How to kick off a world war.

A four way war to be exact.

I already planned to have two assassination for two countries, with terrorist attacks on the country itself or its allies in the other two.

Also each country has unearthed a few artifacts of doom. I also need to incorporate that into the story as well.

edited 29th May '11 12:36:36 PM by Worlder

It's for a Book, I hope?

What kinds of artefacts of doom?

But why would these countries benefit from the invasion -or- why do they feel that the other countries are a threat to them?

Have a disgruntled Serbian student on a very (un)lucky lunch run assassinate a prominent political figure?

Seriously though, if the conditions are right it only takes a spark. Suppose it could be anything, even something so wildly implausible as the death of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.

edited 29th May '11 12:50:39 PM by Gault

What about a raising rival economic force that might surpass even the richest and most powerful country in the world, which doesn't please the latter. tensions rise, sabotages, controversies, and then war.

History Repeats.

Wait, sorry, how does a four-way war work? Do you mean it's 2 on 2 or 3 on 1, or is it 4 countries trying to attack each other simultaneously?

Artifacts of Doom.

Each country that will be involved in the war is slowly uncovering more of them.

For example one artifact is being able to drag asteroids from deep space. It can either provide rare metals or simply make it a Colony Drop.

Another can split open the crust exposing the mantle for mineral extraction. That and being able to summon a volcano at a place owned by an enemy.

Of course prior hostilities will play a huge part like in the cause of any war.

All four simultaneously.

edited 29th May '11 1:01:18 PM by Worlder

A random disaster that prompts one to act would be an option.

From the first story I thought of:

Jin Yang, right. The guy who started the whole thing. He was a rock music promoter who’d just made his second visit to the Edinburgh Fringe. Great success by all accounts. Real wheeler and dealer, signed up all kinds of acts to play in Beijing. He was on his way home, on a plane just out of Edinburgh Airport. Jumps up while the seat-belt sign’s still on, gets into an argument with the trolley-dolly. Gets a wee bit physical. He doesn’t know that she’s had martial arts training. Anti-hijack policy, see? She doesn’t know that he is a kung fu master. Things get a bit out of hand and just as he has her in a headlock he gets a soft-nosed bullet in the skull. Turns out there’s this plain-clothes cop travelling undercover on the plane. More anti-hijack policy. A sky marshall, as the Americans call them. So the Chinese guy goes down, and they’re all kind of looking at each other. There’s blood and bits of bone and brains splattered everywhere. Kids screaming. Adults screaming. Total shock and panic. And the sky marshall sees, right there sticking out of the pocket of the late Mr. Yang’s seat, a couple of books. They’re in Chinese, but they have the titles in English inside. One of them is the Koran. The other is the selected speeches of some Chinese leader. The sky marshall’s relaying all this to his bosses on the ground, using the plane’s own radio. Everybody’s hearing him. Then another Chinese passenger a few seats back jumps up and starts yelling. The sky marshall turns to him, with his gun levelled. By this time, half the passengers are telling their folks, using their own mobile phones. They all think they’re about to die, and they’re right. Because yon wee sign that used to warn you not to use mobiles or computers or games while the plane was taking off or landing was there for a reason. Your gadgets really can interfere with the aircraft’s controls. Well, they did this time anyway. The plane’s been called back, obviously. But something goes wrong on its approach. There was a heavy fog that day over the Firth of Forth. Pilot’s flying blind. Flying by instruments. Instruments that have been knocked out of kilter by some computer geek’s fancy new mobile phone, while he’s telling his girlfriend he loves her or what have you. Controlled flight into terrain, it’s called. In this case, the terrain is the naval dockyard at Rosyth. Where Britain’s top aircraft carrier is in dock for a refit before a mission to the South China Sea. And in the South China Sea there’s been a bit of bother over Taiwan—a breakaway big island that the Chinese are very touchy about. Kaboom. A headline the next day says CHINESE AL QAEDA NUKES ROSYTH. And that was The Guardian, man. My lecturer at Telford College had it on his desktop. The Record just said bomb reds now. Most of the British Army was in Iran already. China wasn’t exactly a long march away. The Yanks took care of the heavy stuff, as usual. Japan kind of weighed in, for no better reason I can see than from force of habit. Two years into the war our boys were up to their eyebrows in shit. Not knowing where the next attack’s coming from—Communists, Muslims, Japanese, Falun Gong Sect, you name it. Meanwhile, the official machinery is grinding away. Government inquiry sifts through the wreckage of the Rosyth incident. Plods through every surviving witness. Brings out a report. It tells us three important things about Jin Yang. One—he’s from China’s Muslim minority area. Hence the Koran in the seat. Two—he’s a businessman and a member of the Party. Hence the book of speeches by a Communist official. All about how building up business and getting rich is the way to the glorious future. Jin Yang has to swot up on that sort of thing, and parrot it every now and again to keep his bosses happy. Three—Jin Yang was a heavy smoker, like lots of Chinese men are. On his first visit to the Festival Fringe, he’d had a very nice time. Deals in smoke-filled rooms and all that. At the airport he got through half a pack of cigarettes in the departure lounge to calm his nerves. There was a special booth just for that very purpose. All’s well. Second time, a good few years later, the smoking ban had come in. He had a much less fun visit. He did a lot of his deals in doorways. On his way home, he’s through security and stuck in aeroplane land when he finds that the Airstream smoking booth has long since been ripped out. His flight’s delayed. Nobody knows just when it’ll be ready. Even if he could get back through security, he’s afraid he’ll miss his flight, and then he’ll miss his connection. So he’s stuck. For three and a half hours. It wasn’t a hijack. There was no Al Qaeda connection. No Chinese government connection either. It was just air rage. So that’s how the war started.

