ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that any explanation of why some wars are long and some wars are short should logically be related to an overall explanation of the causes of war. It shows that in trying to analyse why wars occur and why peace occurs, the more revealing and illuminating time is often the outbreak of peace rather than the outbreak of war. The idea that arms races inevitably lead to war carries the corollary that disarmament agreements must promote peace. There has been a tendency to be carried away by the lack of a major-power war since 1945 and to see it as unique. International war has been the most acceptable way of solving serious disputes between independent nations. Perhaps the world will become more sympathetic to new means of solving international disputes when it experiences a major nuclear war and realises how archaic and inefficient warfare has become as a problem-solver.
