Wars

Goodness knows why this mind works the way it does.  I have been thinking about the causes of war.  I guess that is because we had a friend over, and he talked about it.  It made me wonder, “what are the causes of war?” 
As a result, I did as one does, and went to the internet.  I was incredibly surprised to learn there is a set of encyclopedias called “Encyclopedia of War” which consists of three volumes.
In some cases, the causes of people’s demise is a war by any other name, and is the result of a leaders ideas being used on their own people.  In some instances, the people did not agree with them, and wore the consequences, while at other times they were really just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  A few examples were Starlin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Lenin.  In these alone, over 80 million people died.
Rwanda shocked me.  Hundreds of thousands dead in the blink of an eye.  I could not believe what I was reading when I saw the headline “England and Argentina at war.”  Peace between these nations was shattered overnight.
To me, war is basically what can occur between two people but on a national scale.  One source cited the three main reasons for war are resources, power and ideology.  The way I see it, “resources” is me wanting what you have, and using force to get it. “Power” is, I’m bigger than you and you will do my bidding.  “Ideology” is, I believe this, and you will believe the same thing or suffer the consequences.  That is very simplistic, but it seems to me that stripped down to basics, this is what a lot of conflicts result from.
I guess ideology includes religious wars.  It seems often people say things like “religion causes most wars.”  I found it interesting that less than 7/100 wars result from ideology, and when Muslim conflicts are removed it is not a lot more than 3/100.  A long way from most.  That got me thinking about recent conflicts.  Vietnam, the Gulf war, Iraq, Korea, American war of independence, Boar war and Afghanistan.  Most that I know of anyway were the result of the lust for power or resources.  Most, but not all.
There is a big difference though between a conflict I have with my neighbour and the conflict a nation has with another.  The cost in human lives of wars between nations can be astronomical.  The first world war cost heaps of lives and then the Spanish flu got em.  Double whammy really.  It seems to me that today there is a reluctance to have human involvement.  Kill em all from a safe distance.
I can’t talk though.  Is not stealing, or lying to another, or getting one up man ‘ship, just war on a minute scale?  It seems such things are played out a lot.
There is no guarantee, and I will do what I am told, but I really do not want to be involved in a war.  I can become a statistic very easily, and I have enough on my plate already thank you.