International Relations - Essay Example

The 20th century was welcomed with the Arabian war that lasted for twenty five years. The subsequent years were full of expeditions mixed with colonization of various parts of the world by powerful nations mostly from the west. The colonies in various countries started engaging their colonial masters in uprisings mixed with revolutions in the world. The main one is the Russian revolution of 1905 followed by American occupation of Cuba (Schulzinger 234). The Chinese Republican revolution of 1911 ushered in the First World War that lasted for four years.

The World War I reshaped the politics of the world because there was emergence of alliances amongst the most powerful countries of the world. The Allies made up of France, The United Kingdom and Russia, the Triple Entente, against the Central powers which was centered on the Triple Alliance of Austria-Hungary, Italy and Germany but Italy didn’t enter the war since Hungary was offensive (Bagby 65). Italy later joined the Allies. Many people died and later paved way for many revolutions even in the colonies because many soldiers were recruited from the colonies and they were now well equipped and experienced to fight the colonizers.

The war had been triggered by assassination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria by a Serbian leading to a revenge and subsequent entry of other countries that were allied to the respective countries. The Allies were victorious as the central powers led by Germany were forced to retreat. This war led to redrawing of the European map because some nations lost huge chunks of land and formation of smaller nations as a result of disintegration of major powers. The world did not get peace even after the first word war, Haitian and China Revolt followed and the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent Russian civil war the following year.

The world was shaken again in 1939 when the World War II started and when through to 1945. During this war, the Axis powers, Japan, Germany and Italy as they tried to dominate the world against the Allied powers, Britain, United States, USSR and France. The ugliest event during this war was the atomic bombs that were dropped in Japan by the US; the bombs destroyed the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the atomic bombs caused a lot of suffering to the Japanese (Rittberger 127). There haven’t been major wars again although peace is yet to be realized in the world mostly due to the tension that was caused by the cold war that sparked war in some countries like Korea.

The recent armed wars include the US invasion of Iraq, the Somali crisis that is worse due to emergence of Al shabab and subsequent entry of Kenya to try and stamp it out and the death of Osama as Al Qaeda leader. The International relations are taken care of by The United Nations that was formed after the Second World War. Among the most challenging tasks globally has been terrorism and global warming. Terrorism which is as a result of unlawful violence and war or general use of terror as means of coercion, is however politically instigated and at times used by a state to legitimize its actions against some groups.

Terrorism has been part of the current world due continued disagreements amongst the world leaders thus the many aggressions against one another in the name of