5 Comments

1. Kevin:

   Stan,
   Check out this video game.

   Frontlines: Fuel of War Trailer
   Frontlines: Fuel of War Trailer (pt2)

   Go to the game’s website and view the timeline; it is a scary warning.

   26 February 2008, 4:37 pm

2. Kevin:

   Frontlines: Fuel of War Timeline

   2006

   The beginning of the Long Emergency, global peak oil extraction is reached. Oil prices begin an irrevocable rise that slowly begins to weigh on global economies and leads political leaders to increasingly place energy at the forefront of national policies.

   2007

   Ukraine joins the EU. A process of pulling the strategically valuable former soviet republics away from Russia and integrating them into the EU and NATO has begun, much to the chagrin of the Russians.

   2008

   Democratic Socialist movements have swept through every nation in South America, the continents nations build strong trade and aid agreements and weather the coming economic downturns quite well.

   After several years of civil war that has severely undermined the civilian government, the US declares martial law in Iraq. Widespread suppression of dissent and massive military action against insurgents allows US forces to make permanent their fortifications. Iraq effectively becomes a US overseas protectorate and a semi-reliable flow of oil is established from the countries oil fields. However, because the occupiers can do little to stop the bloody civil war raging between the countries Sunni’s and Shias, the conflict rapidly spreads to neighboring countries.

   Global Influenza Pandemic; first of many subsequent H5N1 avian influenza outbreaks kills thousands, mainly in South East Asia, and causes tightened borders, and paranoia. The disease will continue to outbreak for the next 10 years.

   The government of Afghanistan, already straining under insurgencies invites US/NATO forces to establish permanent bases in Afghanistan.

   2009

   Insurgents attempt to overthrow the government of Pakistan. Civil war ensues, threatening to tear apart the country. Only the intervention of US/NATO forces from neighboring Afghanistan secures the government.

   Georgian Republics, Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia join EU, against the strong protestations of Russian Federation. NATO member states iterate their commitment to reinforce the independence of those republics, much to the satisfaction of the US and EU oil companies who are pumping oil from the region.

   The Sunni/Shia conflict raging across the Middle East depends as Iran and Saudi Arabia fight a proxy war against each other using ethnic and religious militants who launch bloody insurgencies in each country, terrorizing the civilian populations and causing shocking amounts of infrastructure damage. Only the presence of the US military sitting between them in Iraq prevents them from going to all-out-war. World oil prices, already high, begin to surge based upon fears that any widening of the conflict could drastically reduce oil production.

   2010

   Attempted coup by pro-US, CIA backed military officers in Venezuela fails and US involvement is revealed to the international community. The US retaliate with economic embargoes and surgical military action intended to cripple the economy and topple the regime. However, because of their solidarity with fellow South American countries, the country survives. Later that year the League of South American Free States is formed. Based mainly of Brazilian agricultural might and affordable Venezuela oil, the League is much stronger than anticipated.

   The first of several large scale pro-democracy, pro-liberalization movements in China are brutally crushed. Over the coming years all of the major powers come to resemble military police states to some degrees. Secret police tactics result in massive civil unrest and domestic terrorism in all major states.

   The EU builds large scale fortifications and military bases in the newly joined states of Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. While officials downplay the significance of the build up, they are obviously geared towards protecting against the Russian Federation and securing access to the Caspian Basin oil reserves in these countries.

   2011

   The superpowers pick sides in the escalating Sunni/Shia war. China and Iran sign a deal to trade arms and oil, thereby providing Shia forces with a nearly limitless supply of arms, including (secretly) Chinese nuclear technology. Conversely, the Western Powers arm the Saudi’s, and their Sunni proxies, against the Iranians and the Shia militias they support. Because of the influx of high tech military weaponry, the conflict expands to include outbreaks of conventional air and land combat, as well as the use of high tech weapons against civilians.

   Massive global recession. Political developments in the Middle East, rapidly falling oil yields, repeated disease outbreaks, and environmental degradation cause inflation and a recession across the globe. In 2nd world countries with less robust economies and larger populations, particularly China and Russia, this results in severe, violent political unrest, and large-scale anti-government insurgency. Martial law becomes all-but-officially permanent in these countries. In many parts of the developing world, particularly Africa, nations crumble and a new age of anarchy begins. Starvations on a hitherto unseen, massive scale occur. In other countries, many in South America, robust micro-economies allow much of the population to thrive.

