Why war?

Why war?

R. J. Overy

Book - 2024

"Why has war been such a consistent presence throughout the human past? A leading historian explains, drawing on rich examples and keen insight. Richard Overy is not the first scholar to take up the title question. In 1931, at the request of the League of Nations, Albert Einstein asked Sigmund Freud to collaborate on a short work examining whether there was "a way of delivering mankind from the menace of war." Published the next year as a pamphlet entitled Why War?, it conveyed Freud's conclusion that the "death drive" made any deliverance impossible--the psychological impulse to destruction was universal in the animal kingdom. The global wars of the later 1930s and 1940s seemed ample evidence of the dismal co...nclusion. A preeminent historian of those wars, Overy brings vast knowledge to the title question and years of experience unraveling the knotted motivations of war. His approach is to separate the major drivers and motivations, and consider the ways each has contributed to organized conflict. They range from the impulses embedded in human biology and psychology, to the incentives to conflict developed through cultural evolution, to competition for resources--conflicts stirred by the passions of belief, the effects of ecological stresses, the drive for power in leaders and nations, and the search for security. The discussions show remarkable range, delving deep into the Neolithic past, through the twentieth-century world wars, and up to the current conflict in Ukraine. The examples are absorbing, from the Roman Empire's voracious appetite for resources to the impulse to power evident in Alexander the Great, Napoleon, and Hitler. The conclusion is not hopeful, but Overy's book is a gift to readers: a compact, judicious, engrossing examination of a fundamental question"--

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Subjects
War.
Sociology, Military.
Conflict (Psychology)
Violence.
violence.
Published
New York, NY : W. W. Norton & Company [2024]
Language
English
Main Author
R. J. Overy (author)
Edition
First edition
Physical Description
viii, 288 pages ; 24 cm
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 233-273) and index.
ISBN
9781324021742
  • Preface
  • Prologue: Why War?
  • 1. Biology
  • 2. Psychology
  • 3. Anthropology
  • 4. Ecology
  • 5. Resources
  • 6. Belief
  • 7. Power
  • 8. Security
  • Conclusion
  • Abbreviations
  • Notes
  • Selected Readings
  • Index
Review by Kirkus Book Review

An expert exploration of the title question. Veteran military historian Overy--author of Blood and Ruins, RAF, A History of War in 100 Battles, and many other acclaimed books of military history, begins in 1932 when Einstein put the title question to Freud, who, the author writes, maintained that violence was "characteristic of the animal kingdom" and "could see no effective way of inhibiting the urge to fight and destroy." Freudian explanations persisted until the 1970s before vanishing in favor of science and history, which had never been absent but never conclusive. Evolutionary biologists maintain that "warfare was one way…for humans to adapt to behavior that maximized survival." They cannot resist explaining human behavior as homologous with that of animals, but this remains tenuous. Despite a similar lack of hard evidence, historians maintain that lethal violence increased as primitive hominins settled into communities, tribes, chiefdoms, and states. That prehistoric societies were pacific was widely endorsed until the 1960s, when four areas of evidence tipped the balance: skeletal trauma from innumerable massacre sites with remains of whole communities, cave drawings and iconography, fortified sites, and a surfeit of weapons. Readers expecting Overy's usual vivid battlefield fireworks will be disappointed. This is a work of ideas. Overy asks a big question and queries other thinkers, who deliver confidently, perhaps overconfidently, expressed answers. Other scholars disagree, but Overy sees no end to war. The USSR's collapse was a false dawn as an assertive China challenges American hegemony. Wars to obtain loot (i.e., "resources") retain their appeal with lithium and rare earths in the wings to replace oil's long-delayed decline. Perhaps most disheartening are hubristic wars launched by aggressive autocrats (Alexander, Napoleon, Hitler) who wreak massive but fleeting destruction. Readers may pray that "fleeting" applies to Vladimir Putin. Astute if uncomfortable insights. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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