As we have repeatedly learned from history, the two key causes of catastrophic disasters are “Mother Nature” and “man-made.” These twin permanent threats to humanity have brought grave security costs on political, social, economic, and strategic levels. Therefore, it is not surprising that every generation from antiquity to modern times has developed “best practices” to cope with selected current challenges as well as a need to avert or survive the next expected and unexpected national, regional, and global dangers.
More specifically, such tragedies include earthquakes, famine, and plagues. Thus, during early 2023, misfortunes have struck China, Turkey, and Sudan. Additionally, the death toll due to the raging Covid-19 pandemic has reached 6,922,654i as of May 1, 2023.
Similarly, technological failures such as leakages of nuclear power plants occurred in the United States, Japan, and Ukraine. Also, state and non-state actors have launched tragic terrorist operations, wars, and flights of refugees, at home and abroad. Will civilization survive ongoing and future human conventional and unconventional calamities?