Nearly sixty years ago, I was seated comfortably in the Morrison Library at U.C. Berkeley.  Oblivious to the luxury around me, I was fascinated by an essay I was reading. The essayist was reacting to the recent renewal of the old Basque separatist movement.  He predicted that there would be many similar movements in the future.  He proposed that several apparently stable countries will likely break apart.  Indeed, such has subsequently happened, and the forces of disintegration continue.  Witness Brexit. Since that essay was written, Yugoslavia shattered into its Balkan constituents, with brutal war to follow.  The Soviet Union collapsed into its many former republics, and the Eastern European countries regained their independence.  Czechoslovakia then divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.  Eritrea broke off from Ethiopia.  Today, the Kurds are trying to establish an independent Kurdistan, and Syria has bloodily disintegrated...(Read Full Article)