Dynamics
|
|
Generational Dynamics |
| Forecasting America's Destiny ... and the World's | |
| HOME WEB LOG COUNTRY WIKI COMMENT FORUM DOWNLOADS ABOUT | |
|
These pages contain the complete rough draft manuscript of the new book
Generational Dynamics for Historians,
written by John J. Xenakis.
This text is fully copyrighted. You may copy or print out this
material for your own use, but not for distribution to others.
Comments are invited. Send them to mailto:comments@generationaldynamics.com. |
The heart of Generational Dynamics is difference between crisis and non-crisis wars.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
My previous book was criticized because it didn't adequately explain the method to determine whether a war was a crisis or non-crisis war. Without such a method, Generational Dynamics is open to the accusation of "cherry-picking wars" -- that is, naming wars as crisis wars simply to make the cycles come out right.
As it turns out, the algorithm was clear in my own head, but not adequately explained in the text of the book.
The purpose of this chapter is to provide an algorithm which can be applied to any war to determine whether it's a crisis or non-crisis war, irrespective of any cycles. Once this algorithm is established, then the accusation of cherry-picking disappears.
The algorithm is as precise as possible, almost as if it were going to be implemented in computer software.
In order to apply the algorithm, it's necessary to understand the history of the war. This may require reviewing several different sources to get a complete picture.
For some wars, it's necessary to review only one source. That happens when the war is either so major or so minor that its classification is immediately clear. For other wars, four or five sources may be required.
I've also found that, on the average, it's slightly easier to evaluate a crisis war than it is to evaluate a non-crisis war. That's because identifying a non-crisis war often amounts to proving a negative, which is always difficult in any domain.
My own initial experience in reading Strauss and Howe's The Fourth Turning was that the underlying theory was too vague for me, for reasons I've enumerated in chapter xxx. Two of the problems were that: (1) The authors' restriction to six cycles in the modern Anglo-American timeline was way too small a sample to establish any sort of reasonable credibility. Unless the generational paradigm could be established for all nations at all times in history, then it would be no better than astrology. (2) The theory was established by evaluating personal diaries and histories, something which is difficult to either evaluate independently or to extend to other places and times.
I immediately latched on to the concept of "crisis war" as something that could be independently evaluated and verified. If I could find a pattern of crisis wars throughout history, then it would validate the theory; if I couldn't, then I would drop the whole thing.
One major insight had to do with World War I. Strauss and Howe explain that America was not deeply touched by WW I, and although that turns out to be true, a deeper answer was needed if only to have something to say to critics who claim that the Fourth Turning purposely ignores WW I to make the theory and the cycles to come out right.
The insight occurred when I suddenly realized that WW I was just as much a crisis war as WW II, but for a different region of the world. WW I was an East European crisis war, and WW II was a West European crisis war.
This gave rise to the Principle of Localization, which we've already discussed in chapter xxx, and to the view that crisis wars must be verified for every society and nation, or else the theory was useless.
I began examining one region after another -- America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia -- and I developed narratives for each and wrote my book, Generational Dynamics: Forecasting America's Destiny.
I developed a great intuition for evaluating wars and seeing whether they're crisis or non-crisis wars. However, Generational Dynamics was subject to one of the same criticisms as the Fourth Turning theory -- that it depends on personal evaluations of rather than objective criteria. I realized that the credibility of Generational Dynamics requires that a set of independently verifiable, objective criteria be provided for evaluating wars to determine whether they're crisis or non-crisis wars.
I tried to include such a set of criteria in my last book. The method that I described consisted of a list of questions that could be asked of any war to determine whether it was a crisis or non-crisis war. None of these questions is determinative by itself, but several of these questions taken together can provide an answer. The questions are listed below. The symbol (+) indicates that an affirmative answer indicates a crisis war, and the symbol (-) indicates that an affirmative answer indicates a non-crisis war:
I thought this list of questions was pretty good, but several people criticized it and said that I was the only person who understood the questions and could apply them.
The fact is that these questions did work for me, and worked for me very well. So I was faced with the problem that my head and my heart were telling me that my theory was sound, but I had not yet found a way to convey the theory effectively to others.
I kept working on this problem, and developed more and more refined questions and criteria. Since my background is in computers, I finally decided that I needed to produce something like a computer software algorithm, in order to be precise enough for others to follow reliably.
So that's exactly what I ended up with, and it's presented later in this chapter. It's obsessive in its presentation and level of detail, but it does provide a set of independently verifiable, objective criteria be provided for evaluating wars to determine whether they're crisis or non-crisis wars.
