But it points to how the global context is changing. policymakers and a highly nationalist domestic audience: A 2014 poll by the Perth U.S.-Asia center found that 74% of Chinese think their military would win in a war with the U.S. This may be a bit of posturing both for U.S.

“A U.S.-China war is inevitable” recently warned the Communist Party’s official People’s Daily newspaper after recent military face-offs over rights of passage and artificial islands built in disputed territory. The worry is that the brewing 21st century Cold War with China and its junior partner Russia could at some point turn hot. Indeed, it’s likely China’s alleged recent hack of federal records at the Office of Personnel Management was not about cyber crime, but a classic case of what is known as “preparing the battlefield,” gaining access to government databases and personal records just in case. China built more warships and warplanes than any other nation during the last several years, while the Pentagon just announced a strategy to “offset” it with a new generation of high-tech weapons. and a newly powerful and assertive China are engaged in a massive arms race. Russian land grabs in Ukraine and constant flights of bombers decorated with red stars probing Europe’s borders have put NATO at its highest levels of alert since the mid 1980s. Keep up with everything from pay to health care by subscribing to, and get access to up-to-date pay charts and more with all latest benefits delivered straight to your inbox.Yet that risk of the past has made a dark comeback.

Read next: This 'Outstanding' Soldier Is About to Get Kicked Out of the Army - Again Stay on Top of Your Military Benefits Find more information on how to submit your own commentary. The opinions expressed in this op-ed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of. Protect yourself, and protect your family. It's not a matter of courage or masculinity. If you wouldn't go on patrol in a war zone without your helmet, don't leave home without your antivirus gear. That's more protection than ceramic armor and a helmet give a soldier. But that was a long time ago masks are widely available now.Ī good mask will prevent anywhere from 50% to 90% of Covid infections. In February when there weren't enough masks to protect our doctors and nurses, we were asked not to use scarce supplies. Mine is lighter, and cheaper it's just a simple surgical mask. I also wear anti-virus body armor, just as my daughter, a noncombatant in Afghanistan had, to wear her armor. But staying home gives me a much better chance to avoid COVID and to keep them from getting it. Even putting limits on public behavior is hard I want to go to a restaurant, want to hug my daughter, and see my son. Quarantine works, but people don't like it. With a strict quarantine, this disease would have been crushed 150,000 lives ago. Stay home lock down the economy hold until there are no new cases. The hardest tool to use in epidemiology is quarantine. Herd immunity didn't work in Sweden, and anyway, getting there will cost 100,000 lives. Far into the future, physical protection will be important to crush this bug. They are a lot more certain to give protection even than a vaccine. We do have, however, good physical defenses against COVID-19. Related: The Latest Rundown on the Military's Coronavirus Cases And it will take months upon months to line up everybody and get them protected. It will probably take two shots, a few weeks apart, to give you a good chance of immunity. It could be months before there is enough for every American. If a vaccine becomes available next month, when will you be able to get it? Not immediately.

Vaccines don't always work there is no way to know if your shot worked for you. I wouldn't cross the street if I thought there was a 1 in 200 chance it would put me in a coffin.įor now, we lack any biomedical defenses against COVID-19. Go into a crowd where there are sick people including some who don't know they're carriers. There isn't enough Regeneron for everybody the latest studies say Remdesivir doesn't help much, if at all. And about 1% of all those who get sick, well, they die. Many victims go through a week or two of agony, short of breath, aching badly, running a high fever, but then get well. My daughter caught the bug a few months ago, lost her sense of taste for two weeks, and felt poorly. Even if you've had the jab, if you get exposed to the virus you could have the chance of a coin flip of getting infected. If it's like most vaccines, it will only be 50% to 80% effective. But first, let's suppose we got a vaccine by the end of the year.

World war 3 release date