Maybe or maybe not.
Everything you listed could’ve been done without a central bank.
We’ve had a high national debt without a central bank(See post Civil War)
Government spending is a Congressional responsibility.(Answerable to the people & people like spending)
Wars happen because people love warfare.(Pick up a history book)
With or without a central bank you’ll have the same policies.(The world works the same way no matter the era)
COULD HAVE these things occurred without a central bank?
Well, yah.
However, the likelihood is so small as to be imperceptible.
Government spending is the culprit as you rightly state.
CENTRAL BANKS ARE KEY TO GOVERNMENT DEFICIT SPENDING, though. Otherwise, they are forced to go to MARKETS to borrow. Central banks can and do generate “money” out of nothing to prop up a bond market where no real demand exists. I don’t know how long it has been going on where Japan has sold NONE of their bonds.... zero. Their central bank absorbs them all. I have been shorting 30 year treasuries since they were at 134. I look for them to go down AT LEAST to 110, but that will bring another set of excruciating circumstances and I look for the Fed to, once again, try to monkey with the markets.
This thing is going to blow up spectacularly, and it will be rooted in Central Bannks.
This might be interesting reading:
http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com/2022/11/the-era-of-all-powerful-central-banks.html
“With or without a central bank you’ll have the same policies.”
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Without the Fed who would then be the buyer/lender of last resort?
Who else can print unlimited money and bail out companies?
While I appreciate your point that unwise and imprudent government policies will be with us always, the Fed has enormous power that often enables, if not encourages, excessive risk that exacerbates the usual levels of government profligacy.
On the matter of wars, I strongly disagree with you. Wars do not just happen because people love warfare. If you truly read the history books you’ll discover that this a superficial and profound over simplification. Its not the love of conflict that accounts for wars. Wars are brought about by various political, economic, territorial, cultural, ideological, religious, expansionist, etc. issues. Show me the historical research that empirically states that wars happen because people love the carnage, destruction and deprivation.