As it turned out, the family that owned this house was safe, somewhere in the south. They'd largely managed to avoid the worst of the conflict, until finally, as it always does, it arrived at their door. Prosperous Sunni Muslims, they'd been successful in keeping a low profile through successive transitions of government, but unfortunately their daughter had married the son of a Shia family across the road. That house, equally beautiful, had been demolished. Only shattered concrete blocks remained. The boy had disappeared, presumed killed. Civil society had vanished, replaced by ideology and division.

Iraq has been torn apart since the US invasion in 2003, but this wealthy area on the outskirts of Mosul had largely avoided the turmoil. Bombs had targeted the vital transport, power, water and sewage facilities in the capital, but the conflict only swirled over small areas. Even when the insurgency started to develop its rapidly increasing ferocity, it didn't touch this area. The residents could quite rightly feel comparatively safe, as long as they didn't venture into the badlands.

But civilisation, just like peace, is a transient concept. War is stronger, much stronger, and it can expand to occupy any space that gives it room to grow.

A terrible summer and failing crops saw a new wave of violence flare in the wake of a vacuum created by Barrack Obama's (so-called) Allied departure. Syria was rapidly engulfed in a new, increasingly bitter conflict that quickly spread throughout the region. It is only now, as a result of the Iraqi forces finally retaking Mosul, that it has finally become obvious that, in some parts of the Middle East at any rate, peace will return. Even in the capital Baghdad itself there are, in some parts for the first time in years, marriage parties and proper celebrations taking place in public. Yet even here you'd be mad to walk outside alone through some parts of the capital at night.

The norms of civil society are still not strong enough to restore normality. For many families they never will be. War is easy to walk into but most of us have absolutely no idea, not even the faintest glimmering, of the utterly devastating cost of conflict.

Donald Trump has trump an itchy Twitter finger. He's using it to rant and rave about visiting Armageddon on North Korea if Kim Jong-un so much as looks at Guam. That's perfectly reasonable, because it makes sense as part of deterrence theory. But that's this particular threat's only logic, because nobody wins after a nuclear war, or indeed any war at all.

Sixty years ago this month the New Yorker magazine devoted its entire issue to an event that was really not properly understood, even back in 1947. This was the bombing of Hiroshima; harrowing accounts of the vaporising of bodies, blasted survivors and raging fires, people slowly dying from radiation sickness, and corpses lying in the streets. Particularly today, this event, the deaths and the tragedy are so horrific, they are almost impossible for us to comprehend. And it's exactly the same with the war – the killings and murder – that's taking place in the Middle East.

There is no way, really, of empathising with the reports we hear of this continuing conflict. We distance herself from the horrific events. "That's Iraq for you," we say.

And yet the reality is that every society, even ours, is just a short step from similar disintegration.

Malcolm Turnbull has talked with equanimity about the prospect of war on the Korean peninsular, but that's the right thing. If you listen to the detail, the specifics of what he's said, it's unobjectionable. Of course if the North was to attempt to bomb the US, under ANZUS Washington would ask, and we would join, a coalition operation against Pyongyang.

What is concerning, however, is the ease with which our own society seems ready to tumble into war.

At one time, Australia was a long way away from conflict. That's not the case any longer. Thanks to the marvels of the Internet, cyber and space warfare represent new dimensions in any future war. It's easy to dismiss North Korea, which has virtually no capacity to inflict any damage on us. It has far more profitable targets than Darwin for its few nuclear weapons.

But the intellectual detachment of commentators who suggest that we should attempt to erect some sort of missile defence shield is bizarre. The cost would be crippling; effectiveness doubtful; and the means of subverting it easy.

The key problem is that no one is rigorously providing any comparison of the new threats we face to the defences that are vital. Unless this is done soon we will end up like the families of Mosul, good ordinary people, who thought everything would turn out to be okay in the long run.

It might, but the cost might be too great in the meantime.