The most well-known contemporary writing on historical generation patterns comes from the duo of William Strauss and Neil Howe. Their book The Fourth Turning, published in 1997, expanded on their earlier writing about generations and postulated four generational tropes in American history. These saecula began and ended during a crisis, often wars but sometimes compounded with other factors such as severe economic depression. The major takeaway of their research is there are clear rhythms of human behavior that remain represented in modern generations. The current Millennial Generation is the Strauss-Howe heroic archetype, mirroring the GI Generation that fought in World War II and the Republican Generation that fought in the American Civil War. An implication is that the current era is a conflict period starting around 2008, and history has slotted the current Millennial Generation to address current global crises.

Implications for the Next War

“See that little stream—we could walk to it in two minutes. It took the British a month to walk to it—a whole empire walking very slowly, dying in front and pushing forward behind. And another empire walked very slowly backward a few inches a day, leaving the dead like a million bloody rugs. No Europeans will ever do that again in this generation.” “Why, they’ve only just quit over in Turkey,” said Abe. “And in Morocco —” “That’s different. This western-front business couldn’t be done again, not for a long time. The young men think they could do it but they couldn’t. They could fight the first Marne again but not this. This took religion and years of plenty and tremendous sureties and the exact relation that existed between the classes...You had to have a whole-souled sentimental equipment going back further than you could remember. You had to remember Christmas, and postcards of the Crown Prince and his fiancée, and little cafés in Valence and beer gardens in Unter den Linden and weddings at the mairie, and going to the Derby, and your grandfather’s whiskers.”

― F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tender is the Night

The work of these individuals is significant because they identify that humans as a group have a clear pattern of behavior for engaging in major conflicts. If the 50, 80, or 90 year cycles are accepted, they respectively imply that the next major conflict will occur around 1989, 2019, or 2029 based off World War II’s start year of 1939. Hearkening back to Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., the human lifespan cycle is significant, because it eliminates those who have first-hand experience with conflict. Therefore, our current cycle timeline is likely connected to the dying out of World War II veterans.[11] In this modern context, the individuals of the GI Generation have been among America’s most celebrated statesmen and would likely counsel against bellicose behavior that is only tangentially related to American national interests. Societies as a whole tend to forget the costs of war, and right now wars are fought by a warrior caste.[12] Humans need a break between conflicts to emotionally rest and economically refit.

The will to wage war has surpassed any technological advance thus far.

The suggestion that new tactics or technology are limiting factors for conflict is common in the immediate run-up to a conflict. This has consistently been disproven by the models detailed above. Currently, this is most represented by nuclear weapons and the concept of weapons of mass destruction, and to a lesser extent by cyber deterrence. However, this is just a modern iteration of the pattern of the traditional human reflection that they live in a post-conflict world due to technological advances―even though conflicts still end up breaking out again. The present patterns suggest that state regimes would refuse to employ weapons of mass destruction because of mutually assured destruction, so states will just carry out conventional war. The will to wage war has surpassed any technological advance thus far. Certainly, we are now seeing a variety of states engage in conventional war with other states. Two historical examples of post-conflict world orders that did not persevere were the Westphalian Peace and the Edwardian Era of pre-WWI European diplomatic and economic ties.

The models all suggest the next conflict will fulfill the requirements to be considered major. The goal of the models is to ignore the post-conflict literature and look at the trends―these are the only true predictor of future conflict.

We need to look at these patterns objectively―in that manner we can see the macro trends of human behavior and the tendency for major war after a set amount of peace. The next war will likely be along some sort of economic/systemic lines and include some major powers, but regional powers certainly will play an important contributing role due to globalization. The next war will involve all castes and classes; many households will be gravely affected. Current conflicts are simply the staging ground, and tactical laboratories, for whatever comes next.

If the historical cycles prove true, the next war will be a grand affair. Not in glory, but in bloodshed. We may be doomed to repeat history. Again.