AS CHINA DOES WHAT THE EMPIRE OF JAPAN TRIED TO DO IN 1939 TO EXPAND ITS TERRITORY ACROSS ASIA SO DOES CHINA IN THE 21ST CENTURY BY TAKING RESOURCES FROM ITS NEIGHBORS FROM THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS FOR OIL AND THE BORDER OF INDIA IN THE HIMALAYA FOR WATER

Whether it’s the devastation in Syria, armed skirmishes in Africa or Russia’s expansionist leanings, armed conflicts are usually seen as falling into one of very few categories; capturing territory, a political ideology attempting to dominate another or, simply, for a country to get its hands on oilfields.
But, according to one theory, whatever the stated reason for most wars, they actually come down to one reason. Or rather, one resource, which is all around us.
And with stores of this resource dwindling in some parts of the world, things could be about to get a lot worse with a potential future flashpoint being between two of the world’s nuclear armed superpowers — India and China.
Alok Jha, a British journalist with a background in physics, will speak at this weekend’s Festival of Dangerous Ideas at the Sydney Opera House about the role water has played in a multitude of conflicts including both the Arab Spring and the civil war that has engulfed Syria.
“The Roman empire and the Persian empire would go to war for access to water and would live or die by that,” Mr Jha tells news.com.au. “That doesn’t happen as blatantly anymore, it’s much more subtle.”
Part of the problem, he argues in his new book The Water Book, is we’ve managed to hide water from view and have forgotten its importance.


http://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/climate-change/this-precious-resource-leads-to-most-wars-and-armed-conflicts-and-things-are-only-getting-worse/news-story/9771c0cc08068bae5cd0cf0d4c6f1273