Chapter 1-3

Chapter 1

• Causes of war and peace should be the same

• Assumption that peace is normal state of affairs is innacurate

• Historians explanations of peace in modern times center on 19th century

  • Blainey doesnt agree but then he asks what made these two periods peaceful and their explainations

• Lewis F Richardson

  • Mathematical Psychology of War

    • Where war doesnt come from

      • could not find evidence that nations that speak common language more likely to live in peace

      • extremes of wealth and poverty have little to do with peace

      • sharing religion also makes no differences

    • Where war comes from

      • War weariness (war is like a disease and when people forget about war, they become immune)

        • also believed by Toynbee (professor) who proposed a cycle of war

          • General war —> brief peace —> supplementary wars —> pause of peace —> general war

          • believed that countries without wars for a long period will fight a war soon

      • Why Blainey hates this theory

        • war weariness implies sweden will fight a war like why would they do that

        • sees nation as personification of the individual, the way someone reacts to a war is different if they won or lost that war

        • war weariness can either increase chances of war and sometimes increase chance of peace, any decision to fight would be based on a pciture of what war or peace would be like

• Long era of peace reflects existence of strong outlets for militant energy and ambitions/Delinquent explaination

  • ex: making money, turning energy to domestic growth

  • industralization kept them busy

  • blainey also does not agree

    • assumes that nations have fixed stock of energy, alternatively channelled into peaceful and warlike pursuits

      • also can be said that revolutions serve as substitute for war