   2013

   Iran/Saudi war spreads across region, erupts into direct conflict. Smaller Middle Eastern nations like Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan disintegrate, anarchy ensues. Iranian and Saudi forces clash over and on the Persian Gulf, and across the lawless deserts of Eastern Iraq. US forces in country can only retreat to their fortifications and continue to protect the oil supply.

   Severe climate change ends seasonal weather predictability in many parts of the world causing intense strain on ecosystems, and massive devastation of dependant human populations as crops fail and food stocks disappear. Massive starvation, hitherto unseen in modern human history breaks out in Africa; entire populations disappear, nations crumble, wide spread anarchy ensues. The rest of the world looks on in horror.

   Journalists reveal that Israel has been heavily arming and covertly aiding both sides of the Sunni/Shia conflict against each other. International outrage, particularly in Iran and Saudi Arabia is extreme, and both countries retaliate with conventional and guerrilla attacks against Israel. Israel strikes back against all of its neighbors, the final act that engulfs the entire region in bloody war.

   Following the assassination of its dictator by Islamic militants, Pakistan disintegrates into chaos and tribalism. Only the capitol and certain strategic and urban areas remain under ‘government’ control, mostly with US/NATO and Indian assistance. NATO Fortifies bases in Afghanistan and US Troops prop up the ramping forces of the government in Pakistan.

   US Energy corporations gin a long term deal with Turkmenistan to exploit selected oil reserves along the Caspian Sea, and to ship it out via a new pipeline through occupied Afghanistan and Pakistan.

   2014

   The world is stunned as a three-way nuclear war between Israel, Saudi Arabia and Iran decimates all three countries. Major cities and large tracts of previously inhabited land are rendered radioactive dead zones. Intermittent oil extraction continues from a few remote, well-fortified oil fields, mainly those held by foreign powers in Iran, Iraq and the Saudi desert.

   Middle Eastern oil production, already low, falls dismally. The industrial economies of the world, which are floundering in a recession, still attempting transformation to post-petroleum sustainability, are thrown into full-scale depression, the likes of which haven’t been seen since the 1930s.

   Global warming begins to cause the oceans to rise noticeably. Coastal populations in Europe, North America and China begin semi-orderly migrations inland. In less developed countries flooding kills millions who cannot go anywhere else.

   An “EU” style trade block forms in North America, called NAFU, the North American Free Union that includes Canada, The United States and parts of Mexico.

   2015

   The North American military begins hijacking foreign oil tankers leaving South American ports, setting off open hostilities between the two. Retaliations by South American intelligence agencies within the North American states serve as a pretext to justify invasion and NAFU troops attempt to seize key assets within Venezuela and Columbia. The League’s military and intelligence forces, bolstered by modern Chinese arms foil the attacks and inflict severe losses on the North American attackers. The North American command retaliates with a small number of strategic strikes on key SA assets. A militarized zone between the two blocks, in Central America, is established and fortified.

   China and India skirmish several times, as do US and Chinese troops at the borders between China and Pakistan/Afghanistan. Tensions between China and India drive the latter into an alliance with the US designed to show a united front against increasing Chinese aggression in the area.

   Petrochemical revenues from the Caspian Basin oil beds result in the Central Asian Republics, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, becoming “The New Middle East” as they become more prosperous economically and correspondingly more powerful in the world community. Some of these countries, such as Kazakhstan, use the wealth to industrialize.

   Russia and China, as well as a few smaller states in the region, form the Red Star Alliance, a framework for joint military operations under a single command structure, as well as energy and technology sharing agreements.

   2016

   US Strategic Missile Defense goes online, making North America invulnerable to long and medium range strategic weapons. This immediately cools any hints of aggression by the Red Star Alliance, specifically in Central Asia, as the US nuclear arsenal serves as a trump card and deterrent.

   Continuing pandemics of disease sweep the globe causing casualties in the hundreds of millions.

   The NATO member countries plus Afghanistan, Pakistan and India form the Western Coalition (WC), ostensibly as a bulwark against increasing Red Star Chinese power in Central Asia, but actually as a way of synergizing mutual energy resources and the forces required to secure them. The entire coalition is brought under the strategic defense shield.

