Causes of war

Complementing the Memorial’s commemorative function, that of remembering and honouring all who served Australia in time of war, is research into the causes of war. The ultimate aim of such research, the prevention of future wars, follows the tradition of the Memorial’s founder Charles Bean, as well as the heart-felt wishes of veterans generally, their families and others everywhere. At the Memorial’s opening in Canberra on Armistice Day 1941 the Governor-General, Lord Gowrie, anticipated how future visitors would respond to the galleries and the commemorative area: “every one of them I am firmly convinced will declare, and will declare with no uncertain voice, never again, never again”. Indeed, for our children today, and of theirs tomorrow, the solution to the vexed problem of wars’ prevention is critical if, – to quote the UN Charter – we are to save “future generations from the scourge of war”.

As the relevant literature is vast, the sources cited below represent but a useful starting point. The two types of sources, books and journals and websites, complement one another, for while increasingly, more and more valuable sources are available online (at great convenience and little cost) there remains a great deal of highly significant material that is not. Accordingly, valuable insights can be gained by selecting from both sources.

Researched by Dr Ian Buckley

1. Books and journals

Introduction

For convenience this section is divided into Causes of war – General, and Causes of particular wars. In the books and journal articles cited, the emphasis of most is on long-term underlying factors which, together, cause wars. Some works deal with such causes in theoretical terms, but frequently the most convincing evidence comes from historical analyses of particular wars undertaken by historians or key political figures of the time. For example, in attempting to understand Britain’s or Australia’s reasons for involvement in the First World War, it is highly illuminating to go to Winston Churchill’s The world crisis (1911–15) and to Billy Hughes’s war-time speeches, collected in “The day” and after (1916). Similarly, for the European background to the Second World War, Churchill’s The gathering storm and Lord Robert Cecil’s All the way provide vital insights.

Significant background considerations apply also to three broad areas, each concerned with understanding the evolution of the human species as a societal animal, from prehistoric to modern times. Each aims at conveying something of what has brought us to where we are, each providing insights as to how injustices and tensions may arise. The first relates to how humans made the transition from hunter-gatherer to settled agriculture and how, over time, the distribution of resources within and between human societies became less and less even.(e.g., Ronald Wright’s A short history of progress (2004); and Jared Diamond’s Guns, germs and steel (1998)) The second, aims at a fuller understanding of the motivations behind the formation of nation states with their exaggerated inequities, most critically over the distribution of and access to land; and the drive to dominate other states.(e.g., Sir Thomas More’s Utopia) The third area, which stems from the ongoing expansion of technology and international trade since the Industrial Revolution, aims at improved recognition of the social forces underpinning the development of Empires, Empire rivalry and consequent wars. See, e.g., Adam Smith’s Wealth of nations (1776; 1999 & online), Hobson’s Imperialism: a study (1902 & online), Marcus Cunliffe’s The age of expansion, 1848–1917 (1974), Michael Edwardes’ The west in Asia, 1850–1914 (1967), Barbara Tuchman’s The proud tower (1980).

A. Causes of war – General

Geoffrey Blainey, The causes of war, 3rd ed., New York, 1988

Marcus Cunliffe, The age of expansion, 1848–1917, London, 1974

Jared Diamond, Guns, germs and steel, London, 1998

Jared Diamond, Collapse: how societies choose to fail or succeed, New York, 2005

Michael Edwardes, The west in Asia, 1850–1914, London, 1967

Albert Einstein & Sigmund Freud, “Why war?”, International Journal of Group Tensions 1 (January–March 1971) 3–25 (An exchange of letters between Einstein and Freud in 1932)

John Hobson, Imperialism: a study, 3rd ed., London, 1902, 1938.

Michael Howard, “The causes of war: historians and the problem of power”, Encounter 58 (March 1982) 22–30

Michael Howard, The causes of war and other essays, Cambridge, Mass., 1983

Michael Howard, “The causes of war”, Wilson Quarterly 8 (1984) 90–103

Michael Howard, The lessons of history, Oxford, 1993

Dominic Johnson, Overconfidence and war: the havoc and glory of positive illusions, Cambridge, Mass., 2004

Jack Levy, “Declining power and the preventive motivation for war”, World politics, 40: 1 (October 1987) 82–107

Sir Thomas More, Utopia, Introduction by John Warrington, London, 1955.

Philip Noel-Baker, The first world disarmament conference (1932–1933) and why it failed, Oxford, 1979

Pugwash: “Eliminating the causes of war”, 50th Pugwash Conference on Science and World affairs, Cambridge, 2000

John Rawls, Justice as fairness: a restatement, Cambridge, Mass., 2001

Adam Smith, The wealth of nations, books I–V (1776), London, 1999.

