Why We Fight

Why We Fight


“If war was hell and only hell and there were
no other colors in the palate, [if] that was
the essence of the experience and all that
there was to the experience, I don’t think
people would continue to make war.”
—Michael Herr

         War is hell. War is cruelty. War is horror. Those are the statements we often hear and the summaries most often reached in regards to the nature of war. Indeed, there is no denying that war is terrible. It was perhaps General Sherman who said it best, “War is cruelty; and there is no refining it.” But statements such as these beg the obvious question: “Why then do we continue to wage war?” War is one of the common threads throughout human history, a history shaped largely by conflict and war. The study of war is therefore a critical task if we hope to understand humanity but too often has the study restricted itself to the nature of war while ignoring the question foremost among all others. Why does humanity wage war? What causes us to engage in war, despite the terrors, despite the hardships, despite the horror and the cruelty and the destruction?

         It is often suggested by pundits and critics that war is, at heart, political and go so far as to suggest that it is the tool of a greedy privileged few that blinds the masses to do their bidding. Is war’s nature political? Is it “politics by other means” as Clausewitz asserts? While it is true that most wars have been fought over political or ideological causes, these are immediate, momentary causes. When war is viewed as a whole, as a concept, such causes prove superficial. We must strive to examine war itself, war in its entirety, not individual wars fought over this or that issue. War itself, no matter the cause of an individual instance of war, stands as its own entity with its own characteristics. Humanity’s relationship with war is far deeper than the political realm for war is a force that taps deeply into our innermost psyche. So deep, in fact, that it could be considered an extension of this psyche.

         Though we may deny it, we are mostly optimists when examining ourselves as a species. We see a march of human progress and we honor those who create; we honor peace. It is then easy to think of war as a force opposed to human progress, as something to be shunned and feared and fought against. But we do ourselves a disservice when we undercut conflict and stereotype it in our conscious minds, for in our subconscious, war is as vital as ever. As a species, we have an undeniable tendency to destroy as well as create, a tendency that cannot be explained by politics or religion or ideology. Cities are built up and pride is taken in them; this instinct is talked about and celebrated. But a satisfaction is also derived from destroying those same creations; this instinct we do not often talk about, and when we do it is in terms of denunciation and disgust. Yet the instincts, both of them, are within us all. And why should we be disgusted? Are they not opposite sides of the same coin? A yin to the other’s yang? A positive to balance the negative?

         We must acknowledge and to some degree embrace this “darker” side of the human psyche. It must also be remembered that both extremes are dangerous; endless creation without cathartic bouts of destruction will lapse into stagnation and destruction without the balance of creation runs the risk of self-annihilation. What humanity must realize is that war, though terrible, is not necessarily an evil in and of itself. War is a necessary force of balance in the world and the human psyche. War will never end because war is a part of us. This we must acknowledge. This we must learn to talk about.

         Beyond its psychological roots, war must also be examined in terms of its impact and role in history and society. We have all undoubtedly heard the classic 60’s refrain “War, what is it good for?” and long has the question carried an implied “absolutely nothing” as its answer. However popular that notion may be, it does not hold up under stricter scrutiny, especially in the context of history. Human history is consistently marked by conflict and wars often prove to be key turning points about which history revolves. The American Revolution changed the ideological course of the entire world, the War of 1812 ushered in a new political order in Europe, World War I heralded the dawn of the twentieth century, World War II and the battles of the Cold War resolved the great ideological struggles between the world powers.

         Why do wars act as such turning points? Because war is about far more than destruction; it is also about the rebuilding and reshaping after that destruction. War is a catalyst, and while it destroys, it also opens possibilities and sparks change. An apt comparison would be to a forest fire. Such a fire destroys countless acres of forest, but that destruction opens the forest floor to sunlight, clears the area of dead vegetation and returns vital nutrients to the soil. Afterwards, new trees and plants spring forth from the ashes and the forest takes on a new form. These fires, though destructive and decried when they are blazing, prove to be beneficial in the long-run and are in fact vital to the health of the forest. Similarly, after every major conflict a period of accelerated social, political and technological development occurs. This is not a coincidence but is rather an effect of the stresses and demands of wartime.

