ABSTRACT
The most original contribution of the Greeks to military thought was their self-conscious development of the concept of raison detat. They perceived warfare as a rational and utilitarian instrument of politics and thought of interstate relations as a structure of power politics independent of moral questions. This approach to interstate affairs was pioneered by the Sophists of the fifth century B.C. and became common in political oratory, especially at Athens. One of the leading insights of the sophistic revolution was to make a clear distinction between the just (dikaion) and the advantageous (.sympheron), which permitted rational debate about war and diplomacy. The sophistic type of political oratory was invented about the same time as historical writing, in the late fifth century B.C., and soon established a close connection with it. In the fourth century, it was widely assumed that one of the primary purposes of historical writing was to provide information for orators on matters of war and peace.