   2017

   Surrounded by desperate, hostile populations, and extracting ever dwindling amounts of oil at rapidly increasing cost from all-but-depleted deposits, the foreign powers evacuate their remaining forces and leave the Middle East. What little population and last vestiges of civilization that remain disintegrate into a tribal wasteland.

   2018

   Despite high tech solutions and centralized management, the major powers are unable to sustain agricultural yields sufficient to support subsistence levels for their populations. Starvation begins to become commonplace in developed countries.

   Economists agree that the global depression has become more or less permanent. Previous economic models that relied upon supply/demand, industrial output and the flexibility of free markets are unable to account for energy depletion, environmental collapse, over population, and societal disintegration. Radical voices claim that the are simply not enough resources to support a recovery for the entire global population and that war is the inevitable outcome.

   2019

   Under great pressure from their Russian and Chinese neighbors, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan surrender their neutrality and join the Red Star Alliance. The Western Coalition Authority is stunned and cannot stop them. Red Star Command begins to aggressively extract oil and ship it out of the new member countries.

   The winter of 2019 brings catastrophic weather that kills millions, and leaves many regions uninhabitable. Tropical countries experience deep freezes, and storms of hitherto unseen ferocity pound coastlines.

   2020

   Russian Missile Defense comes online only four years after the US, Russia brings Red Star allies under its missile defense shield. ICBM and medium range missiles effectively useless, making strategic nuclear war between the superpowers obsolete. Nuclear arsenals, already small through limitation treaties, are re-tooled for tactical use.

   Superpowers initiate conventional military build up in Central Asia.

   2021

   Globe hails good news as treaty between Red Star and Western Coalition ends long, inconclusive conflict along Chinese/Pakistani/Afghan border in South Asia. Leaders from both powers make rhetorical pledges to stand down from conflict and concentrate on problems at home, while simultaneously escalating arms race.

   The pro-Red Star government of Turkmenistan is overthrown in a bloodless coup, and the new government stuns its Red Star allies and cedes from the Red Star Alliance. The government then awards oil extraction contracts to WC energy corporations and allows WC security forces into the country to protect the extraction operations. Oil that once flowed north to Russia and West to China now flows south to WC ports in Pakistan, bound for the industrial heartland of the developed nations.

   A ‘super-hurricane’ so powerful that a new category of intensity must be created for it, forms in the pacific and devastates the west coast of North America from Alaska to Portland.

   2023

   The Turkmen oil flowing to the Western Coalition countries benefits their desperate populations.

   2024

   The deposed regime of Turkmenistan, in exile in Moscow, offers proof of Coalition backing of the coup that overthrew them, and appeals to the International Community to restore them in their countries. They are rebuffed despite Chinese and Russian lobbying. Red Star troops aided by the deposed dictator of Turkmenistan are air dropped into the major cities and seize control of the key strategic assets in the country including oil fields, government infrastructure, communications networks, and the security apparatus.

   May 2024

   Using extensive intelligence about the country, Red Star Commandos are dropped and inserted into strategic areas of Turkmenistan including the main ministries in the capital city, and strategically important energy sources. The country is cut off the power grid, and easily paralyzed. WC forces in the country are killed in ambush, or mount a fighting retreat back (N1) to safer territory on the Afghan border.

   Meanwhile, two large Red Star large invasion forces are sent in to Turkmenistan, one from Russia, one from China, via Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan respectively, to reinforce the occupying troops and shore up the returning dictatorship. However, WC special forces use the high mountains of Uzbekistan to ambush and destroy one of the large tank columns before it arrives to the front (N2). The result is a tenuous occupation of the country by the RS.

   June 2024

   The WC launch a heavy counter attack from Afghanistan which advances deep into Turkmenistan and sweeps aside the occupying forces. WC and RS space command forces clash, destroying much of both sides’ surveillance and communications abilities.

   Now taking the offensive, the WC strikes and decimates the main body of the second Red Star convoy that is entering northern Turkmenistan. Before the RS forces in Kazakhstan can regroup and dig in to defend, The WC front pushes forward over the border into that country, striking opportunely at Red Star industrial support infrastructure (N3) and crippling the Red Star frontline. The maneuver catches the entire RS command off guard, forcing surviving RS units to retreat back over the border into Russia, expecting reinforcements to assist them in shaking WC close in pursuit. The conflict escalates to full fledges war as WC and RS forces in other parts of the world, including along the Pakistan/China border, in the South China Sea, along the EU/Russian Border, with both sides taking heavy losses, but neither able to advance.