So let's begin by presenting an expanded intuitive description, before getting to the final algorithm
Generational Dynamics distinguishes between two very different kinds of wars:
Ask any college student to tell you what he knows about the following American wars:
In each case, he'll probably be able to tell you at least some basic information, such as what the issues were, who the participants were, what caused the war, who won, and the war's relevance today.
Now ask any college student to tell you what he knows about the following American wars:
Unless the college student is majoring in history, he probably won't be able to give you any such comparable information about any of these wars, and probably won't know anything more about them than their names, if that. These wars have become "near-forgotten" by the vast majority of Americans.
That's just one of the many differences between crisis and non-crisis wars. The first group of wars listed above are crisis wars because they were fought with a great deal of energy (what I like to call "visceral energy" or even "genocidal energy" for reasons I'll explain), and were extremely consequential in America's history. The second group of wars were far more political and politicized, with little visceral energy, and have had little historical impact.
In some cases, the student will know the name of the war. For example, as a result of the 2004 presidential election, everyone knows that we fought in a "Vietnam War," but it's rare for anyone under age 50 to know any details whatsoever. Few people can even find Vietnam on a map, let alone discuss the issues surrounding the war.
The same sort of thing is true of World War I. Most people will know the name, but will believe that it was very similar to World War II, which of course it wasn't. Even people who can tell you a great deal about World War II will have no idea what World War I was all about, or that World War I was mainly an East European war, while World War II was mainly a West European war.
The crisis wars are the most memorable, the most significant, the ones with the greatest historical impact. Look at the wars portrayed in the following graphic:
 |
I believe that any scholar looking at this graphic would have to agree that these are the most important, most significant, most transformational wars of the last few centuries in America and Europe. You would find it very difficult to identify a war that isn't on here and is more important than the wars on here.
If you agree with that, then you already agree with most of the points we're making, because these wars do indeed occur in roughly 80-year cycles.
And that's the underlying basis of Generational Dynamics: That crisis wars do indeed occur in roughly 80 year cycles, and that therefore we can forecast future crisis wars.
While crisis wars come "from the people," non-crisis (mid-cycle) wars come from the politicians.
While crisis wars are fed by visceral and even genocidal hatred of the population toward their enemy, mid-cycle wars are pursued by a population usually feeling no particular hatred of the enemy, or at least by people who are more interested in compromise than genocide.
While crisis wars are fought by a united society or nation, mid-cycle wars are politically controversial, often fraught with antiwar (pacifist) movements and political embarassments.
Let's compare the Vietnam War of the 1960s and 70s with World War II and the War on Terror today.
During the Vietnam War, few people felt the war was important to their own lives, except insofar as their own sons, brothers and fathers were fighting and dying in the war. The American people did not fear the Vietnamese people, were not angry at the Vietnamese people, and did not desire vengeance against the Vietnamese people. There was massive political turmoil about the Vietnam War, with constant riots and demonstrations against the war, especially by college students.
These are all indicators that the Vietnam War as a mid-cycle (non-crisis) war. It was a political war, a war that comes from the politicians rather than from the people. No one doubts that America could have won that war if we had used America's military power to the fullest, but we never did because of political opposition. In the end, we lost the war because of political opposition.
Now consider the War on Terror today.
The American people are infuriated and anxious following 9/11. They fear that terrorist acts are going to harm America's way of life (and, indeed, Osama bin Laden said he wanted to do exactly that). There was overwhelming support for both the invasion of Afghanistan and the invasion of Iraq. Both political parties strongly support the war on terror; the Democrats have criticized the Bush administration's handling of the war, but there is no effective effort to end the war. In fact, there's almost no antiwar movement at all.
One of the most telling things is that following 9/11, Americans were willing to lock up American Muslims in jail without a trial. Nothing like this happened in the Vietnam War. The last time anything like this happened was in World War II, when we locked up Japanese-American citizens in camps.
During World War II the Japanese hated us and we hated the Japanese. Like today, President Roosevelt received enormous criticism and contempt by his political enemies for the way he conducted the war, but no one ever suggested that the war against Germany and Japan should be ended before there was total victory. By the end, we were firebombing and destroying entire cities like Dresden and Tokyo, and of course we used two nuclear weapons on two Japanese cities.
These examples illustrate the dramatic differences between crisis and non-crisis wars. If you've never looked at wars this way, you may think that these differences aren't always so sharp, that some wars are half and half with respect to the characteristics described here.
But in fact I've performed hundreds of evaluations of wars to determine whether they're crisis or non-crisis, and I've found that if the evaluation parameters are followed, all wars are either one or the other, are either visceral or political, and that there's rarely any doubt about it.
