CANDID AND TO THE POINT / काम की बात
Organised a Conclave on 17 Apr 2021
Enjoyed interacting with the young Minds
Theme
Accelerating the Paradigm Shift
Issues Covered
Aatmanirbhar Sashastrata
Importance of Military Diplomacy
Countering the 360deg Chinese threat
Excerpts from the interaction:-
On Chinese Fault Lines
On Chinese Behaviour
On Rafale and Space Warfare
On QUAD
On Pakistan, Balakot and Abhinandan
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On advice from Gen Katoch added this post on interesting war quotes
All’s fair in love and war.
– Anne Frank
I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
– Albert Einstein
In war, truth is the first casualty.
– Aeschylus
The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.
– G.K. Chesterton
All war represents is a failure of diplomacy.
– Tony Benn
Wars of pen and ink often lead to wars of cannon and bayonets.
– Edward Counsel
The military don’t start wars. Politicians start wars.
– William Westmoreland
War settles nothing.
– Dwight D. Eisenhower
“All war is a symptom of man’s failure as a thinking animal.”
― John Steinbeck
“Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality.”
― Lewis Carroll
Anonymous
Never start a fight when you are not ready for war.
Never start a war you cannot finish.
War doesn’t determine who’s right. War determines who’s left.
The absence of war is not peace.
Arm Chair warrior will fight till the last drop of your blood.
Value additions are most welcome
Starting a new series on War and Warfare, beginning with definition of war.
Defining War
Dictionary Definitions. Definitions of war in different dictionaries are as follows:
These definitions are understandable and accurate definitions in the general context however, they are too simplistic to convey the complexity and many facets of war. The war needs to be conceptualized and defined in a broader perspective. War has been defined over the years by the strategists. Each has added a new facet (highlighted in italics in the text) to the definition. Some of the definitions are as follows:
Von Clausewitz (1911) defined war as “an act of violence intended to compel our opponents to fulfil our will”, and “War is nothing but a continuation of political intercourse, with a mixture of other means.”
Sorel (1912) defined war as a “political act by means of which States, unable to adjust a dispute regarding their obligations, rights or interests, resort to armed force to decide which is the stronger and may therefore impose its will on the other”.
Russell’s (1916) definition of war as “conflict between two groups, each of which attempts to kill and maim as many as possible of the other group in order to achieve some object which it desires” is even more general and uncritically inclusive. Russell states the object for which men fight as “generally power or wealth”.
Johnson (1935) defines war as “armed conflict between population groups conceived of as organic unities, such as races or tribes, states or lesser geographic units, religious or political parties, economic classes”.
Kallen (1939) gave a political definition of war: “If war may be defined as an armed contest between two or more sovereign institutions employing organized military forces in the pursuit of specific ends”. The significant term in the definition is `organized’. He further adds that this organization of the contending armed forces extends back behind the battle lines and tends in modern wars to embrace all civilian activities, such as the industrial, productive, and commercial, and also the social interests and individual attitudes.
Bernard (1944) stated as follows: “War is organized continuous conflict of a transient character between or among collectivities of any sort capable of arming and organizing themselves for violent struggle carried on by armies in the field (or naval units on water) and supported by civil or incompletely militarized populations back of the battle areas constituted for the pursuit of some fairly well-defined public or quasipublic objective.” This objective is of course not always defined to the satisfaction of all concerned and it is liable to change according to circumstances during the continuance of the struggle.
Wallace (1968) considers war to be “the sanctioned use of lethal weapons by members of one society against members of another. It is carried out by trained persons working in teams that are directed by a separate policy-making group and supported in various ways by the non-combatant population”.
Ashworth (1968): “Mass or total war may be defined as a type of armed conflict between large nation-States in which populations and resources are rationally and extensively organized for conquest. It is important to note that populations are mobilized both in terms of activities and psychological states: the former implies comprehensive military and civilian conscription; the latter implies the systematic development of belligerent and hostile attitudes towards the enemy among all or most of the population.”
Deutsch and Senghaas (1971): “By ‘war’ we mean actual large-scale organized violence, prepared and maintained by the compulsion and legitimacy claims of a State and its government, and directed against another State or quasi-State, i.e. a relatively comparable political organization”.
Barringer (1972) considers war to be “one possible mode of policy activity aimed at effectively and favourably resolving an ongoing conflict of interests. In this sense war is but one of numerous conflict procedures, others being negotiation, conciliation, mediation, arbitration, and adjudication. It is merely a particular subset of the larger set of all conflict modes.
All the definitions read together cover most of the facets of war. However, in the modern times the very nature of warfare are changing rapidly. More about these changes later.
Coming up next : Types of War
References: