war and peace

war and peace

1. war

   • was is ending
     • Since the end of the Cold War, the number of armed conflicts has fallen by about 40% from about 50 in 1991 to about 30 in 2004. High-intensity conflicts (those that cause more than 1,000 battle-related deaths per year) are down 80%,
     • inhabitants of the planet had an average risk of becoming a casualty of war of approximately 0.4%, compared with an average of about 1% between 1945 and 1990. People are much more likely to die of disease and pandemics (91%) or in car accidents (2%) than in a war
       • good ues of examples
     • There can be no doubt that the end of the Cold War has led to greater peace between states than at any previous time in history
     • More wars are ending than there are new wars breaking out
   • intrastate wars
     • However, the real challenge now is preventing or resolving intrastate wars. In other words, present-day conflicts are of a new type: In the past, states fought each other, but now clans, ethnic groups, and factions are challenging the state itself. Interstate warfare is therefore being replaced by ethnopolitical warfare
     • War is becoming “deinstitutionalized” and reverting to what it was before 1648
     • other counties getting involed
       • Supranational bodies are intervening in matters that were previously the exclusive preserve of states, in a bid to manage and control crises. It can be argued that the words war and conflict have taken on new meaning.
     • Every year, “ethnic wars” account for the majority of “major” armed conflicts
       • Typically, ethnic conflicts are caused by the collapse of states
   • casuulties of war
     • Forty percent of the casualties of war are direct victims (killed in battle), and 60% are indirect victims (those who die as a result of the consequences of armed confli Civilians, who make up a large percentage of the casualties, are 10 times more likely to be indirect victims than direct victims. It is estimated that approximately one third of the civilians who die in armed conflicts are killed by government forces and two thirds by intrastate groups.
     • The indirect victims of armed conflict are largely women and children. Many are sexually
   • no reason to be happy
     • However, there is little cause for celebration, for armed conflicts that could, theoretically, have been prevented or controlled continue to claim hundreds of thousands of direct and indirect victims year after year.
       • In short, it is too early to say that war is being eradicated or even curbed. Human insecurity remains a challenge and a serious danger. Many armed conflicts continue to rage with deadly consequences and wars that seemed to be coming to an end have flared up again.
   • reason for war
     • Armed conflicts are also spurred by the profit motive: fierce competition for control of resources, particularly minerals, diamonds, oil, and water. Elites, guerrillas, mafia, and mercenaries engage in warfare to exact tribute or to lay their hands on a nation's wealth. The geography of a conflict—its fault lines—is shaped more by the distribution of resources than by ideological or political differences
     • Democratization is a growing source of violence. Approximately one third of states are in transition.
       • recent wave of democratization has left scars in its wake because of the failure of many transitional states to protect human rights or establish a state of law and because the democratization process has given rise to instability and bouts of political violence
   • Definition of war
     • Classic warfare is disappearing as war becomes “privatized,” in the sense that it is being waged increasingly by private armies rather than conscripts or professional soldiers. Since the beginning of the decade, there have been growing numbers of nonstate armed conflicts—that is, fighting between different factions within a state as opposed to fighting between the state and one or more factions
     • There is no consensus in the abundant literature
       • Quincy Wright (1942) of the University of Chicago, defines war as “violent contact of distinct but similar entities”
         • This definition is inadequate since it ignores the importance of the political dimension of war.
     • War may be considered, then, to be an armed confrontation between enemies with irreconcilable or incompatible political goals, which always has the potential to escalate into an unlimited engagement aimed at achieving total victory and the destruction of the opponent.
   • types of war
     • International war is war between states. It may be a regional war, such as the wars in the Middle East or between Pakistan and India, or a world war if the conflict spreads, as in World Wars I and II.
     • Intrastate war has been the most common type of warfare since the end of the Cold War. violence between governments, factions, ethnic groups, and other groups trying to win or maintain control over territory and political power. Intrastate war may also be associated with civil strife or traditional ideological warfare
     • War may be conducted by conventional means (invasion, bombing, coercion) or unconventional means (terrorism, insurrection, using chemical, biological, or nuclear arms).
     • Wars may be short, long, or indeterminate.
     • War may be total or limited. In the first case, it knows no bounds: The annihilation of the enemy, the extermination of its population
     • Unconventional wars include psychological warfare, proxy or indirect wars, “nonwar operations,” and cold war
     • new wars include information wars, “star wars,” the war against international terrorism, the war on drugs, and wars for control over resources