   July 2024

   Almost unopposed, the WC frontline advances across the border into Russia from Kazakhstan. The Russians try desperately to stop their advance using tactical nuclear weapon strikes (N4) but are unable to halt the advance because of lack of effective intelligence about WC positions. WC forces moving north along the Caspian sea again defy expectation, turning south to strike at RS Southern Russian command who are dug in against the Caucasus Mountains. WC attack choppers sweep through or evade RS air defenses and destroy RS forces approaching the front. WC Troops chase the RS back to their central command headquarters, a Soviet era deep mountain fastness closely linked to a nearby ICBM silo, located within the highlands of the North Caucasus Mountains. There they lay siege to the fortification and capture the RS southern command (N6).

   Preparing for a new offensive in Tajikistan the RS army builds up forces in Western China and moves them closer to the Afghan border. However, WA and Indian troops rapidly strike into China attacking through and over the mountains on the Pakistan/Chinese border, catching Red Star forces on their flank, causing devastating loses and huge disruptions of supply and support lines. Local insurgents who have been fighting for Western Chinese independence armed with WA supplied weapons, join in and inflict heavy losses on Red Star forces inside China. Western China erupts in civil war, and the Red Star units invading Central Asia are withdrawn home to restore control.

   With WC troops occupied with the Fighting in Central Asia, the RS launch a long prepared for invasion of Taiwan. WC forces from the Philippines and Guam are airlifted to the island to mount a desperate defense against the huge invasion force, while American air and naval power engage the invaders on and over the China Sea. Despite, brutal fighting, the Invasion is successful. WC and Taiwanese commandos continue to launch strikes against the invasion force from within the mountainous center of the island. Taiwan is all but leveled by the fighting and bombardment. However, the invasion proves costly to the Red Star Alliance, as it engages a huge amount of Chinas focus and distracts them from reinforcing the Central Asian and Russian front.

   August 2024

   Having removed the Russians from the Caucasus, the WC command finishes the job by striking across the top of the black sea at the flank of RS forces reinforcing the conflict on the Russia EU border. With the crippling or surrender of these elements, the RS command in Russia has severely limited forces with which to further defend the territorial integrity of the country. All units are with drawn back to the Russian heartland and deployed for defense of the nation.

   As soon as hostilities break out between China and Taiwan, the North Koreans launch a pre-emptive artillery bombardment of South Korea, triggering a catastrophic mixed conventional nuclear bombardment of the whole peninsula. Civilian casualties are massive and the infrastructure of both countries is destroyed. WC troops stationed on the DMZ, largely protected by their fortifications, hold off the invasion force of North Korean and Chinese troops trying to unite the two countries, often using tactical nuclear weapons.

   September 2024

   In a bold, desperate move to cripple Russia before the Chinese reinforce them, WC troops take advantage of an unseasonably early spring thaw and mount a surprise invasion of the Russian heartland. WC Forces in southern Russia strike north into the industrial heartland where they cripple the countries primary energy and industrial production facilities.

   Russian armored units, artillery, and tactical nuclear strikes inflict severe losses on advancing US/EU forces. However, US/EU eventually establishes air and space superiority, and utilizes it to force the Russians back to the suburbs of Moscow (N7). WC troops march on the city, despite Russian use of tactical nuclear weapons to slow them, and a series of bloody battles are fought inside the city limits, culminating in the Western Coalition capture of the city, and the seat of Russian government (N8). The Russian Federation offers a conditional surrender which includes deactivation of their missile defense shield.

   October 2024

   Russian Red Star forces in Siberia and eastern Russia refuse to surrender and fall back to the Ural mountains where they are met by reinforcements from Siberia. The Russian military command structure declares itself the Russian government in exile, and fortifies the eastern portion of the country with the assistance of China.

   Red Star Alliance and WC representatives meet to sign a ceasefire. The War is over for now.

   26 February 2008, 4:48 pm

3. Kevin:

   World of Frontlines

   The world of Frontlines, circa 2024, is the dark depressed result of the excesses and missteps of 20th century modernism. Overpopulation, environmental decay, technology, and the erosion of civil political structures have left the world a dangerous, chaotic place.

