WWI was a terible war .... chem wpns, trenches, ect ....
WWII was even larger scale .... nukes, fire storms, war on civ populations ....
None of that is even close to the wholesale destruction that modern militaries are capable of today. And I'm only talking about the "conventional" weapons. All of the technologies from WWI and II (nothing really new) have been honed to even greater desructive capabilities in the past 60 years.
Very few actually comprehend the might America and it's allies wields. The only major weakness that we have (asside from our general arrogance) is our politicians ... we put our own limiting factors on our warfare (this is both a good thing and a bad thing BTW). If America were bent on world domination, as "They" would like to attribute to us, our borders would be MUCH larger than they are. I am not arrogant enough to think that the whole world would be painted with Stars n Stripes, but the world would be unplesantly supprised if the American Dogs of War were ever unchained without restrictions.
The Gulf War was an eye opener. The Coalition (read America) shocked the world with it's capabilities. And we didn't even use the best we had at the time. Most of it was old warehouse stock. We've gotten even better in 10 years.
As a soldier (and most military personel have the same sentiment), I don't want to wage war. See soldiers know who does the actual fighting
. But we are more that willing to do so to protect our home.
Todays battlefield is nothing like Fortress Europe ever was. It is all encompasing. The Enemy can reach out and touch you from anywhere, at any time. And terrorists don't use the same level of restraint that 1st world militaries use (for the most part). People seem to think we are at Peace, but we are already at War. As for whom is to blame, that is too complicated of an answer. Would everything be better if everyone could live and let live, and "Just get along!"? Sure, but that ain't going to happen any time soon unfortunatly.