“War. What is it good for?”
These were the opening words of a song from Edwin Starr in 1969. It is now the title of a new book by Professor Ian Morris. This week, I went to a meeting at the House of Commons, organised by the Henry Jackson Society and chaired by the Conservative MP Julian Lewis, where Morris set out the main themes of his book.
Morris grew up in Britain and studied at Birmingham and Cambridge Universities before moving to the University of Chicago in 1987 and on to Stanford University in 1995. He is now Jean and Rebecca Willard Professor of Classics and a Fellow of the Archaeology Center at Stanford University.
At the meeting, he put forward the four claims in his book based on a study of the whole of human history:
- War has created larger and safer communities.
- War has been responsible for making more prosperous societies.
- War seems to have been the only way to create such bigger societies.
- War is now in the process of putting itself out of business.
Expanding on these themes, Morris acknowledged that war is one of the greatest human evils. It has ruined livelihoods, provoked unspeakable atrocities and left countless millions dead. It has caused economic chaos and widespread deprivation, and the misery it causes poisons foreign policy for future generations. Yet, in his view, there is a case to be made that it is thanks to war that we live longer and more comfortable lives than ever before.
He pointed out that a person born 20,000 years ago would have faced a one in ten or even one in five chance of dying violently. But in the century since 1914 — despite its two world wars, atomic bombs, and multiple genocides — that risk has fallen to barely one in a hundred.
This analysis poses many questions. Is war then in fact a good thing? Without war, would we never have built the nation-states which now keep us relatively safe from random acts of violence, and which have given us previously unimaginable wealth? Is war perhaps the only human invention that has allowed us to construct peaceful societies? And yet, if we continue waging war with ever-more deadly weaponry, are we running a risk destroying everything we have achieved?
His conclusion is a controversial one. He supports the notion of the USA as a global cop and argues that the best option for the world over the coming decades is to support and bolster the strength of America so that it can continue effectively in this role.