We described the difference between generational crisis wars and mid-cycle wars as being visceral, genocidal wars versus political wars.
There's one more complication: In a war between two countries, just because the war is a crisis war for one of the belligerents doesn't mean that it is for other belligerents.
This was the case with the Vietnam War, which was a non-crisis war for America, as we discussed.
But for the Vietnamese it was a crisis war. The previous crisis war in the region had been the French Indochina wars of the 1880s and 1890s, and by the 1960s and 1970s those wars had been forgotten by Americans, but not by the Vietnamese.
Before going to the specific algorithm, let's discuss some of the many differences between crisis and non-crisis wars.
Americans don't understand crisis wars, even though they happen all the time around the world. Americans don't even really understand their own crisis wars - the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and World War II.
There are in fact two distinctly different kinds of wars that occur in any society. The vast majority of wars are non-crisis wars (also called mid-cycle wars). These are political wars, fought to achieve some political goal. Frequently they're fought with little enthusiasm from the general public, and there is usually a political resolution that restores roughly the balance that existed before the war. Some societies have wars of this type as a way of life. Frequently these wars are forgotten within a generation. (For example, the Korean War is almost forgotten today. The Vietnam War per se is forgotten today, except for the politics surrounding it. Even the 1991 Gulf War is almost forgotten today, at least by people under age 20.)
But crisis wars are different. They have political goals, but they have an energy all their own, often genocidal in nature. The energy increases until an extremely violent and historical climax is reached. If there's a political resolution, it's almost always with the intention of forcing compromises so that no such war will ever happen again. Crisis wars are not forgotten by the nations participating in them, even centuries later.
Any war might begin slowly, as the participants continue to hope for a peaceful resolution. In non-crisis wars, there sometimes is a peaceful resolution that ends the war quickly. But crisis wars do not end peacefully. They continue to gather energy until they explode in a final crisis climax.
In The Fourth Turning, William Strauss and Neal Howe describe what happens during the climax of a crisis war: "The Crisis climax is human history's equivalent to nature's raging typhoon, the kind that sucks all surrounding matter into a single swirl of ferocious energy. Anything not lashed down goes flying; anything standing in the way gets flattened. Normally occurring late in the Fourth Turning, the climax gathers energy from an accumulation of unmet needs, unpaid bills, and unresolved problems. It then spends that energy on an upheaval whose direction and dimension were beyond comprehension during the prior Unraveling era. The climax shakes a society to its roots, transforms its institutions, redirects its purposes, and marks its people (and its generations) for life. The climax can end in triumph, or tragedy, or some combination of both. Whatever the event and whatever the outcome, a society passes through a great gate of history, fundamentally altering the course of civilization."
This kind of climax, occurring after the war has gathered energy sometimes for years, is what defines a crisis war.
There are other secondary criteria that distinguish a crisis war, but these other criteria are important only because they help us determine historically whether the kind of climax just described actually occurred. The secondary criteria indicate whether or not the war is gathering energy or losing energy over time. For example, the presence of an active antiwar (pacifist) movement is almost always a sign that the public has little energy for the war, and that it's not a crisis war.
The main factor that distinguishes a crisis war is the attitude of the public toward the war and the enemy. In crisis wars, the public feels a visceral anger and hatred at the enemy, a fear for the country's survival or at least for its way of life, building to a desire to achieve total victory, no matter what the cost. In many crisis wars, this rage becomes genocidal.
Americans today can understand this feeling. We can turn on the television today and see news stories about the hatred of Palestinians and Islamic extremists toward Israel and America, towards Jews and Americans. For many, this hatred extends to Europe and to the West in general. In return, Americans can probe their own hatred toward Islamic extremists, especially in the months following the 9/11 attacks.
Americans can also remember (or read) that they didn't have these feelings during the Vietnam or Korean wars. Few if any people hated the Vietnamese or Koreans, and most people didn't even know where Vietnam and Korea were.
But Americans can also read news accounts of attitudes in World War II. German and Japanese documents of the time show clearly how much the Germans and Japanese hated the English and Americans. And the feeling was returned, as shown by how the Americans firebombed and destroyed Dresden and Tokyo, and then dropped two nuclear weapons on Japanese cities. These are the kinds of attitudes that you have to be able to gauge to assess whether a war is a crisis or non-crisis war.
