Or a technological innovation will occur allowing sea water to be cheaply modified into fresh water. When I say ‘cheaply modified’, I mean less expensive than war.
“When I say ‘cheaply modified’, I mean less expensive than war.”
I would hope you’re right. But the project will cost a definite amount which will seem a very high price. War, in the “before” picture always seems cheaply won. I wish I could count the number of before stories I’ve read from the US Civil War to World War one where the side starting it said “we’ll be home by Christmas,” or, “I sure hope there’s still some fighting when I get to the front.” Argentina started a war with the UK over the Falkland’s to keep people’s minds of their economy. They obviously thought that war was the better alternative to actually cutting the budget and dealing with their real problems. People experience magical thinking. It’s easy to imagine that if I do (fill-in-blank) all these wonderful things will follow. In reality once you’ve taken that first shot all your plans fly out the window because the enemy does what’s in their best interest, not what you imagined they’d do. So, yes, after the war it would appear to the devastated countries that cutting entitlement programs and energy and food subsidies to pay for the water project would have been cheaper but that would have been too unpopular whereas everybody loves a good war. At least in the beginning.