Sadly and selfishly on my end, you are right. It won't finish in our generation, but it has already materialized into forms that we are seeing vibrantly--like Steemit.
The battle has been going on, and I do think it's going to have massive losses like you say. China evidently wrote in their military doctrine 40 years ago to venture into unconventional warfare. They have in development or are developening EMP. Imagine they threw such a device to our electrical grids? Paranoia and hysteria would ensue. But we need to go through this bullshit in order for history to progress. We are habitual creatures, we learn through trial and error. We'll get there...and it's going to be one hell of a ride.
RE: Blockchain....open source....disruptive technologies