Introduction
The term war can be used to refer to the situation whereby one or two sides have a conflicting struggle which involves the political, religious, or economic struggle between countries, individuals, or between some groups respectively. Thus war may be seen as a hostile interaction between two parties who have more than one differing policy. Wars can be regarded as being civil or proxy respectively depending on the occurrence of that war about the territory of origin.
A civil war can be regarded as a war that arises as a dispute between the parties who exist in the same country. At the same time, the war which occurs when some third party uses the other parties to fight so that that third party gets some gains in the form of economics, religion, and nationalism is referred to as the proxy wars. Wars have been in existence since the medieval period, thus they can not be seen as a new thing at all.
For instance, wars have existed since the time of the civilization revolution and even the wars are constantly recorded in the holy books such as the bible and the Koran respectively. From other perspectives, the wars can be seen as the cultural practices which have evolved as a result of the repetition occurrence between some communities as a result of hatred. Wars at the same time are a universal issue.
Wars have dates back to the ancient time wars such as those of Israelites- Amalekites war and the Israel-Meadinites wars to the common wars which occurs between two or more states or two different empires. Consequently, wars may occur in different settings such as the land, air, and the sea. The wars have taken different forms in nature which are aimed at arming the involved enemies.
The forms which have been used include the use of the militaries to attack the opposite enemies, use of the economical embargos, movement restrictions, or the use of the genocides to harm the enemy nation. Wars have been explained by the use of many theories but the causes of wars can be categorized as being material causes or being ideological causes. The material causes include the economic cause and the territory causes.
At the same time, the ideological causes include religious causes and nationalism causes. (Blainey, Geoffery, 55-60). Some of the commonly reported wars which have occurred in world history include the American civil war which occurred as a result of the human rights discriminations, the Gulf war, Israel Arab war, Pakistan India war, Burundi Rwanda war, Congo war, Chinese Tibet war, French revolution war, Spanish tribal wars, Sudan war, and the Sierra Leone wars respectively. This paper tries to analyze the material causes of wars about the historical and current trends of occurrence of these wars respectively. At the same time, this paper will try to evaluate the effects of these wars on the present society.
Territorial causes of war
The most appealing cause of wars is the generally referred material cause which has been seen to bring a lot of impact to the rise of countries against others leading to the sufferings of the individuals who can be regarded as being innocent. The territorial effects have consequently led to the establishment of regional and international conflicts respectively. Some of the recorded wars which have started as a result of the territorial conflicts include the Gulf war, Israel Arab war, Pakistan India war, Burundi Rwanda war, and the Chinese Tibet wars respectively. All of this has occurred by the use of the military invasion respectively.
The Gulf war which can be seen as one of the wars which were caused by the territorial conflict which has been catalyzed by the international and regional factors respectively. Kuwait and Iraq are generally neighboring countries that were the former British colonies (Angelo M.Codevilla, 70-73). At the same time, these two countries were controlled by the Ottoman Empire during ancient times. This war dates back as earlier as the year 1991.
When Kuwait was guaranteed independence by Britain Iraq refused to accept arguing that Kuwait was generally part of the Iraq territory. Moreover, Iraq argued that they were in the same territory while they were under the Ottoman Empire’s rule. These arguments triggered the attacks by Iraq. Thus this claim which shared the history of the colonial period triggered the territorial Gulf war. The dispute was based on the Rumalia oilfield which Iraq claimed that it belonged to her. Moreover, Iraq claimed that Kuwait was stealing their oil by using the drilling technology from their side which was consequently denied by Kuwait.
About these claims, Iraq had demanded to be paid compensation worth billions of money. After Kuwait refused to comply with the demands of Iraq, the Gulf war broke out respectively in the year of 1991. At the same time, the conflict on the ownership of the Bubiyan and the Warbah island was another cause that can be seen as the territorial clause of the gulf war. Iraq wanted to possess these two islands so that it can use them for the transportation of its oil products to the Persian Gulf (Barzilai Gad, 44-49).
Thus Iraq decided to put pressure on the islands with the help of the military forces. Further, the Arab community tried to prevent the straggle but failed. As a result, the Arab league stated to act as the mediator to end the crisis which was found to be a useless effort since Kuwait was unwilling to give the islands to Iraq respectively but instead it gave Iraq some loans. But following this sequence of events, Iraq was still not willing to leave the islands and this made it attack Kuwait in 1990.
