The Diversity of Wars

What is war? By common definition, wars involve violence. Conflicts, disputes, differences of opinion, negotiations and so on are not wars until violence erupts. Conflicts of interest between states and between groups within states are frequent. They may involve resources, boundaries, security, class differences, ideological differences, individual ambitions, and many other factors. Social incompatibilities of one sort or another are ubiquitous, but not all lead to violence. Some political scientists maintain that, given the diversity of modern societies and their situations, conflicts of interest are inevitable, but violence is not. A dispute over resources, rights, borders, religion, or what have you, may be a necessary condition for a violent conflict to occur, but is rarely sufficient. Indeed, as we shall emphasize in a number of contexts, it is seldom possible to point to any one factor as a sufficient cause of any particular war: violence occurs when a number come together.

Wars are diverse, and we could launch into a long discussion about what should and what should not be called a war. It is questionable whether, when President G.W. Bush declared 'war' against a largely unidentified group of terrorists, it should really have qualified as such. The border dispute between Nigeria and Cameroon has resulted in a considerable number of casualties, but does it qualify as war? And what about Northern Ireland, where there were no independent authorities with their own armies and running their own areas of country, but a steady toll of casualties? Some wars are rarely reported in the West, like the long-drawn-out attempts by the Burmese (now Myanamarese) government to subdue the Karen.

Some authorities have taken the criterion of 1,000 battle fatalities a year as a threshold after which a dispute is properly labelled as war. Others prefer 25 casualties a year and a cumulative total of 1,000. But such criteria would be useless for many purposes for their use would mean postponing the decision as to whether an outbreak of violence constituted a war until it was too late to stop the escalation to violence, and until much suffering had already been caused. And do civilian casualties count as battle fatalities? If they do not, a very distorted picture could arise. For instance the Vietnam War (1965–73) is estimated to have involved about a million military combat deaths, but three times as many deaths in all (Figure 1). For Cambodia the figures are of the order of 160,000 military deaths and 1,200,000 deaths in total.

In any case, in recent decades wars have often been preceded or accompanied by covert operations, arms supplies and even assassinations, carried out by countries that had no public role in the emerging conflict. For instance, the CIA operated for the USA behind the scenes in Chile, Nicaragua, Salvador and Angola, and gave aid to the Mujahideen when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan.

In some such cases the distinction between terrorism and international war becomes far from clear. Thus actions in 2002 described by Israel as involving the suppression of Palestinian terrorism were themselves described as terrorism by others. In El Salvador the USA organized a mercenary army whose aim was to subdue the civilian population – a civilian population which, according to Archbishop Oscar Romero, was 'fighting to defend their most fundamental human rights'. The Archbishop was later assassinated by elements of the USA-backed security forces. Again, should the Israeli bombing of Tunis in 1985, or the bombing of Tripoli by the USA a year later, be seen as acts of war or as international terrorism? Actions traced to Lebanese citizens, like the hijacking of an airliner in Karachi, and massacres in Rome and Vienna, seem comparable to these actions by Israel and the USA, but were labelled as terrorism. And more recently the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington have been taken as justifying a declaration of war by President G.W. Bush – a declaration which aptly described the military action, though the prisoners who were subsequently taken were not treated as prisoners-of-war according to international standards.

For such reasons, it is rarely profitable to attempt to put precise limits on such a heterogeneous category. We do better to recognize that wars are diverse, and that they differ along many dimensions that are not just matters of scale. For instance, if the dispute is international, taking place between states, the means for its resolution are likely to be quite different from those necessary if it involves conflicting groups within a state. In the past most wars were international, but at present wars between states are far less frequent than intra-state wars. Among the few exceptions in the second half of the twentieth century have been the Iran–Iraq War, the Gulf wars, the conflicts between Israel and the Arab states, India and Pakistan, and within Africa.