The difference between crisis and non-crisis American wars is as plain as the nose on your face if you know just a little bit of history. The Revolutionary War, Civil War and World War II were fought with a great deal of energy and determination. The Mexican-American war, the Spanish-American war, World War I, the Korean war, the Vietnamese war and the Gulf War all caused huge political debates and internal dissension in America. One interesting fact is that a recent historical assessment of all American Presidents found that the second most controversial President (after Bill Clinton) was Woodrow Wilson. Why? Because Wilson's decision finally to enter World War I, four years after it started, is still hotly debated and highly controversial even today. I've spoken to a couple of people who, even today, still bitterly criticize Wilson for entering World War I. By contrast, there is little or no controversy over Franklin Roosevelt's decision to declare war on Japan after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.
So it's possible to evaluate American wars simply because we have so much information about them. Unfortunately, such information rarely exists for historical wars. As a result, all we can do is look for clues in the historical descriptions to indicate the public attitude toward the enemy and the war.
That's the purpose of the criteria used for evaluating a given war. These criteria do not directly tell us what the attitudes of the people were, but they do provide indirect evidence of the public attitudes.
We're still continuing our informal discussion, prior to giving the precise algorithm.
A crisis war is like a ball rolling downhill. It may (or may not) need a push to start, and it may be temporarily stopped by obstacles on the way down. But it keeps gathering energy, and at some point its momentum becomes so great that it's unstoppable, until it reaches the bottom of the hill in an explosive climax that forever changes the landscape.
The criteria we're describing measure the rolling of this ball of war. Since we can't measure public attitudes during historical wars, we look for "clues" in the historical descriptions of the wars to see if the criteria for a crisis war are met. If the clues are ambiguous, then it's necessary to refer to additional sources to get more information. In my experience, it's rare that an ambiguous situation remains ambiguous for long. Whether a war is a crisis or non-crisis war becomes abundantly clear very quickly.
There are two major criteria that identify crisis wars, and several secondary criteria. The secondary criteria do not by themselves necessarily indicate a crisis war, but they often point to way to seeing how the major criteria should be evaluated.
There are two major criteria that identify crisis wars:
With regard to the last point, it's well to remember the following principle of Generational Dynamics: Nobody ever remembers the atrocities they commit on others, but no one ever forgets the atrocities that others commit on them.
The following are secondary, non-conclusive criteria that identify crisis wars:
The above secondary criteria are not conclusive, since they can also occur in non-crisis wars. However, they occur far more often in crisis wars.
Still continuing our informal discussion, a non-crisis (mid-cycle) war is like pushing a ball uphill. It has to be constantly pushed, and if you stop pushing, then the ball stops. Depending on the hill, the ball might roll by itself for a little while, but it always comes to a stop without more pushing. Finally, you get tired of pushing, and the war stops.
The main criterion for a non-crisis war are that it doesn't satisfy the major criteria for a crisis war.
That's why it's a little harder to identify a non-crisis war than a crisis war. You essentially have to prove a negative.
The following are secondary criteria that identify non-crisis wars:
Open planning and mobilization. Examples: 1991 Gulf War, 1982 Falklands war for England. If a country openly plans for war and mobilizes, and openly states conditions under which war will or will not occur, then the war, if it occurs, is almost always a non-crisis war.
Exogenous cause of war. Example: Germany in WWI or Russia in WW II. If a country is pulled into a war because of an exogenous factor, such as a treaty with another country or an unexpected invasion, then a non-crisis war is indicated. This situation is a weak indicator since it can also arise in crisis wars, but in the absence of other factors it indicates a non-crisis war.
"Top-down war." Example: Korean War. This refers to situations where a politician leads a country to war with little enthusiasm or support from the people.
Strong antiwar (pacifist) movement and political turmoil. Example: America in Vietnam War, WW I. This indicates lack of public support for the war.
Surprising capitulation or unclear conclusion. Example: Vietnam war, Korean war, Germany in WW I. If there's no clear winner to the war, or if a nation capitulates or withdraws before it's necessary to do so, then it's most likely a non-crisis war.
Punishment of losers by winners. Example: Gulf War against Iraq, WW I against Germany. This is a complex criterion and really requires further study, but the overwhelming feeling after a crisis war should be that there's plenty of blame to go around and to impose conditions to guarantee that another such war won't occur. If punitive conditions are imposed by the victor, then it means that the crisis war has yet to be fought.
Sometimes a war is more difficult to evaluate because it's a crisis war for one participant and a non-crisis war for the other participant. In these cases, there may be no final "violent explosion," since the non-crisis participant may simply capitulate rather than face that kind of vengeance. An example is the colonists (crisis) versus the English in the Revolutionary War.
In these cases, it's necessary to use secondary factors to evaluate the participant.
The above descriptive criteria are not specific enough to provide historians with a specific algorithm for historians who are attempting to evaluate historical wars. The following is intended to provide such an algorithm.