Journal of peace research, 18: 1 (1981) (six articles on various aspects of research into the causes of war)

Barbara Tuchman, The march of folly, London, 1984

Ronald Wright, A short history of progress, Toronto, 2004

B. Causes of particular wars (from the Boer War to the Korean War)

The Boer War

Anthony Nutting, Scramble for Africa: the great trek to the Boer War, London, 1970

Craig Wilcox, Australia’s Boer War: the war in South Africa, 1899–1902, Melbourne, 2002

Keith Wilson, “The Boer War in the context of Britain’s imperial problems”, in Keith Wilson, ed., The international impact of the Boer War, New York, 2001, 158–167

First World War

Winston Churchill, Liberalism and the Social Problem, London, 1909.

Winston Churchill, The world crisis, vol. I (1911–14), London, 1927

Winston Churchill, The world crisis, vol. II (1915), London, 1927

Winston Churchill, The aftermath, London, 1944

Marcus Cunliffe, The age of expansion, 1848–1917, London, 1974

G. Lowes Dickinson, The international anarchy, London, 1926

G. Lowes Dickinson, The European anarchy, New York, 1917.

Michael Edwardes, The west in Asia 1850-1914, London, 1967

Martin Gilbert, A history of the twentieth century, vol. I (1900–33), London, 1997

G.P. Gooch, History of modern Europe, 1878–1919, London, 1923

G.P. Gooch, Before the war: studies in diplomacy, vol. I, London, 1936

G.P. Gooch, Before the war: studies in diplomacy, vol. II, London, 1938

Ian Hamilton, A staff officer’s scrap-book, London, 1905

John Hobson, Imperialism: a study, 3rd edition, London, 1902, 1938.

William Hughes, “The Day” and after, London, 1916. Excerpts online.

Alan Moorehead, Gallipoli, Melbourne, 1989

John Mordike, “We should do this thing quietly”: Japan and the great deception in Australian defence policy, 1911–1914, Canberra, 2002

Barbara Tuchman, The proud tower: a portrait of the world before the war, 1890–1914, New York, 1970

Barbara Tuchman, August 1914, London, 1980

Keith Wilson, “The Boer War in the context of Britain’s imperial problems”, in Keith Wilson, ed., The international impact of the Boer War, New York, 2001, 158–67

Keith Wilson, “The making and putative implementation of a British foreign policy of gesture, December 1905 to August 1914: The Anglo-French entente revisited”, Canadian Journal of History 31 (1996) 227–255

Second World War

Lord Robert Cecil, All the way, London, 1949

Winston Churchill, The aftermath, London, 1944

Winston Churchill, The Second World War, vol. I, The gathering storm, London, 1985

Martin Gilbert, A history of the twentieth century, vol. I, (1900–33) London, 1997

Martin Gilbert, A history of the twentieth century, vol. II , (1933–51) London, 1998

Martin Gilbert, The roots of appeasement, London, 1966

Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf, London, 1992

John Maynard Keynes, The economic consequences of the peace, London, 1920

Basil Liddel Hart, History of the Second World War, London, 1970

Philip Noel-Baker, The first world disarmament conference (1932–1933) and why it failed, Oxford, 1979

The Vietnam War

Barbara Tuchman, “America betrays herself in Vietnam”, in The march of folly, London, 1984, 289-474.

Michael Sexton, War for the asking: Australia’s Vietnam secrets, Ringwood, 1981

The Korean War

Bruce Cumings, Korea’s place in the sun, New York, 1997

Bruce Cumings, “Wrong again”, in London Review of Books, 25: 23 (3 December 2003)

Gavan McCormack, “Making sense of the Korean crisis”

2. Websites

Introduction

Many of these sites deal with the third problem area mentioned in Introduction (1), that of grasping the effects the Industrial Revolution continues to have, not only on production, overseas expansion and trade, but on resource competition and environmental degradation. It seems essential to look more widely for possible solutions. For as we have seen both historically and still today, the less-than-sane extension of these expansive trends has resulted in unbridled competition both for resources and markets, consequent mutually counter-productive wars, and environmental assaults of such magnitude as to threaten all. A possible alternative approach to the world’s ever-accelerating production might be to limit it but, by following the advice of Adam Smith, ensure that the domestic benefits are distributed more evenly, thus sharply reducing environmental despoliation, production gluts, extremes of international trade competition, thereby, one hopes, sustaining our life-giving environment and making wars a thing of the past.