“So long as mankind
Shall continue to lavish more
Praise upon its destroyers than
Upon its benefactors war shall
Remain the Chief Pursuit of
Ambitious minds”
EDWARD GIBBON (1737-1794)
Decline and fall of the Roman Empire
The relativistic and pluralistic coloration given to the TRUTH has
always precipitated divisions, conflicts, controversies and wars.
Hence, the first victim of war is the TRUTH. When the truth is
murdered, hoodwinked, hara-kiried and suppressed in any collectivity
it stimulates the instant death of peace redounding to war.
Within the context of usage, war is the unleashing of violent martial,
political, socio-economic, religious, cultural etc. hostilities
against another individual, nation or collectivity. War is fighting,
expedition, crusade, jihad, insurgency, terrorism, armed conflict,
battle, rebellion, revolution, uprising, offensive insurrection and
attack etc.
The Peloponnesians wars, the 100 days war, the First and Second World
Wars, the battle of tondibi, the Nigeria/Biafra Civil War(1967-1970),
the Rwanda, Burundi, Sudan, Sierra-Leone, Mali, Chad, Central African
Republic, Islamic State (IS), Al-Shaba, Boko Haram, Al-Qaeda, Shite,
Sunni Religious Wars, Libya, Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Yemen,
Russia, America, Egypt, North and South Korea, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait,
Middle East, India, Libya, Ukraine, China/Taiwan, Pakistan,
Bangladesh, Philippines, Afghanistan, Syria Wars have turned our world
into an oubliette of doom, death, disease, quagmire and an apocalyptic
dungeon of hopelessness.
Wars have plunged and will continue to plunge mankind into the abyss
and labyrinth of arrested development. It is the proverbial vulture of
our world waiting to consume the carcasses of the dead. It brings out
and unleashes brutish bestialities, sanguinary proclivities,
Neanderthal brigandage, belligerent lunacy and genocidal decimations
on helpless children, women and innocent men etc.
In the 21st century that boost of so-called modern civilization, with
over 300,000 universities, over 1 billion Christians, 2 billion
Muslims Buddhist, Hindus and nominal Traditionalists etc. It is a
shame and a cadaverous disgrace that wars still remains the major
means and ways of settling our differences. O’ what a hypocritical
World! Seeing the evil of war the essayist Dr Finley Peter Dunne
(1867-1937) posited in his book ‘WAR and WAR MAKERS’ that “I wish it
could be fixed up, so the men that start the wars could do the
Fighting”.
The Late Biafra war General Emeka Odumegu Ojukwu observed in his book
‘Because Am Involved’ that “Nobody Likes blood-letting, one would
certainly wish there were no more wars in all parts of the world,
because no war in history has ever solved the problem it set out to
solve, eventually, whatever solution there is, emerges from a
conference table, and not from the battle field. It is only those who
have not been involved in a war that will always push war as the first
solution to any problem. War does not solve, it cowers but the problem
remains”.
The people of Ife-Modakeke, Urhobo / Itsekiri/ Ijaw, Tiv-Igala, Boko
Haram insurgents etc seem not to have learnt their lessons about the
futility and negative consequences of war. The People that cause the
war and set the stage for the war do not fight. It is the common man,
the flotsams and jetsam and the poor downtrodden that die in reckless
battles. Hence, the statesman Winston Churchill (1874-1965) said that
“Little did we guess that what has been called the century of the
common man would witness as its outstanding feature more common men
killing each other five centuries together in the history of the
World”.
But in very rare cases when painstaking, mindboggling, intensively
Saber-rattling and doggedly consummate dispute resolution and schism
management alternatives has been exhaustively explored and exploited,
men could be reluctantly compelled to resort to war in self-protection
and self-preservation. But it is the established philosophy of the
stoics and pacifists thinkers that on no ground and condition must war
be fought. But Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) in his book ‘Mein Kampf’ said
“it must be thoroughly understood that the lost land will never be won
back by solemn appeals to the good God, nor by hopes in any League of
Nations, but by the force of arms” and George Washington (1732-1799)
said that “to be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means
of preserving peace”. They preferred war wholly and partially, but war
put an end to their lives ambitions and dreams.