Some of the intra-state wars have been incredibly protracted: that between the security forces and armed opposition groups in Colombia has been going on for 38 years and involved mainly civilian deaths. In such cases, do armies confront each other, or is it a matter of guerrilla bands? Is it a civil war between political, religious or ethnic groups, or a liberation movement operating initially from outside the country concerned? Many recent wars have involved attempts to eliminate conventional forces by attrition or conversion: the antagonists have aimed not at the acquisition of territory, but rather to win over the local population to their viewpoint, and to get rid of those who cannot share it. Again, are democratic or totalitarian groups involved, or is it a conflict between groups with differing political ideologies? The transition from totalitarianism or militarism to democracy, or vice versa, can involve a period of instability during which violence may easily break out. Is the violence between organized groups of individuals, or between undifferentiated mobs? What sorts of weapons are involved? How organized are the warring parties? Were those involved mercenaries, conscripts, or loyal idealists? We could say that war is simply the use of violent means to achieve political ends, but that begs many questions, not the least being what counts as a political end. Should the greed or ambition of a military leader be dignified by being called a 'political end'? In this book we have taken a broad perspective and, in seeking to understand the bases of war, we discuss violent conflict within states and terrorism as well as international war.

The diversity of wars implies even greater diversity in their causes. Only two decades ago the major problem seemed to be the threat of war between the superpowers, with the probability of its leading to a nuclear exchange. Many of the other wars then occurring around the world could be seen as proxy wars, instigated or supported by the major powers. But it now seems that the Cold War situation, while encouraging some wars, had a restraining influence on others. Since the Cold War ended wars have broken out within states and between states in many parts of the world. Many of these started because repressive regimes, formerly supported by one of the superpowers, were challenged from within. Lack of democratic governance, economic factors, the greed of leaders (for instance, the acquisition of drugs in Colombia, diamonds and minerals in Africa, timber in Cambodia), and many other factors have fuelled the flames. And, more recently, actions perceived as involving excessive hegemony by the USA were seen by many as partly responsible for the 11 September terrorist attack resulting in thousands of fatalities.

To give some indication of the scale of the problem, it is estimated that, during the twentieth century, over 100 million people died in armed conflict and a further 170 million in political violence. Although the frequency of wars has decreased since the end of the Cold War, there has been an increase in the proportion of civilian deaths – around 90 per cent according to most estimates. And, though we have mentioned it already, it cannot be too strongly emphasized that casualty figures, though horrifying in themselves, represent only a fraction of the suffering caused by war. For every person killed, it is likely that at least one or two are bereaved, and perhaps thereby scarred for life. Many of those disabled become dependent on others for the rest of their lives. Many combatants never fully recover from the psychological horror of war. Refugees and even the migration of whole populations frequently accompany war. Families are torn apart, with children deprived of the care that they need. Not only did at least two million die as a result of the Rwandan conflict, but a UNICEF estimate indicated that it produced 95,000 unattached orphans and other unattached children. A random survey of these found that 91 per cent had lost family members, and 42 per cent both parents; 48 per cent had been threatened with death themselves, 64 per cent had witnessed massacres, 20 per cent had witnessed rapes and 25 per cent had been injured.

In the next three chapters we consider how modern weapons of mass destruction, and even modern so-called 'conventional weapons', have the potential to make future wars even more devastating than those in the past.

CONCLUSION

Wars are diverse, and there can be no generally accepted definition of what constitutes a war. For that reason alone, one cannot expect the causes of wars to be simple. Whatever the cause, wars are resulting in ever more fatalities and in an ever greater proportion of noncombatant casualties.

The Nuclear Peril

THE RISK OF A NUCLEAR WAR

The nuclear age began in August 1945, with the detonation of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The vast majority (about 85 per cent) of people alive today (2003) were born into the nuclear age. And since no further nuclear weapons have been used in combat, it is easy to understand that most people believe that we have 'learned to live with the bomb', and there is no need to be worried about it. Indeed, this belief turned into a conviction after the end of the Cold War, followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, and the virtual end of the ideological struggle between capitalism and communism. This struggle, which had been going on since the October Revolution of 1918, had been the cause of much tension and even of many wars, mostly in former colonial countries (see pp. 62, 98).