carriage return plzkthx

edited 29th May '11 3:53:23 PM by annebeeche

^ That's how the source gives it. (Well, except for when the carriage return shows up in the middle of a sentence.)

edited 29th May '11 4:34:51 PM by feotakahari

For something darkly humorous, have each country make secret alliances that they secretly meant to not uphold so they could backstab their "allies" easily, which results in 4 countries getting tangled in a four-way war.

An assassination and complicated alliances after someone tried to take over a continent. The assassination drags everyone in alliances into war. This is what happened in World War One.

Have everyone blame one country for the war. Have said country build up under a new political party and an influential person who uses dogma to raise national fever, and try to enslave the world as rightful rulers after being so badly blamed and punished for the other world war. This is what happened in World War Two.

Really, I would look at what caused the real world wars to get an understanding of how they started. It would give you ideas that might help.

Well wars usually start for the reasons mentioned above, people think that the sacrifices that they'll be making will justify any sacrifices they need to make for the war. Economic powers will think that war will let them secure more resources or eliminate competition while war-loving powers will see the opportunity for prestige and most importantly the lack of a possibility of defeat.

If these artifacts are all very power but destructive it seems like the different governments want to use them on their enemies territory and don't trust any one else with the artifacts to not weaponize them. Paranoia and a lack of resources which would make the artifacts seem viable, even desirable sounds like the most plausible setup.

Add a Hitler!

And shitloads of Mentos and Pepsi.

You have many options. here some off the top of my head

china goes war hawk and invades tiwan after some falling-out with the US

North Korea sinks another south korean ship and south korea decides that There not gonna take it and it snow balls from there

Something goes boom in one country and they blame another country.

and the old standby of false flag ops.

^ See, this is where I think WWIII theorist fails. A world war doesn't simply start because a government goes "Okay, let's go fight some other countries" and those other countries and its allies pile on to it. Nope.

While that is what superficially caused the real-life World Wars, there are many underlying causes and conditions that played the more important role in kick-starting a full-blown global-scale war.