   Two inextricably linked core dynamics have come to exert the greatest influence over the state of the world in 2024; overpopulation and environmental decay/depletion. The swelling of humanity beyond 7.5 billion members has placed insurmountable strain on the global ecology’s ability to support life. The climate system, stressed by years of pollution, changed beyond how anyone’s computer models had predicted. Forests died, plains turned to deserts, glaciers melted, dry places became flooded, and most importantly, weather patterns changed drastically. The old, familiar, natural weather cycles were turned up their ears; snows fell in deserts, annual rains never fell again, and a new climactic chaos was set in motion. The effects rippled out into the world of human affairs: crops and water sources failed causing starvation, migration, and conflict. Economic and population support systems that were thousands of years old were suddenly left without the basic natural capital that had fuelled them and sustained their dependants.

   Additionally, the depletion of global petrochemical resources has brought an end to the once steadily increasing supply of cheap energy. As large deposits of oil, gas, and coal ran out, there were increasingly aggressive moves to tap smaller deposits as fast as possible, with soaring commodity prices providing the incentive. Nations often fought over energy stocks that were previously held to be marginal. Many small states, such as Venezuela in South America, and the Central Asian ‘-istans’, saw energy booms as their once modest energy resources became highly valuable, and their global political capital increased. This in turn sparked a brief period of modernization and prosperity, at least for a small class of elites, before their deposits were drained and they returned to their previously economic status.

   The pressures that overpopulation has put upon natural and economic resources combined with dwindling energy supplies extracted a huge toll on the once mighty system of states and super states. In many places in the less developed world, such as Africa and South East Asia, many once powerful states ceased to exist in any meaningful way, having disintegrated into a jumble of wild lands, tribal coalitions and warlord fiefdoms. For instance much of Indonesia, wrecked and deforested by over exploitation, is an archipelago of the dark, dangerous pirate kingdoms that war with each other, and vie for the right to plunder intruders and neighbors. In other parts, such as Central Asia and the Middle East, the integrity of states have has only been maintained the outside influence of another state, sometimes as assistance of alliance, sometimes as assimilation or through a puppet government. In case of Afghanistan, the former NATO countries, the Western Coalition, have all but occupied and annexed it to use a secure staging ground to protect their energy extraction operations in the region.

   In the developed world, the death of energy has shortened the reach and power of nation states, weakening the superpowers, which are less able to project their power at great distances from their borders, and forcing lesser states into alliances or subservient roles in order to acquire the resources needed to maintain their sovereignty. Because of this, the superpowers have been weakened vis-vis each other, but strengthened relative to smaller states. In general, a new regionalism has taken over which forces states to deal more directly with their neighbors, reversing the trends of globalization that had been on the rise for decades previously. Wars, both small and large, are frequently fought on almost every continent, and all in its first 24 years, the 21st century is on pace to greatly surpass the vast death tolls of the 20th century before it.

   In practically all nations, rich to poor, a steady process of Brazilification, in which the middle class disappears, and the gulf between the upper and lower classes widens. This resulted in massive civil unrest and internal conflict, with the poor railing against the unequal distribution of scare resources and the rich using technology and the tools of the state to preserve their status. Where the states were strong this resulted in increasing government repression and the dwindling of civil rights and basic freedoms. In other cases the state was overthrown, was co-opted by extremist political forces advocating change of varying degrees, or merely disintegrated into class warfare. In general, a new totalitarianism is seen, particularly in states like Russia and China, which have historical precedents and cultural dispositions towards it. In the ‘freer’ parts of the developed world, ever more sophisticated technological methods of social engineering and consent manufacture are needed to quell the increasing unrest of a population raised with the ideas of democracy and freedom. Increasingly, government use of disinformation and propaganda gives way to outright force used to stop dissent. All of the developed nations are guilty of the use of coercive violence against disruptive elements in their own populations, and all come to resemble police states in some way. This trend facilities the increasing power of the military class within these societies, with the corresponding weakening of the ability of civilian government institutions to oversee them.

