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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   3050 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for March 16, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

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What is the longest golden age that we know of? We have the five good emperors of Rome around 80 years. The Pax Britannica was around 50-80 years. Pax americana - 1944-1969 - 25 years and probably something like 1986-2001.

You are using the terms in a narrower sense than normal. The Pax Romana is traditionally defined from the ascension Augustus in 27 BC to the death of Marcus Aurelius in 180 AD, 206 years. The Pax Britannica from the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 to the start of World War I in 1914, 99 years. And the Pax Americana from the end of World War II in 1945 until the Current Year, 80 years and counting.

Especially good periods seem to last about a decade; the Roaring Twenties can be dated from the end of World War I in 1918 to the start of the Great Depression in 1929, while the 90s range from the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 to September 11, 2001. Not sure how to date the 50s, though.

The 50s began on August 15, 1945, and ended on October 6, 1973. They got an extra 20 years out of that especially good period, and it was not merely "especially good" but exceptional, because the Americans were the only real winner in a major global-but-off-continent conflict (the Second European Civil War).

Calling it “European” is an understatement, but at least it describes a useful subset of the theaters.

“Civil War,” on the other hand, is completely off base. The opponents weren’t a unified state before, during or after the war. I can’t tell if you’re joking or just being contrarian.

To steelman the “European Civil War” concept, the monarchies of Europe involved in WWI were basically cousins from the same elite family.

As for WWII being similar, a case could be made that the onerous restrictions on Germany were basically a continuation of the same war but without bullets.

(Not that I believe either.)

Dynastic relations had long since ceased to matter in European statecraft by the time WWI broke out, and only the tsar had final say in kicking the war off(Britain entered due to parliament and in Germany and Austria powerful generals were pushing for war). The monarchs were also cousins due to recent intermarriage and not because they were part of the same clan.

If I had to draw the lines such that independence wars were separate, I’d look for something like participation in government—“no taxation without representation,” right? Confederates had served in the same military, sent Congressmen to the same assemblies, and otherwise participated in American institutions.

Honestly, I’m willing to class independence wars as civil wars. The American Revolution apparently counts.

I don’t know enough about Korea to speak with confidence. Did either government claim continuity with a previous controlling government? I see one source claiming that the initial border skirmishes counted as civil war. What makes you say that it “doesn’t feel strange”?

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