Renewed great-power rivalry does not necessarily mean a simple return to the interwar years. The 1920s and 1930s included dictatorships and dangerous competition, along with the League of Nations and other attempts to constrain state action. The more openly acquisitive multipolar politics of the 1890s and 1900s offered fewer such restraints. This comparison places turn-of-the-century naval expansion within a particularly unstable international order rather than treating it as a technological race alone.
Notable Point · 3:20-4:29
Why a return to the 1890s would be more than renewed rivalry
The opening distinguishes interwar dictatorship from the looser multipolar order of the 1890s and 1900s, where coercion faced fewer institutional restraints.