Another war that has been established as a result of the territorial problem is the India-Pakistan war. This war as arose as a result of the territorial dispute between these two countries regarding the state dispute of Kashmir (Fry, Douglas, 80-92). Kashmir is on the border between Pakistan and India. Jammu Kashmir territory backs back to the time of the independence of India in the year 1947 when the Muslim community demanded their state which they are given.
However, this territorial dispute has been catalyzed by the presence of an ideological and religious difference between India and Pakistan. Pakistan is a Muslim-dominated country while India can be regarded as a Hindu-dominated country respectively.
India and Pakistan had engaged in the war in the year 1947-1948 for the first time respectively. But in the year 1965, the second war erupted. The stability in this border is in jeopardy as the presence of the militia group who are constantly acting as the terrorist groups and they have constantly attacked India, for example, they attacked the Indian parliament, they have at the same time constantly attacked the railway department of India and even the recent terrorist activity in Mumbai was well organized by the Muslim extremist from Pakistan.
The Israel Arab dispute is a major territorial dispute which has been established in the Middle East respectively. This dispute has been attributed as the result of the dispute over the Gaza strip which every side argues belongs to their territory respectively.
The war was triggered as earlier as the year 1945 after the creation of the Republic of Israel by the United Nation resolution. Palestine had constantly argued that Israel’s land belonged to them but at the same time Israel has no option but to resist the attacks. This war has led to many casualties when compared with other wars. The worst fought war between Israel and Palestine occurred in the year 1967 whereby the fighting was known as the six-day independence war. Moreover, some factors such as the involvement of other counties in this crisis such as the United States of America have increased the tension between these two forces respectively.
Economic causes of war
Another war that can be categorized as being caused by the material cause is the Congo war which is generally regarded as the second African war respectively (Barkeley, Bill.50-57). This war arose as a result of the conflict which was based on who was supposed to control the natural resources in the Republic of Congo. The natural resources included the minerals and the forest resources respectively which were concentrated in the Eastern Congo.
Most of the resources have been fully exploited by the Uganda and Rwanda armies. Some of the political analysts have consequently said concluded that the main cause of this war was the great competition between the Kabila supporters in the year 1999 for the natural resources which catalyzed the outbreak of this war which has been generally regarded as the worst recorded war in the African history (Clarke, John. F, 72-79).
This war is even taking place up to date and it has led to much killing of people and loss of properties which has consequently reduced the economic growth of the region. Moreover, it has led to an increase in the number of refugees in the region. Consequently, this war has been marked by the greatest number of women raped casualties in the region. The effect of this war covers even the wildlife sector for most of the wildlife was either killed or displaced.
The Sudanese war can be regarded as a war that has been caused by economic forces. The Sudanese war started in the years 1983which has been regarded as a continuation of the civil war which occurred in the year 1955 t0 1972 respectively. This war has been triggered by the differences which have currently occurred between the south and the north over the control of the resources. This has led to a large movement of refugees into neighboring countries such as Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Uganda. The conflict is accelerated more by the presence of some divisions between the Muslim Arabs and the Christian Africans.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it may be seen that wars are caused due to several factors which include material and ideological causes. The material causes of war are the most pronounced since ancient times up to date. But the effects of the wars are just similar which includes the loss of life, properties, and the general economic slowdown in the involved region respectively. However, the occurrence of wars can be prevented by the use of the international community.
Works cited
Angelo Codevilla and Paul Seabury, War: Ends and Means (Potomac Books, Revised second edition by Angelo Codevilla, 2006, pp. 70-73.
Barzilai Gad, Wars, Internal Conflicts and Political Order: A Jewish Democracy in the Middle East (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996, pp. 44-49.
Blainey, Geoffrey, Causes of wars, New York: New York press, pp. 55-60.
Berkeley, Bill. The Graves Are Not Yet Full: Race, Tribe, and Power in the Heart of Africa Basic Books.2001, pp. 50-57.
Clark, John F. (2002) The African Stakes in the Congo War New York: Palgrave McMillan. 2002, pp. 72-79
Fry, Douglas P. The Human Potential for Peace: An Anthropological Challenge to Assumptions about War and Violence, Oxford University Press. 2005, pp. 80-92.
Gat, Azar, War in Human Civilization, Oxford University Press. 2006, pp. 48-57.
Kelly, Raymond C.Warless Societies and the Origin of War, University of Michigan Press. 2000, pp. 17-25.