The evaluation algorithm can be applied to any belligerent in any war to determine whether it's a crisis or non-crisis war for that belligerent.
The prerequisites for use of this algorithm are:
The Evaluation Algorithm is in four steps, to be applied in order. Each step might produce three results:
In other words, you go through four steps. Each step results in either "determines x" or "supports x" or "?", where x is C for crisis or N for non-crisis.
Make sure that you under the difference between "supports x," which provides evidence of a crisis or non-crisis war, and "determines x," which provides proof.
Here's a summary of the four steps:
Step 1: Evaluate Historical significance. If the war is historically significant, the result of the step is "Supports C"; if the war is near-forgotten, then the result of the step is "Determines N."
Step 2: Determine intensity of genocidal violence. High genocidal violence gives the result "Determines C"; intermittent, stalemated or low-level violence gives the result, "Supports N."
Step 3: Determine level of political considerations. If the war is highly politicized, the result is "Determines N"; if the pursuit of the war is nonpolitical, the result is "Supports C."
Step 4: Determine resolution. If the resolution of the war is a set of painful compromises designed to prevent future wars, the result is "Supports C"; if the resolution is that the victors impose punishment or reparations on the losers, the result is "Supports N."
If you are a historian, you may find these steps puzzling, because they don't seem to correspond to anything you've seen before in the study of history.
But that's the point. Generational Dynamics is a brand-new discipline, and in particular a brand-new way of looking at wars. The steps summarized above do not make sense in the ordinary study of history, but they are crucial in the evaluation of crisis wars.
A crisis war must always be a historically significant war. If a war is not historically significant in a particular society or nation, then it can't be a crisis war for that society or nation. Therefore, the purpose of this first evaluation step is determine whether the war is historically significant for the society or nation being evaluated.
Some people have expressed to me their discomfort at calling a war that kills thousands of people a "near-forgotten war." I do not mean any disrespect to anyone killed in war, or to any individual who feels a particular war is significant. However, we're talking about a discipline here, a new discipline which has never been applied before, and it requires following certain rules.
Whether a war is "historically significant" or "near forgotten" depends on how recent the war is. For long past wars, you can refer to history books of the time and see what historians say about the war's significance, or whether they even mention it. If the war is more recent, you can take a poll of college students and ask if they know anything about it.
If you are unsure whether a war is "near forgotten," then treat the war as "historically significant," and go on to Step 2.
Here are some examples of evaluations of wars on their historical significance:
Results of the evaluation of step 1:
The determining factor for a crisis war is the visceral energy, the intensity of hatred, the genocidal fury, with which the war is pursued, especially as the war reaches its climax.
I often talk about crisis wars as being "genocidal," and I actually mean two different things by that. They're genocidal in the sense of wanting to destroy or exterminate one's enemy, but they're also genocidal in the sense of a willingness to risk one's own destruction. In World War II, America's D-Day invasion, as well as Germany's and Japan's unwillingness to surrender even when they were clearly lost, are examples of this kind of willingness to risk one's own destruction.
That can be measured for recent wars, but for historical wars, that kind of information may not exist. Hence, we have to look for clues in historical accounts that indicate what happened.
Here are some of the factors that indicate that a war exhibits this kind of genocidal violence:
Here are some examples:
Caution: It would be nice if we could use "battle deaths" as an indication of genocidal fury, since that number is often easier to get than some of the other indicators. While it's true that a massive slaughter of civilians, especially when accompanied by rapes or a "scorched earth" policy, has got to be a crisis war, it's also true that a non-crisis war can kill a lot of soldiers, as World War I did across the static Maginot line; and conversely, a crisis war may fail to kill great numbers of people. All in all, it's the killing of civilians (mass murder of men and/or mass rape of women), rather than the killing of soldiers, that makes a crisis war. A massive forced relocation of an entire ethnic group of population, with the resultant torture and starvation, is also almost certainly a crisis war.
Note: A crisis war unites a country politically (think of President Bush hugging Dick Gephart after 9/11). When a country's existence is in danger, or at least the country's way of life is in danger, then everyone unites to fight the common enemy. In the case of a crisis civil war, fought along an ethnic, religious or geographic fault line, each of the belligerents becomes united to fight the other belligerent.
Results of the evaluation of step 2:
Some wars are pursued for visceral feelings of fury and hatred, while others are pursued for purely political considerations. A judgment must be made of the level that politics plays in the conduct of the war.
Here are some factors that indicate that a war is highly politicized:
A war may be somewhat politicized at the beginning, but whether it's a highly politicized war depends on whether the politicization continues to the end.
