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From: ANDY@SUSHI.STANFORD.EDU
Newsgroups: mod.politics
Subject: War caused by misunderstanding?]
Message-ID: <12236062324.58.MCGREW@RED.RUTGERS.EDU>
Date: Wed, 3-Sep-86 16:57:49 EDT
Article-I.D.: RED.12236062324.58.MCGREW
Posted: Wed Sep  3 16:57:49 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 4-Sep-86 03:40:54 EDT
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Reply-To: ANDY@Sushi.Stanford.EDU
Organization: The ARPA Internet
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Approved: poli-sci@red.rutgers.edu


I often see/hear statements that are roughly equivalent to:

    "War is caused by misunderstanding."

Does anyone have an example of a war that was CAUSED by
misunderstanding?  (I realize that WWI was triggered by a
misunderstanding over the murder of Archduke Ferdinand, but the causes
were there long before.  I believe that WWI would have happened
eventually even if his driver hadn't screwed up.)

Please include some explanation of your use of "cause" and
"misunderstanding".

thanks,
-andy

[ Hmmm... well, let's see.  I think that we could look at WWII first.
The Japanese misunderstood the American people's will to fight: they
calculated that a quick strike on the Pacific Fleet and other US
possesions would dishearten the populous that the US would negotiate a
peace in Japan's favor, and so they went ahead and attacked.  It can
be argued then that this misunderstanding the war.  England and France
misunderstood Hitler's intentions during the pre-war maneuverings and
by their actions (giving to or accepting his actions) caused him to
misunderstand their will to fight which led him to attack Poland and
trigger the beginning of the war.  Hitler's misunderstood Russia's
will to fight, and this caused him to attack the USSR in 1941.

   In WWI, most of the major participants misunderstood the power of
the forces they had at hand and so moved more boldly (or foolishly)
than they might otherwise (although you're right about the war being
inevitable as things stood.  Serbia and Austria-Hungary were headed
for war in any case, and world war was a step a way from that).

   Is this the sort of thing you're looking for, or am I on the wrong
track? - CWM]
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