That most people are not worried about the nuclear peril is evident from the findings of many opinion polls. An example is seen in the graph (Figure 2) representing results of a public opinion poll in the UK, which has been conducted systematically, every month, for the last 20 years. The graph presents the combined response to two questions: (1) What would you say is the most important issue facing Britain today? (2) What do you see as other important issues facing Britain today? At one time, over 40 per cent rated nuclear disarmament and nuclear weapons as among the most important issues, but the percentage of respondents giving such answers decreased rapidly, and ever since the end of the Cold War has remained very low, at about 1 per cent. From various indicators it would appear that the response in the United States and other countries in the West would be similar.

The generally held belief that a third world war was prevented by the existence of nuclear warheads, and that their presence in the arsenals is no cause for worry, is an illusion. For one thing, although nuclear weapons were not used in war, many of them were exploded in testing various designs of these weapons (a total of 2,051, see Table 1). In the early years, much of the testing was carried out in the atmosphere, and the radioactive products of these tests, the fall-out, spread all over the globe, exposing people to varying doses of radiation. It has been estimated that the 528 nuclear tests in the atmosphere may cause about 300,000 deaths, mostly from cancer. Not enough is known about human casualties from Soviet tests, but anecdotal evidence indicates that the Soviet authorities were much more lax in protecting the population in the test areas, leading to higher casualty figures.

The main threat, however, arises from the very existence of nuclear weapons. Thousands of these weapons are kept in the arsenals, presumably for deterrence purposes, to prevent a perceived enemy from launching an attack on us, but sooner or later they will be used, deliberately or inadvertently. There is a historical precedent for this: the reason the Allies began developing the atom bomb during the Second World War was specifically to prevent its use by Hitler, yet nuclear weapons were used against Japan as soon as they were made. On several occasions we came perilously close to their deliberate use again. Eisenhower considered their use in the Korean War (1952–53), and this was repeated a few years later in the Taiwan crises. China developed its own nuclear weapons in response to what it saw as nuclear blackmail by the USA. Perhaps the best-known event was the Cuban Missile Crisis, in October 1962, when we were a hair's breadth away from a nuclear holocaust. There were also several false alarms: in one case a flock of geese was mistaken for nuclear missiles and triggered an alert, fortunately without serious consequences.

A vivid reminder of the nuclear threat occurred in May 2002, during the India–Pakistan crisis over Kashmir; we were officially warned that a conventional war there might escalate into a nuclear exchange. This crisis has been resolved, but only temporarily; the nuclear danger will remain as long as the conflict over Kashmir continues, or as long as nuclear weapons are held by either side.

Moreover, ever since the events of 11 September we have been told that terrorist groups of the al-Qaeda type may acquire nuclear devices with which to threaten the Western world. This threat too will exist as long as nuclear weapons exist, or as long as materials suitable for nuclear weapons are being stored in many places, not always adequately protected.

Above all, the threat of nuclear weapons being used in combat has increased dramatically following the new doctrines introduced by the G.W. Bush administration. Under these, nuclear weapons have become a standard part of military strategy, to be used in conflict just like any other high explosive; moreover, nuclear weapons may be employed in a pre-emptive attack.

Among most of the people who have studied these problems, there is a general feeling that the avoidance of a nuclear exchange so far has more to do with good luck than with good management. And we cannot rest the security of the world on good luck. The lesson of the past 50 years is that while the probability of a nuclear war occurring at a given moment is very low, the consequences should such a war occur are so grave as to make the risk factor unacceptable. The risk factor is obtained by multiplying the probability of the occurrence of a given event by the magnitude of the harm it would do, should it occur. We, the authors of this book, are convinced that the risk factor, taken over a long period of time, is so high that we must undertake the seemingly unrealistic task of eliminating all nuclear weapons as a first step towards the elimination of war altogether.

In order to persuade the reader of the same, we need to have a look at the consequences of a nuclear war. This was the topic of much discussion in the early years of the Cold War, but it seems to have been forgotten, or pushed into the deep recesses of our consciousness, in later years. It is time for a reminder.