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On the Origins of War: Donald Kagan

Thoughts from an evangelical perspective

Posted Wednesday, July 02, 2008 by Charlie Trimm
Categories: Military Issues
A friend recently loand me this book and wanted to know what I thought. I put it off for a few months but I finally got around to skimming it recently and found it quite interesting. The main question of the book, reflected in the title, is the following: why do we go to war? To discover an answer the author (a professor at Yale) looks at four wars (Peloponnesian War, First World War, the Second Punic War, and the Second World War) and one almost-war (Cuban Missle Crisis). He looks in some detail (the book is 600 pages, and most of it is looking at these events) at these wars and tries to discover why the wars happen (or didn't happen). He comes up with two conclusions, one broad and one specific. The broad conclusion is that peace does not just happen; it must be preserved with large amounts of effort. The wars happened because not enough energy was expanded in trying to keep the peace. For me as evangelical this makes perfect sense. Ever since the entrance of sin, peace does not come naturally, since sin has corrupted everything that is good. If we want peace, we must strive to keep it. Of course, various caveats would need to be made, such as the exact definition of peace, but overall the point is a good one. But the specific conclusion by Kagan is more disturbing. He says the best way to keep the peace is by having a very strong military and using force. Chamberlain's appeasement before WW2 is his parade example, but he shows in the other wars the same theory. He thinks that before WW1 broke out England should have put a draft into effect and raised a huge army to show Germany that any plan they put into practice to dominate England would be foolish. After the first Punic War Rome made Carthage bitter but did not demolish their military strength. While pragmatically this view might work (I emphasize the "might work," I am not entirely convinced of that), it does not fit into a Christian worldview very easily. Much more needs to be done in encouraging peace in a more constructive manner, rather than beating them down so badly they cannot respond.

Tuesday, July 08, 2008 7:42 AM

Eric wrote: An interesting perspective. How could peace have been fostered in either WWI or WWII? A lack of dialogue was not to blame for either situation. The Germains believed in their right to take what they wanted. England was the one country standing in the gap, but until the U.S. kind of rode into it, there wasn't much hope.

Sunday, July 13, 2008 7:39 PM

Charlie wrote:

That is a good point, and in these two cases I do think that the military card should have been played earlier, especially in WW1 with the opportunity to prevent the Armenian massacres. I do think that violent force is required on occasion, especially when a third party is being brutalized. But I also think that much more could have been done in the two decades before each of the wars. While my knowledge of the Weimer Republic is minimal, it seems that the Allies could have done considerably more to rebuild Germany and strengthen a stable government there. I would see the major opportunity for peace not as coming in the 30's, as it was too late then, but in the 20's, beginning with the treaty that ended WW1. My knoweldge of the time period before WW1 is even less, so I really can't say anything there, but I still wonder what could have been in the 1890's and early 1900's to encourage peace. One of the major problems in my mind would be the empire building that was going on as the Ottoman empire was falling: each of the major powers wanted a share of it. While there is no doubt that colonization in Egypt, North Africa, and many other places introduced much good, it has done immeasurable harm as well. The book review I posted a few weeks ago contained the idea that we need to not so much take out the sharks as take out the environment that supports the sharks; i.e. help economies to prosper, people to be safe, etc. If this had been done in Germany in the 20's, one wonders how different the 30's would have looked. But ultimately, as I said earlier, sometimes force is simply required.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 9:56 AM

Eric wrote:

That makes a lot of sense, and I think you are dead on. One of the major issues with the Germany after WWI was that the country was decimated, crippled financially. Hitler gave his people pride and literally created a sense of extreme nationalism. We perpetuate the cycle when we continue to hold countries responsible, after the conflict is completed (ie expecting Germany to pay for the costs of the Allied countries after WWI). We also perpetuate the cycle when we impose sanctions as it breeds a similar type of discontent in the society. I am reminded of Revelation where the four horsemen are sent forward, one with specific instructions to destroy the wheat and barley (common man) but leave the wine (the rich).

One issue that looms over all though, is the fact that some societies simply believe in the use of force as a means to success and believe in the their personal supremacy over other people groups, religions, etc. How do you manage a diplomatic solution in these instances? The problem with the philosophy of 'peace' as it is put forth today is twofold. First it naturally assumes that people are basically good and have been wronged. Right the wrong and the problem goes away. Second, it defines 'peace' as the absence of war or violence, and I'm not sure that this is a good definition Biblically speaking.