Caution: Every war has a political objective. Actually, every war has multiple political objectives, including publicly stated objectives and secret objectives. The difference between a crisis and non-crisis wars is that a crisis war unifies the country politically, and a non-crisis war divides the country politically.
Note: A violent civil war along an ethnic, religious or geographic fault line must be a crisis war; a civil war along political lines (such as Caesar's civil war) is a mid-cycle war.
Results of the evaluation of step 3:
Crisis wars change history; non-crisis wars do not.
If the first three steps have not been enough to make a crisis/non-crisis war determination, then the final test is how much the history of the society or nation under consideration was changed.
The predominant feeling after a crisis war, among winners and losers, is that "nothing like this must ever happen again." This is distinctly different from a desire to reward the winner and punish the loser. A crisis war brings out the worst in people -- torture, mass murder, rape, starvation, disease. Even the winners cannot be proud of having exhibited the most ugly, vicious human behavior possible. In a sense, everyone loses a crisis war.
The result is that the participants impose painful compromises -- not to punish the losers, but to prevent another war of this type of war forever, or at least for as long as possible. These compromises may be imposed by the victor on the loser, or they may be imposed by international conference or treaty. Usually these compromises lead to substantial changes in the nature of the nation itself.
My experience is that this is among the weakest of indicators used to determine crisis from non-crisis wars, since it requires assessing political motivations. Nonetheless, it can provide additional support when other indicators are inconclusive.
Here are some examples among the West European crisis wars:
Note: When applying this rule to look for factors that imply a crisis war, look for a historic change that's important in the long run: The American Revolution expelled the British and created a new Constitution; the American Civil War abolished slavery; the English Civil War changed the relationship between King and Parliament. However, it's sometimes difficult to evaluate something like a "historic change," and in those cases the results of this step are inconclusive.
Here are some examples of American non-crisis wars:
Note: However, these evaluations often contain some ambiguities, and so this step should be used only if the previous steps produce ambiguous results. For example, some people might argue that WW I produced historic results for Germany because it gave birth to the Weimar Republic and because a peace treaty gave Alsace and Lorraine back to France. Those were not very historic changes, but the fact that it can be argued shows how difficult it is to apply this step. (WW I evaluates to a non-crisis war for Germany because of the politicization and early surrender.)
Note: A related difficulty in this rule is that it's sometimes difficult to evaluation "historic change" on a country by country basis. Thus, WW I did cause historic changes -- the Bolshevik Revolution and the destruction of the Ottoman Empire, for example. However, those were Eastern European changes. As far as Germany is concerned, there was no historic change. But again, this kind of complication shows how difficult it is to apply this step.
Results of the evaluation of step 4:
This and the following sections provide some evaluations based on the preceding rules. In an effort to keep these evaluations completely "honest," based on the evaluation algorithm just given, I've indicated with a "?" when I do not have enough historical information to complete a step. My experience is that every evaluation can be completed by consulting enough historical sources about the particular war.
The following are evaluations of American wars, with separate evaluations for other countries participating in the wars.
In each case, the war is evaluated based on the criteria given in the preceding sections. There is purposely no mention at all of cycles in the following evaluations, to make it clear that each war is being evaluated on its own, without reference to other wars.
The 1991 Gulf War. America. This war fizzled within a few weeks. The Americans defeated the Iraqi army, but there was no crushing climax. If this had been a crisis war, then the Americans would not have hesitated to smash into Baghdad and destroy Saddam Hussein's government, as well as Saddam himself. As it was, we just stopped fighting. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: little - (supports N)
Politicization: high (determines N)
Iraq. The Iraqi army collapsed immediately, obviously having no will to fight. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: Uncertain
Genocidal violence: little - (supports N)
Politicization: high (determines N)
The Vietnam War America. This war fizzled as well. If America had wanted to win this war, it could have bombed much more aggressively, instead of being bound by antiwar politicians who imposed everything from Christmas truces to personnel restrictions. Americans "Vietnamized" the war, allowing us to back out, leaving South Vietnam in charge of its own defense. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: little - (supports N)
Politicization: high (determines N)
Vietnam. Now look at the Vietnam War from the North Vietnamese point of view, and you get quite a different picture. The North Vietnamese, led by Ho Chi Minh, exploded in fury as early as the 1968 Tet Offensive, and energetically pounded the Americans and South Vietnamese, ruthless crushing the opposition. The Vietnamese War was a crisis war for North Vietnam, but a non-crisis war for America.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: High - determines C
Politicization: Low - (supports C)
This makes the point that when you're evaluating wars, then you have to evaluate them from the point of view of all the major participants, since it may be a crisis war for some but not for all.
