I find it compelling to read that the tin buttons used by Napoleon's army, disintegrated in the Russian winter, contributing to Napoleon's retreat. Then, as later in WWII, it was winter that won the battle.
So it was interesting to me when I studied disease and its impact.
Listen to this:
In 1860s cities like London still threw its waste into the streets and was slowly killing itself with infection. It was Cholera, a harsh teacher, that finally forced western civilization to clean up its cities and build sewage systems.
Yellow fever contributed to the end of the slave trade from Africa to the Americas because black slaves were resistant to it and their white masters were not. The "cost of doing business" just became too high.
It was the French who began the Panama Canal, but disease killed so many workers in spite of new standards of cleanliness that the project was abandoned. After thousands of american soldiers died of yellow fever during the conquest of Cuba, Maj Walter Reed and LtGen Gorgas (think of Walter Reed Medical Center and Gorgas Hospital) who eliminated mosquito breeding places and in 5 months eliminated yellow fever from Cuba, proceeding then to Panama.
In the middle ages, millions of serfs were slaves to feudal lords. From 1347-1351, 30% of Europe's population died in waves of the Black Death. The reduced population could demand higher wages, more food, and which then permitted mobility to people that could break free in no other way.
We can argue the sudden and violent arrival of the Spaniards, or Cortez's Tlaxcalan allies, but it was really smallpox that overthrew the Aztecs, arriving in Tenochtitlan in 1520, and the decimated and demoralized Aztec empire fell in 1521.
Can you believe King George of England called it "the blessed pox"? In some places in North America, the smallpox killed 95% of inhabitants, (including the original landing place of the Pilgrims) emptying the land of occupants ahead of the waves of immigrants, allowing Europeans to occupy the continent.
Alexander the Great's army mutinied when they thought they were going north and east into India, because they feared the disease they expected to find in the hot river valleys they would follow. So Alexander the Great went West instead, and the eastern and western empires remained separate.
More than 15 million people died in WWI, 9 million in combat, and the war showed no sign of ending. Ever hear of the Spanish Flu? It didn't start in Spain, but Spain was neutral in this war, and the Flu was first reported by the uncensored Spanish press. Spanish Flu was a major player in the final battles of WWI, not attacking old or young as is usual for disease, but young, healthy soldiers. Governments were overwhelmed by caring for the living and burying their dead. More than the shocking conditions of trench warfare, it was the Flu that forced an armistice. US President Woodrow Wilson, the most popular and influential leader during the war, argued for his "14 Points" hoping to rebuild a better world. But he was ill of the flu during the meeting that prepared the Treaty of Versailles. The conditions of the treaty were so harsh, and countries took so much territory to enrich themselves it virtually guaranteed WWII.
So it's not the age of the dinosaur, or the age of man, it's really been one long age of bacteria?
Or is it another manifestation of God's hand in all things?
What if foolish children of God get caught in a war they simply can't figure out how to end?
What if human kind has fallen into filth and needs an incentive to get itself out? His invisible hand controls movement of people, ends wars, opens and closes waves of immigrants.
If that is the case,
then the question "How can a kind God allow bad things?"
becomes rather,
an acknowledgement that a kind God
allows his children to make choices,
and then like a parent with a child who screams in a tantrum until it hiccups,
but cannot stop,
intervenes in a subtle way that causes the child to grow in comprehension
and take responsibility.
As for the innocent who die living the best life they know how to live,
I
personally
believe that God receives them unto Himself,
and that He's got a plan up there in heaven
to sort all this out.