(i) Economic background. Ask yourself, as a citizen of your country, this: If you are living a fulfilling life, everything is fine and dandy, you have a good job that brings in good money, a loving family, maybe a child or two to care for, would you support your government going to war and jeopardizing everything? Now, on the other hand, if you are living in poverty, unemployment, uncertain of the future or even the dinner on your table, and the general prospect of life is just bleak owing to economical downturn or whatever it is, and then you are promised that by going to war you'd have a chance to improve your life, would you be inclined to support said war?

Add in a bit of "Jews et.al are ruining German lives" to the last scenario and you'd get the major underlying cause to the 2nd world war from the German side - people are desperate, and the Nazi took advantage of it.

(ii) Social background: Social issues are a leading cause to stir a people to go to war with another country. Again, ask yourself this: What would it take for you, someone living in peace and quiet, to suddenly grow a hatred for another country, people or race to the point of wanting to do grievous harm to them as a people? Why, an event or implication that they have greatly wronged your people and that harms your life on a personal level, of course! Again, taking the WWII example here: Many Germans were living in poverty and unemployment, and they were convinced that those other countries have wronged them in the last war, and that caused them to live in poverty and dying slowly. Whether or not that is a misconception, coupled with the above reason it makes it incredibly easy to rile massive support from the popular people for war.

(iii) Political background. A democratic government most likely cannot go to war without the unanimous support from its people. An authoritarian government (except for despotic goverments, where the leader pretty much has free rein) most likely cannot go to war without the unanimous support from its political elites. If the two above conditions are met - the people living in poverty and there are widespread xenophobia - but the government cannot convince either the people or the political elite to act on that, an aggressive war cannot happen. At least, not an aggressive total war that is likely to lead to a world war.

The above three conditions apply to the aggressor in the war. To the countries on the receiving end of the aggressive war, there is only one reason. This reason would, in extreme cases, escalate the war into a world war.

(iv) Survival at all cost from the defender's POV. When your country is being subjected to a total war from a foreign power, you would defend yourself with all what you have. If all you have cannot stop your enemies, you'll have to petition foreign countries to lend you a hand. If you are lucky enough to have some allies to jump in to help you... that's how an alliance is formed. And so the snowball would start...

A world war only happens when the two sides of the equations are met: The aggressor finds enough reason to attack, and the defender are desperate enough to petition outside help and are successful. Otherwise, either no war would happen, or it would stop at being only a bilateral or regional war.

It'll be difficult to make every country go to war with every other one at the same time; alliances form and are broken, there are economic principles to consider, and also the fact that each country will have to be careful not to appear to be a greater threat than the others until it's too late, lest the other three band together to take it out.

It is potentially interesting; you just need to think a bit to make it work.

Longstanding resentment + lots of weapons + an inciting incident = world war.

Resentment can come from a lot of things. A past war (and the results of said war), a difference in religion/language/culture/race, oppression by one side, invasion or taking over land, breaking treaties, forming alliances with enemies, any combination of these, and many things I missed.

Edit: Oh, money. Forgot that. Money, power, and tradition— the triumverate of war.

edited 12th Sep '11 6:52:53 AM by Ronka87

As I mentioned above, longstanding resentment, social unrest and all that is only a recipe for war in general, not a world war. For a world war to happen, you'll need all that factors in a large number of countries. Or in two or three major countries who pull all their allies in with them.

True, alliances are an important part of it. Also, you could have a world war if a few countries with large-spanning empires go at it.

That was actually the case with both RL world wars - the protectorates going to war because the mother nation did. Or at least, they formally went to war (Declaration of war and everything), even though in many cases the protectorates didn't see any major action, expeditionary corps aside.

Oh, and @ OP: As far-fetched as the idea of using Artifacts Of Doom in a world war setting may seem, it provides an excellent incentive for the most powerful countries to go to war to claim these rare resources. Add in a global economic downturn or two and the world powers would be at one another's throats within months.