   Countries that found themselves unable to compete for dwindling energy and natural resources were forced to deal with the reality of a dwindling energy supply first. Places like India adopted cheap, efficient, often high-tech alternative energy sources like solar, wind, and bio-fuel, to meet the needs of daily life, much of which was adopted by individuals and neighborhoods on a local level. In the developed world, where populations were much more accustomed to the luxuries of a cheap energy economy, many shocking changes in lifestyle accompanied the rising scarcity of energy. For all but a small global elite, a smaller scale of daily life becomes the norm. The extravagant energy uses of the previous age, such as casual long distance travel, overly illuminated cities and single passenger vehicles were exchanged for efficient solutions that were practical and durable. People relearned how to grow food and make things last. For the lucky ones who lived in places that were spared disasters and catastrophic changes, a simpler life was adopted, gladly. For much of the underdeveloped world no amount of adaptation would delay the inevitable: a massive kill-off. Places in much of Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia simply had too many people. Diseases and starvation wiped out whole families and cultures, cities burned, and where it still could, nature tired to reassert itself over civilized lands.

   The ‘super-state’ coalitions formed as energy related federations of states, much like the way the European Union was first formed to deal with steel trade issues, they formed in the interest of pooling influence in order to mutually secure energy resources, although pretence to other collective objectives was sometimes half-heartedly offered. The idea being that if there is only enough energy for half the world, then the half of the world that bands together to secure it have the best chance of doing so. The current arrangement was based upon a diplomatic convenience: it would be easier for Russia and China to ally with each other and split the Central Asian oil reserves that lay between them than it would be for them to fight over them, which would most certainly lead to mutual destruction and the ceding of the oil to their enemies by default. Russia also felt that a seemingly inevitable conflict with China over the Russian territory of Siberia would be easier to avoid/mitigate of the Chinese were kept close at hand, and were thus easier to monitor. The result however, was practically the same, as immigrants from Chinas swelling population ended up filling the population gap in Siberia left by Russia’s population decline. Siberia became Chinese once again.

   The Western Coalition was a much more natural union; the NAFU countries and the EU have already been allies in NATO for most of the previous century. Indeed the entire NATO framework was merely reinvigorated to form the foundation of the Coalition when the Red Star Alliance formed and started aggregating energy in Central Asia. As there was little in the way of territorial tension, the Coalition was much more stable and active in pursuing its interests aboard. Powerful allies like India, Pakistan, and Japan were attracted imply because they were threatened by the Red Star Alliances existence. However, the main problem of the Alliance was in its scattered nature, its constituent nations were far from the strategic objectives they sought to control. In the end, when resources were scarce, the Coalition wasted much energy aboard that it could have used at home. Regions such as Canada and California, that could support their populations with domestic resources, found themselves sacrificing these resources to fund acquisition projects in far flung places, many of which were failures. This caused much internal pressure to fracture the coalition, much of which has never been resolved.

   Finally, if there was one shining, 21st century example of human adaptability and enlightenment it was the South American Socialist Federation. Perhaps because they had started encountering problems of scarcity, poverty, and state terrorism earlier than much of the world, the governments of South America took many admirable steps to maintain and protect the populations of their territories. Enlightened policies of resource distribution and sharing, equitable trade and ownership laws, many of them quite radical, allowed for many of the hardships felt in rest of the world to be avoided. Despite the immense destruction they brought, the imperialistic attacks by the North American States served only to reinforce a communal identity in South America which translated into an enlightened group effort to overcome the hardships that followed.

   Daily Life

   Despite the changes to modern and no-so-modern lifestyles, life does go on in the world of Frontlines. However there are some major differences between how it is experienced in the developed world and the non-developed world. In many ways the crisis of the 21st century has lead to a blending of innovative high tech solutions with a re-adoption of old, traditional ways of doing things.

   In the developed world the scarcity of energy has resulted in a re-evaluation of the priorities of the capitalist, consumer economic model. While many of the products and advancements of modernism are of great benefit, many of the imperatives of the economic model; unlimited growth, synthesizing of unnecessary consumer demand, rampant materialism, and massive waste, are what lead to the state of the world in the first place. The first changes that accompanied the depression and the dwindling of the energy supply did away with wasteful habits; easy individual transportation, extravagant and/or unproductive uses of energy, disposable consumer products designed with planned obsolescence, personal acquisitions of unlimited wealth, and the whole culture of decadence that was encouraged by late capitalism. There simply was enough of anything to waste. Manufacturing slowed drastically and the pace of progress in society slowed, but goods were made with durability in mind, and re-use, recycling, and refurbishment is introduced into the economic process. Additionally, multi-use products that can fill a number of rules replace specialized products. In the developed world old low-technology for the basic needs of life reappears: rain barrels for catching water, domestic animals commonly kept for food, rooftop gardens in cities, recreational properties turned to sustenance production, and barter for local crafts and services exchanged. The scale and scope of lives gets smaller with people adopting public transit, often itself hi-tech and efficient, and living within its bounds. There is vastly less long distance trade and imported products become rare. Solar stills for condensing moisture or purifying salt water become common in every house. The rooftop solar panel becomes the icon of the age and is more often the sole source for domestic power; lives are lived within the energy means it provides. People learn to make do, somehow.