         A perfect example of this effect is the Second World War. This conflict, the most horrific and devastating in human history, is likely the conflict that has produced the most advances. Radar, rocketry, electronics, jet propulsion and many other new technologies were invented for purposes of war. Japan and Germany’s dictatorial governments were abolished and restructured to become economic superpowers. The worldwide economic depression was ended by the sudden industrial demands of war and this was parlayed into decades of post-war prosperity. The examples go on and on, but they are all attributable to one source: war. Tragic as it may seem, destruction and suffering are often the price of progress.

         Even excepting the pervasive influence of human nature and the intractability of technological progress, is the prevention of war a realistic goal? Many idealistic people argue that if war itself cannot be abolished then, at the very least, individual wars can be prevented. To some degree this is true, but not in the long run. As long as individuals possess free will and nations retain their sovereignty, war is inevitable. War will never fail to come about, even from purely political reasons. A simple exercise in visualization confirms this assertion to be true. First, imagine the world. Is it the same everywhere? Is there homogeneity in race, religion, economic status or any other category? Of course not. The world is composed of hundreds of nations, dozens of religions, thousands of languages, dialects and ethnic groups. To assert that these innumerable factions and subfactions can and should always work together for a common peace is not only an unrealistic idea, but also a violation of mathematical probability. The nations and factions of the world interact like the tectonic plates that compose the Earth’s crust. Each is independent of the others and limited in movement only by the movements and positions of its neighbors. As long as nations are free and sovereign, they will undoubtedly pursue courses of action and policy which may differ, however large or slight, from their neighbors. Sometimes nations will “move” in the same direction or away from each other. Sometimes they will clash, lock together and build up tension between themselves and others as they each try to break free and pursue their individual courses. In geology, such conflicts are resolved by earthquakes; with nations, it is war.

         Idealists generally counter such a model of world politics by arguing that conflicts of interest need not be resolved by war. However, this idea, like the notion of putting an end to war, works only in theory. Multinational agencies abound with acronyms such as UN, ASEAN, EU and CIS, but has the level of war in the world decreased? One needs only to look at the Balkans, Liberia, Congo, Iraq, Afghanistan, Chechnya, Sri Lanka and other “hot spots” to see that war is just as present as it always has been. The reason war will always persist and international agencies fail is that conflicts of interest are not as neat and clean in the real world as in the minds of idealists. Conflicts resulting in war are usually over issues of principle, ethnicity, economic survival or long-standing history. The majority of people do not desire compromise on these issues. The entirety of human history testifies to this fact. In the five thousand years of civilization, those issues have sparked war after war. So many wars that throughout most, if not all, of history, war has been continually present in one part of the world or another.

         So if wars are inevitable as long as individual countries and groups are free to pursue individual aims, then the only potential means of preventing war is to control the entire world and force all people everywhere to follow concurrent, parallel paths of policy. In short, a sort of world-state is the only possible enforcer of global peace. Even overlooking the fact that such a state is both unworkable and unlikely, is the curtailment of national and human freedoms desirable? Human nature and the heterogeneous nature of the world’s population both answer with a resounding “no”. To prevent war is to eliminate political free-will and human diversity (as both are the cause of wars). Never will the independently-minded force known as human nature submit to such external constraints.

         In the end, humanity must not ignore war or blindly bemoan and shun it. More importantly, attempts to eliminate war must be recognized as futile and harmful in the long run. The simple fact is that war is not going to go away. Periodic wars are inevitable and not entirely detrimental. To seek an end to war requires subscribing to unreachable ideals and denying human nature, human history and the hard realities of world politics. Instead of grasping for the straws of starry-eyed idealism, humanity must come to terms with war. It should be neither encouraged nor banished. Instead, it must be reckoned with squarely for it will never cease to reckon with us.