Global Foresight 2025 survey points to a nuclear World War III that will spill over into space

The Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security conducted its third-annual Global Foresight in the wake of the US presidential elections last year. The survey asked nearly 360 individuals from around the globe and across a range of fields “how they expect the world to change over the next ten years.”

A majority of the respondents predicted some positive outcomes for major issues concerning the world today like artificial intelligence and climate change. On a whole, 58% think AI will have a positive impact on global affairs and half predict that global cooperation will increase to tackle global warming which is seen as the biggest global threat to prosperity within the next decade.

However, there was also quite a bit of doom and gloom among the respondents about what the next ten years hold in store. Respondents were pessimistic about democracy receding, the world becoming more multipolar without multilateral institutions and settlements of the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine unlikely to achieve true peace.

Perhaps most concerning reports the Huffing Post was that over 40% of those surveyed expected there to be a global conflict on multiple fronts among the great powers. That is alarming considering that while the question didn’t come up directly in last year’s survey, a similar concern about a potential world war in ten years’ time was expressed by only a quarter of respondents at that time.

World War III could involve nuclear weapons and spread into space

The next one to three years will be a “period of maximum danger” according to former US diplomat Philip Zelikow who assigned a 20% to 30% probability to the prospect of “worldwide warfare.” The largest land war in Europe has been going on now for three years, and when this year’s Global Foresight survey was taken Israel and Hamas had not yet reached a ceasefire agreement.

Furthermore, tensions between the US and China have been on the rise while at the same time the latter has been ramping up cooperation with Russia, and they with North Korea and Iran. An escalation between the US and either China or Russia could lead to military conflict either with China trying to retake Taiwan by force or a direct clash between NATO and Russia. 65% and 69% of respondents somewhat or strongly agreed respectively that these scenarios could come to pass within the next decade.

With the exception of Iran, all have nuclear capabilities. The Islamic Republic for its part could potentially develop its own, while it says it isn’t planning to, within a year or even in a matter of months.

It should come as no surprise then that overall 48% of respondents in the Global Foresight 2025 predict that a new world war might feature the use of nuclear weapons by at least one of the actors. Of those predicting World War III, nearly two thirds expected nuclear weapons to be used.

The possibility that World War III could also play out at least in part in space was predicted by 45% of those surveyed, 60% of those predicting WWIII within ten years.

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