Aren't the elites and the world powers more or less similar? I think that they would go through MAD. It has to happen eventually. After all, even Einstein said that: "I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones." and I'm starting to think that he has a point. Perhaps world war 3 would be such that it causes humanity to regress to development a lot and I can see MAD achieving that