U.S. States without the i's.

[Violet]

I'm sure you've heard of "Divide and conquer"? Me and my dad had a little chat over where it came from. He thinks it came from the Romans and I agree, but the British have also used it. It pretty much means having two of your enemies fight each other, and you being the cause of it. Once both have weakened each other, you step in and wipe them both out. Easily too, since they spent most of their resources taking on each other. Romans used this tac and so did the Brits. The problem with going to war, is that it makes you weaker.

It has a high probability of making one weaker, though the gains one can make in territory can more than make up for it.

Like terrorists? They fear nothing, they (from their point of view) have nothing to lose, and all to gain. They scare me more than any other. I would fear an enemy more who fears nothing and has nothing to lose than an enemy who bares fear and has much to lose. One is capable of anything, the other has limits.

Yes, just like terrorists. Now imagine an entire country worth of them. That would be a very bad situation. 0.o

It's only a matter of time. Which is why it's important to have many friends. Because one day you won't have power and you'll be needing your friends more than ever when that day comes.

I prefer eliminating all the competition. Who needs friends if they are the only one around?

But I agree with allying (if temporarily) with other powers. I wrote an interesting paper on the subject of unity and how it affects strength some time ago, I'll add it sometime (when I synchronize my laptop and desktop).

I think you lost more than you gained. Wars are expensive, and having bodies of the fallen come back tells me that it was a bad idea. Need to focus on home security, not over seas wars.

We did indeed, and again this was in our approach. Had we a "take no prisoners or refugees" mentality, it would have been much cheaper. Not so much wasted in our initial invasion... but in our continued occupation there has been a fair amount of expense. By a country 'in debt'.

In most situations it is much easier to defend than to attack.

I think the U.S lost it's greatness a while ago. I can say the same for Britain too. Our glorious Empire is gone, and soon your place in world power will disappear too. Shame, but it's reality.

We still have that military strength, so we can still roll with the big ones. Without that and all of our little buddies in the UN... right now we are next to nothing. It's the only reason Russia is a power as well. Without military strength, we couldn't hope to defend so much territory, and many countries would take advantage of this.

Countries, no matter how big cannot go into a major war anymore. M.A.D (Mutually Assured Destruction) is what prevents any large nation (or nations allied to a nuclear nation) to go into a major war, or risk sending the entire human race back to the stone age...or worse, oblivion. This is why I'm in favour of nukes, not because I like war but because it prevents them. Think how many wars there would of been if there were no nukes to worry about?

+1. And +1 three more times for this sentiment.

Not weaken. Both sides would be sent into oblivion, along with the rest of the world. China isn't dumb enough to try anything. Unlike extremists, they have some common sense (thankfully).

One side or both would stop the war before it went that far (hopefully). I think China is attempting to slowly take over the world's economy while maintaining its military force