Causes of War and Threats to Peace War is one of the responses by which one society tries to reduce the capacity of another society to obtain its objectives, when one or several of these are conflicting with those of the first society. By this response, society A tries to get the society B to do what is not convenient for B, but of convenience to A. In other words, A tries to get B to do something unnatural, namely NOT to try to reach its own objectives. This is in direct contradiction with the definition of an intelligent system of a human being, and resisted by B. Societies, since they are intelligent systems (IS), always act as best they see fit to reach their objectives. When there is a conflict, the first thing they do is to appeal to a super society. If such a super society does not exist, it is inevitable that the societies do what they consider best to reach their objectives. Sometimes this will be a war. A society, by waging war, takes a natural response, namely trying to reach its objectives. We see that it is no wonder that two societies with conflicting objectives go to war. In a nation, the governing sub society makes the decision to attack or cooperate according to how it sees the best way to reach its objectives. Once it has taken the decision, the general population acts according to the emotions evoked by the governing subsociety and according to existing habits and regulations for civilians and the military forces. The governing subsociety will present the adversary as cruel, greedy, barbarian, and nasty. It will appeal to patriotism and ideals. For all this it will use existing communications media that appeal to emotions and preexisting mental inclinations. Below we mention subjective causes for war that have their root in human nature and the present culture: Belief by the governing subsociety that, in the long run, the war will be beneficial to itself or its society. Errors of appreciation of the political, econo...
