U.S. warships in Gulf for training "In one of the largest, most visible war games America has staged in the Persian Gulf since the start of the Iraq war, two U.S. aircraft carriers and seven other warships cruised near the Iranian coast Wednesday." Wars coming soon? Wars are, unfortunately, a constant in human history. A war does not by itself imply the presence of a dark age, which is characterised by very low levels of cohesion and organisation in addition to a state of general conflict. Such a state cannot be diagnosed for the West. In the Middle East, chaos, disorder and fragmentation is arguably gaining ground - despite the strong involvement of the United States in this region. The wars of the future may tell us something about the West's ability to shape international affairs according to its perceptions. See: See: Iraq and the coming dark age