War is all around us

By Darryl Cornelius, Las Vegas

Thursday, Aug. 31, 2017 | 2 a.m.

Since the turn of the century, warfare has evolved into something that is almost beyond recognition.

Historically, war involved the traditional elements of soldiers, weapons and a battlefield. Rosa Brooks, in her recent book, “How Everything Became War, and the Military Became Everything” describes how warfare now bears little resemblance to traditional armed conflict.

Now the “soldiers” might be computer hackers, terrorists, insurgents or financiers. The battlefield now transcends all boundaries and limits. War can be anywhere and it is totally unrestricted as to location and form.

To a significant degree, we brought much of this on ourselves. For example, in Iraq we created chaos — then we abandoned chaos, creating a power vacuum which allowed ISIS to thrive.

We now live in a world where none of us is totally safe anywhere — not in a school, a mall or even a movie theater. In a world where we are battling a nameless,faceless, stateless enemy, it is hard to see how this will ever end.