge. It seems that the victor always reduces its strength. Edward Gibbon mentions in his books that the Arabs were fond of number four, forty, fourhundrreth, so everything was seen from their prespective as four times. Islamic historic version of the battle of Quadasia says that the host of Rustam was outnumbering that of Sa'ad four to one. I question that.

[Canmoore]

Seems I may have missed some conflicts! But keep up the discussion, I am learning a tonne from these discussions. WAB sure does have some intelligent people.

[zraver]

I am not sure Mesopotamia had a distinct and seperate civilization when Islam invaded.

it didn't, no where between Persia and Greece really did (possibly Judea), the Hellenic world absorbed everyone.

[USAUSAUSA]

Not that I would expect it to get many votes, but the Napoleonic Wars happened just 200 years ago, had several million dead(I think) and started the new order in Europe(At that point Europe was the world).



Anyways, I went with the Romans. Simply because it was first. They say that if you kill a butterfly 2 million years ago you could change the world.

In terms of shock to the global economy and culture, the World Wars easily. WWI directly created WWII, Nazism, Fascism and allowed Communism to really start. It is next to impossible to actually say if things would be truly different without the Romans today. So I would go with WWI in alot of senses.

But I still voted for the Romans.

[Arnold123]

If anything predicted about Armagedon is correct all this lot will look like a snowball in hell.

[Repatriated Canuck]

Seems I may have missed some conflicts! But keep up the discussion, I am learning a tonne from these discussions. WAB sure does have some intelligent people.

Yeah, I used to think I was a highly intelligent poster then I started in here and was humbled rather quickly.

[Repatriated Canuck]

Anyways, I went with the Romans. Simply because it was first. They say that if you kill a butterfly 2 million years ago you could change the world.

If you went and did that all you did was kill a bug. The farther along you get the smaller the ripples.

[chankya]

If you went and did that all you did was kill a bug. The farther along you get the smaller the ripples.

Not true.

"Ripples" are a linear system. The world or history is a non-linear system.(at least it looks non-linear to me). Therefore Chaos theory applies.

"sensitive dependence on initial conditions" commonly known as the butterfly effect (from chaos theory) would have two systems with even a tiny change in starting conditions end up with entirely different and independent trajectories.

Am in a rush, will expand on my comments later.

[Cactus]

Picked the Cold War: Among the major wars it had the most geographically wide-spread impact. Hell, it has been the only one to have extra-terrestrial impact that we can be sure of! It takes my vote.

[HistoricalDavid]

If anything predicted about Armagedon is correct all this lot will look like a snowball in hell.

That's got to be the most questionable 'if' in the history of forum discussion.