The Korean War America. Few people under age 50 know anything at all about this war, and that fact alone means that this could hardly be a crisis war. The war ended (or didn't end) in an armistice. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: little - (supports N)
Politicization: high (determines N)
Korea. From the Korean point of view, the war evaluates to a non-crisis war as well. Not only did this war not end in any kind of explosion, it technically didn't end at all, even though fighting stopped because of an armistice.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: little - (supports N)
Politicization: high - determines N
World War II. America. It took several months for America to become fully mobilized after the Pearl Harbor attack, and in that sense World War II got off to a slow start for America. If WW II had been a non-crisis war like Korea or Vietnam, America would never have had the energy to mount the 1944 D-Day attack. America did mount that attack, showing how massive energy for war can build up. By 1945, America's vengeful fury was in full force, with the massive firebombing and destruction of Dresden and Tokyo, climaxing in the use of nuclear weapons on two Japanese cities. It's worth noting that nuclear weapons have never been used since then -- and the reason is that no country since then has developed a nuclear capability and then had a crisis war. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - (supports C)
England. WW II was also a crisis war for England. England entered the war before America did, but it also got off to a slow start, with repeated warnings to Germany, and the famous "peace in our time" speech by Prime Minister Chamberlain. However England's efforts also gathered energy, and even exceeded America's efforts in some respects. By D-Day, the two countries were fully together. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - (supports C)
Germany. Hitler mobilized quickly and pursued the war vigorously. By 1944 it was clear he had lost, but he refused to surrender, and fought to the bloody end. This evaluates to a crisis war.
In evaluating whether WW II is a crisis war for Germany, we can also look at the issue of secrecy during mobilization. This is a secondary factor in evaluating wars, but it provides an additional indication. If an attacking country mobilizes in secret in order to attack with the greatest possible power and effect, this is a fairly certain sign of a crisis war. However, it's not completely certain, because even some non-crisis wars are pursued with some initial secrecy.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - (supports C)
Japan. Like Germany, Japan refused to surrender even when loss was certain. And like Germany, Japan mobilized for war in secret for a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - (supports C)
Russia. Evaluating WW II for Russia is a surprise for many people because it's not a crisis war.
Russia suffered enormously in what they called the Great Patriotic War, but Russia had had a brutal crisis war just a few years earlier, in the 1910s and 1920s. They were war-weary and had little of the genocidal energy necessary to pursue a crisis war.
Like England, Russia had made peace with Hitler, and expected "peace in our time." But unlike England, Russia did not declare war against Hitler until after Hitler had already begun its invasion. Stalin even sought help from the Russian Orthodox Church, helping to revive what had been destroyed just 20 years earlier. Russians in Stalingrad (Saint Petersburg) and Leningrad suffered massive starvation from German encirclement, but it took until 1944 for the Russian army to finally expel the Germans. At that point, Russia was ready to stop fighting, but the Allies wanted Russia to keep on fighting to help defeat Germany. Josef Stalin achieved a tremendous political victory at the Yalta conference in 1945, where he allowed Churchill and Roosevelt to "convince" him to keep on fighting, in exchange for hegemony over Eastern Europe. Stalin also promised to declare war against Japan, but he didn't do so until several days after America had already dropped a nuclear weapon.
So there was no explosion of violent energy from Russia. Like many non-crisis wars, this one was fought defensively and politically. That's why it's not a crisis war for Russia.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: low to moderate - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
World War I. Germany. World War I began in the Balkans and spread to Austria. Germany was pulled into it because of a treaty with Austria. Russia supported its ally Serbia, and Germany attacked France because France had a treaty with Russia.
Germany pursued the war as almost a comedy of errors. There was constant vacillation. First they were going to encircle Paris, but then they moved forces from the east to the western front, so they stalemated in France. Then in the west they fought well, but they didn't bother to fully coordinate with their Austrian allies -- in effect allowing individual egos to take precedence over the war. At the end, Germany capitulated because of internal political problems, while German troops were still deep into France. [Schivelbusch, 189-90] Germany had little energy throughout this war, and so it evaluates as a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
England and America. England was pulled into the war to prevent Germany from overrunning France, as had happened in 1869. One of the most dramatic indications of how little energy there was the 1914 Christmas truce -- four months after the war began, the English and German front line troops took time off on Christmas eve to drink beer and sing Christmas carols together. Allies' participation ended with German capitulation, while German troops were still deep into France. There was no explosive violence at the end, so it evaluates as a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
Russia. Americans seldom realize that World War I was mainly an East European and Middle Eastern war, and only touched Western Europe incidentally (even though many lives were lost).
