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Wednesday, July 14, 2021

Wars: The Natural State of Mankind

Peace has a privileged status because the masses want to live in a society in which no one dies a violent death, and they rationalize that peace is the natural state for mankind. What is peace? In the context of history, peace is a negative term—it means the absence of war. Without using the terminology of war, peace cannot be defined. There has never been a peace that cannot be seen in terms of a cold war. Either the belligerents go to war or they become engaged in a cold war.

People love to read about wars. History books on wars are bestsellers; the books on the peaceful periods are hardly read. We love to read about wars because we are enthralled by stories of valor and strength in the battlefield. Our roots are in the wars that our ancestors have fought. We take pride in the wars in which our ancestors were victorious; we lament the wars that they lost. We want to know about these wars. When we read about the wars, we immediately grasp what these wars imply for the culture and politics of the present. 

A nation that has not fought wars has no history; its people have no story.

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