A Tanked Think About Oil Intrigue, Islam and the Next Century.

A Call for Your Ideas - How do you see history playing out over the next 6 days, 6 months or 60 years?

It is widely acknowledged that time is finite with a beginning and therefore logically an end but the history of mankind within finite time is a continuum of cause and effect begetting cause and effect. The search for root causes only leads the seeker farther and deeper into the rabbit’s warren of history where it is revealed that events occur with unending and often unforeseen consequences. Therefore, to understand the present, we must begin at the beginning and in the beginning….

As your eyes glaze over and your lids droop and your mind wanders, relax, keep reading, we’re going to assume that we all know world history particularly since the American and French Revolutions. We will assume that all readers are familiar with the fundamentalist Wahhabists in Arabia, the development of the steam engine, the rise and fall of colonial empires, the invention of the flying machine, the Great War, the rise of Communism, the fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Great depression, the Weimar Republic, the rise of the third Reich, the origins of the Muslim Brotherhood, World War Two, the creation of the United Nations, the decline of Western Christianity coincident with the rise of socialism and multiculturalism, the invention of the satellite, the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the fall of the Soviet Empire, the creation of the internet, and the resurgence of fundamentalist Islam and Islamic terror at the end turn of the 21^st century. So, with the barest, most elementary knowledge of our modern history, and the premise that the pursuit of wealth and power are primary movers of mankind, let us vainly amuse ourselves with idle speculation as to what our future holds.

The steam engine, the airplane, the satellite and the internet have transformed Earth into a much smaller world and a much larger marketplace for mankind. In the 21^st century, will the dispersed men of Babel come together in the bazaars and the boardrooms of the world? Will there be a new cold war pitting old enemies against each other? Will nonaligned nations take over the United Nations? Will the UN cease to exist? Will India and China forge new trade or security alliances? Will Africa descend into total chaos and anarchy or into the rigid chains of Islam? Will climate change and rising sea levels dislocate millions and with what consequences?

Let your imagination run wild. How do you see globalization, emerging energy markets, trade wars, cold wars, hot wars, the clash of civilizations and the next set of causes and effects? The pursuit of wealth and power have always been the essential motivators for mankind . Where is that pursuit leading us and as Donald Rumsfeld posed the question, “What are the known knowns, the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns? Don’t worry about submitting award winning essays, simple opinions and your informed questimates will do.