5GW and Global Guerrillas Theory

Externally invalid, externally invalid…

Dan, did you mean “Internally invalid, externally invalid”?

Alternatively, if GGT is correct (unlikely in my view, but possible), it would complement everything that’s been written about 5GW and the generations of war.

How so? The only extension I have tentatively made is this: that GG’s (as I understood them) would be the inept ones in a 5GW world. At the time, I had in the back of my mind the idea that any 3GW and 4GW operatives in a 5GW world would be inept, relative to those actors who actually take a 5GW approach; plus, the possibility that the environmental pressures in a 5GW world dynamic might inspire inept and bumbling efforts at 5GW; and have extended the thought to suggest, later, that GWB is an ‘inept one’. Causing large or small perturbations — loosely, in GGT, limited and localized systempunkt attacks, plus various terrorist acts — might upset or at least call into question certain rule-sets, but GGs would not be able to consciously shape the new dynamic that would result (a new but resilient order). Their diverse activities might put some pressure on the global system and lead to a shifting environment which requires new rule-sets, might in fact inspire new rule-sets (in the minds of others), but they themselves would not be able to maintain any new alignment or their sought-after and idealized order.

More recently, I’ve responded to your questions concerning normative theory, by suggesting that general standards may develop as a result of so many horizontal forces (what Robb would presumably call, bottoms up development), even without explicit vertical direction and maintenance — and this line of reasoning fits with the concept of the existence of a large number of ‘inept ones’ attempting to operate in a 5GW-aligned world. It fits with GGT as I generally understand it, since Robb appears to suggest that a volatile and chaotic world full of diverse and generally non-aligned GGs will destroy any possibility of a nation-state’s direction of affairs. General standards may develop as a result of so much diverse activity, since the activities of GGs will be shaping the world, albeit from multiple directions and without much explicit coordination, and this changing environment will in turn direct the cognitive development of these actors and others forced who live in such a world. (Robb appears to neglect any consideration of how the various GGs will be forced to re-align in reaction to a such a changing environment, however.)

Alternatively, the discussion at Shloky’s blog concerns the possibility that the vague ‘black globalization’ may in fact be anything but the end of globalization: with the implication (it seems to me) that the resulting system, which I suspect Robb might tie to the idea of an emerging global market-state, will have established rule-sets which just happen to eliminate the possibility of strong (or any) nation-states. The key to answering these questions will rest in whether such development must be largely implicit or will develop explicit understandings, i.e., whether such a system can develop without, at any time now or later, the emergence of a system of controls which have come to be accepted by a large majority of actors (GGs as well as others.) Correspondingly, the question arises: Will a system shaped by definite and strong networks of non-state actors ultimately develop into some sort of ‘cartel system’, or into a system in which vertical forces still maintain stability even if nation-states are not the players wielding that control & power? Presumably, Robb would say, NO, and that the continual emergence of GGs unhappy with any established system will maintain a ‘bazaar of violence’ disrupting such a development. If the first is more likely, 5GW efforts to direct the development of such a system, as well as to continue directing it once it emerges, are not only likely but also quite possible; if the second is more realistic, then 5GW efforts would be analogous to ‘pissing in the wind of history’ (JR), since no system of confluential development can be possible when chaos emerges continuously for no purpose whatsoever.

The assumption of a continuously emerging chaos rests on the theory that not only GGs but other actors — all individuals on the Earth — do not tie their activities to either: (1) an observation of the existing environment, (2) a vision for a future environment that can be shaped given the existing environment. It would require a ‘general standard’ of nihilism and hopelessness. If GGT rests on such a possibility, then it would necessarily suggest, also, that so much diverse and non-aligning activity will ultimately inhibit the formation of any coherent understanding of the environment, for the great majority of individuals living on the Earth.