An interesting poll from the website of Al Jazeera.

Depends who the superpower is. And what 'safe' means - safe from what?

As Aelia has said, It depends on the super-power and what exactly they believe safe to be. Comunism could be an ideal economy for a country except for the fact that in many countries where it is practiced the government becomes corrupt and greedy. This leads to the smaller priviledged upper class beauracracy(sp?) and a lower class society doomed to poverty.

I selected 'Not sure'. With a single super power there's no real risk of a massive war, read World War III, but there might be an increased risk of things like terrorism. Any militant opposition to this super power would be(/is?) scattered groups with little to no connection to each other. They're more likely to be terrorists or guerilla soldiers than an conventional army. And as such they don't have to worry about 'mutual destruction' when it comes to nuclear weapons since they, rarely, have a country or population to defend.

A world with only one superpower would only be 'safe' if everyone agreed with it or that it had so much power that no one would dare to oppose it. But that depends on what you mean by 'safe'.

I chose not sure, because the closest the world came to having a single superpower was the roman empire and then people were only safe if they acted as the government wanted them to, otherwise they were taken care of, but if they did so they were safe, so in my opinion it would depend on that one superpowers government, and what exactly is meant by safe.

Not sure I think it depends on :"Be safer from what"?

To be more precise:

1. If the world is divided by countries and each countries is self-governed: NO

2. If the world is united into one single country, like the country of Earth (example): Yes.

3. If I am elected as the leader of condition #2: HELL, YES! :D

As long as americans arent in charge itll be safe ;)

Svaerdhelgon, it's not that Americans are more full of themselves, or more power hungry than other world leaders. It's just that they don't hide it as well. :D

Hehe nice one...

According to my kind of logic the world would be a safer place with 2 or more superpowers. Particularly when the nuclear bomb is in the equation.
During the cold war the two powers USA and USSR were keeping each other chess mate (correct expression???). A direct war would lead to mutual destruction, well the two power of cause had to test their powers against each other (Afghanistan, Vietnam, etc.), but newer a full-scale direct battle. Even during an as difficult crisis as the Cuban one they eventually came to an understanding.
Today you see at world with the USA as a lone super power, and they do pretty much what they like (e.g. the war on Iraq, nine out of ten world citizens were against the war).
The war on Iraq isn’t a very big problem to the world safety. But other aspects of the American foreign policy are, mainly concerning North Korea and Israel/Palestine/Iran.
As for North Korea the American refuse to declare the war over, there is only a truth (sp?), during the last couple of decades there has been launched embargo after embargo onto the poor Asian country. And as of lately they have been announced as a part of the axis of evil, which we have seen gives USA the right to attack in “self-defense”. That would not be a problem to world safety if it weren’t for the fact that North Korea has got the potential to build a nuclear boom. If we hypothetically imagine that the US were to continue the strict line that specific “enemy”, then N K would find them selves in a situation where they are being pushed toward to possible lines of action. One possibility is that they were to surrender and admit the failure of their glorious communism, unlikely.
The other possibility is; some psyco communist leader will choose to go out with a bang, likely.
The Israel/Palestine/Iran is a much longer story but it comes down to: Israel and Iran are both having a large range of mass destruction weapons. The Americans killing Muslims all around the world and giving Israel weapon and money. At some point it will be too much to take for the Arabic pride and they will go too war over Palestine. Unless something is done in a near future, and with the work we have seen from Bush so fare doesn’t indicate that anything will happen soon.
If we hypothetically were to imagine that the USSR still were standing and with a military capacity that could match the US. Do any of you honestly think that an American president would announce that the US is aloud to attack anyone who poses a potential treat?

I don't know how much sense this makes, it is rather late in denmark right now...

Don't blame all americans, just Bush

Yes. Eventually.

Zaros, that's stale mate :D

A couple super powers so they can balance one another out, even with america being the biggest one we still have other countries that can compete with us if not alone then together. A monopoly on anything isn't very good.

That's why i think that the biggest threat in the future to the USA is probably going to be the EU. Not now because we are still to devided on things but we have seen some signs that the American gouvernment (the current one) is trying to hold off advancement by causing some internal problems in the EU. Let alone that the member states still have to work out some things.

But imagine what a truly united Europe would mean to the US. Another economical block with as much military power as them.

[ 12-03-2003, 10:57 AM: Message edited by: the new JR Jansen ]

A truly united Europe ? Heh, can elephants fly ? :D

Sometimes, i know i saw some doing that once, could have been the stimulantes i took though :D .

But seriously, IF it should ever happen, wouldn't that make Europe the biggest threat to the US. Look at what they are doing with the European military proposals and how they are trying to stop that from happening. Claming it would be a threat to NATO, HA.

Curse, my bloody government. They give people a bad view of a fine nation.

There always needs to be a bad guy in the world. The "little" guy always needs an opponent to triumph over.

It's just the US's turn. It will pass.

Look, I'll take the embarrassment I currently sometimes feel for living in the US and being a bully over the fear of nuclear war I felt growing up. To me, having your kids exposed to too much over-sexed Brittney Spears is much less of a problem than having them exposed to movies like "The Day After" as a grade schooler.

When Australia becomes the world superpower with me in charge then the world will be a better place

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