   In the developed world, and for the ruling classes in the non-developed world, a mixture of efficient hi-tech amenities, such as computers, phones, and entertainment appliances, are still available to those who can afford them, as are remarkable pharmaceuticals and health services are a privileged few. The upper classes use technology to segregate themselves from the lower classes and to surveil and keep data on the population.

   Old structures that were built with outmoded energy requirements, such as requiring an electric elevator, special climate controls, or requiring electric lighting to be useful, became obsolete. Cities are arbitrarily retooled for efficiency with some structures being reclaimed or repurposed. As energy gets more expensive, human labor replaces automated or motorized power in manufacturing and construction. Culture drifts back to streets and neighborhoods, away from media and networks.

   Climate conditions also affected people’s daily lives. In many places water shortages occurred for the first time in areas that had always been well supplied. As the earth warmed, the tropical climate band at the equator started to creep towards the tropics, absorbing once temperate lands. New crops had to be acquired and seasonal variations observed.

   In the non-developed world things are bleaker. In many places the larger population has bent the environment’s ability to sustain them to breaking, and massive depopulation occurs. Gradually life resumes with the survivors, who are more accustomed to sustaining themselves modestly amid adversity, having less competitors for their means of survival. Scarcity of previously available natural resources, such as wood, means that people concoct previously unheard of methods of recycling of common wasted products and disposable trash left over from the wasteful consumer phase. Landfills are dug up and their contents are forced into usefulness by sheer desperate necessity.

   26 February 2008, 5:07 pm

4. gdenby:

   Those of us who went thru the ’70s energy crisis I’m sure find a certain pleasure at seeing this article still being as applicable now as then, if not more-so. I will pick a nit, tho’.

   “People on their feet are more or less equal…”

   The contemporary inequality Illich describes is just that “more or less” multiplied thru history. The difference between a quick gatherer or a swift hunter and a slow one could be life or death.

   Illich’s points about the illusory gains made by spending ever more energy moving from place to place are good. In an essay (from ’99, I believe), “2050: THE END OF THE GROWTH ERA? ” by A. Johansen and D. Sornette, the authors describe how the super-exponential growth of both human population and economic activity point to a terminal crisis by 2050, give or take ten years. In other words, we are all using whatever means to accelerate to a point where all resources are gone. They end by commenting that while inter-planetary travel might avert the disaster, “primitive” societies that came to value meaning in life beyond material accumulation is a more likely successful strategy.

   28 February 2008, 1:46 pm

5. nymaa reading group:

   for those illich fans in the nyc area, we will be discussing “Ivan Illich in Conversation” at this month’s meeting of the reading group of the New York Metro Alliance of Anarchists:

   Discussion:
   “Ivan Illich in Conversation” by David Cayley
   A wide-ranging collection of interviews with the influential christian anarchist philosopher and social critic Ivan Illich, most famous for his work Deschooling Society.

   Location: Earth Matters Cafe, 177 Ludlow St. just below Houston. F Train to 2nd Ave., JMZ Trains to Essex/Delancey St.

   ***

   All are welcome! You don’t have to be in the New York Metro Alliance of Anarchists to take part.
   Join the NYMAA Reading Group e-mail list by sending an email to nymaa-reading-subscribe@lists.riseup.net
   The NYMAA Reading Group is open to all those interested in studying anarchism– while some participants have read widely in anarchist theory and history, no prior knowledge of anarchism is expected. We have been meeting monthly since November ’06 and select readings collectively.

   Also, check out upcoming meetings of our friends in the Noam Chomsky and Anarcho-Syndicalism meetup.com reading group , at nchomsky.meetup.com/105 .

   29 February 2008, 3:45 pm

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