Russia's management of the war was disastrously wild and frenzied, and it led to one humiliating defeat after another. The 500-year-old tsarist government collapsed, leading to the Bolshevik (Communist) revolution of 1917, and the Russian Orthodox Church was reduced to near wreckage. Russia pulled out of WW I, but then succumbed to a massive civil war, resulting in tens of millions of deaths by 1928.
When you're evaluating where a war was a crisis war for a given nation, you sometimes need to look beyond the war itself. Russia's participation in World War I might not, per se, evaluate to being a crisis war. But when you look at the entire crisis period, beginning in 1914 with World War I and ending in 1928 after the civil war, you get an extremely violent, explosive picture.
When examining the violent, genocidal energy that accompanies a crisis war, think of this energy as a fire hose that a nation can turn on anyone, and can also turn on itself.
A crisis period generally lasts 10 to 20 years. Sometimes it begins and remains explosive in one region. In other cases, it begins slowly in one region and grows explosively in the same region. In other cases, the war starts out slowly in one region, but then explodes into a completely different region, and even a civil war, as happened here. All of these must be taken into account.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
Turkey / Ottoman Empire. Turkey began with a war against Russia, but had a violent civil war with its own Armenian population. By 1922, the centuries-old Ottoman Empire had been completely destroyed. This evaluates to a crisis war period.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
Spanish-American War (1898). Cuba. The Cuban War of Independence (1895-98 ) ruthlessly devastated the island, killing 10% of the population. [Stearns, 638] This evaluates to a crisis war for Cuba irrespective of American intervention.
Once again, we see that we have to go beyond a single war to examine an entire crisis period.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
America. The Cuban war aroused public sympathy for the rebels, against Spain. When the U.S.S. Maine mysteriously blew up in 1898, America declared war against Spain and the Spanish Fleet. One of the operations was a blockade of Cuba, something that was repeated in 1962. Spain withdrew from Cuba. [Stearns, 614] This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: no - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
Spain. After the Maine exploded, Spain immediately agreed to all American demands, hoping to avoid war. [Stearns, 614] When war occurred, Spain was descredited, causing political problems. [Stearns, 496] This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: no - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
Civil War (1861-65). The Civil War got off to a slow start, as both sides continued hoping for a peaceful compromise. The war became decisive with the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863, which signaled a change in attitude. 50,000 men were killed or wounded in the Battle of Gettysburg in July. In March 1864, Sherman destroyed Atlanta and then marched to the sea, ravaging everything in his path. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: yes - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
Mexican-American War (1846-48). American troops seized California and Monterrey, and occupied Mexico City. There was a huge antiwar movement [Almanac 251]. The war ended as Mexico ceded Texas and other territories to the U.S., and the U.S. agreed to pay $15 million in return. [Stearns 605, 637] This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: no - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
Mexico. Mexico was invaded an occupied by American forces, and dealt with several internal uprisings, including a war with Mayan Indians in the Yucatan, culminating in a massive peasant revolt in Queretaro. [Stearns 637] This really requires deeper information from other sources, but based on this information it evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: yes - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
War of 1812. America declared war on England because England was restricting American shipping to Europe during the Napoleonic Wars. The war was indecisive and ended when the Napoleonic wars ended. The 1814 Treaty of Ghent restored the status quo ante. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: no - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
England. England was engaged in the Napoleonic crisis war. England tried initially to avoid war by agreeing to America's demands, but war began anyway because of a miscommunication. England pursued the war energetically, even to capturing and burning Washington D.C. at approximately the same time that France was capturing and burning Moscow. Both England and France lost these forays, in both cases because they were eventually overwhelmed by native (American and Russian) forces. Even so, this is part of the Napoleonic wars, and evaluates to a crisis war for England.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: yes - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
Revolutionary War. The colonists fired the "shot heard 'round the world" and changed history. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: low - supports C
England. The British should have won. They had many more soldiers and vastly greater provisions. But even when they saw the war coming, they didn't requisition provisions to fight the war. There was a powerful antiwar movement in England opposed to the war. In the end, British General Corwallis let himself be encircled at Yorktown, and then surrendered with 7,000 men. England immediately established trading relations with America. Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: no - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
The following sources were used in the above evaluations, as well as the following evaluations:
[Almanac] Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., general editor, The Almanac of American History, Revised and Updated Edition, Barnes & Noble Books, 1993
[Braudel] Fernand Braudel, A History of Civilizations, 1963, translated by Richard Mayne, Penguin Books, 1993.
[DK] Jeremy Black, general editor, DK Atlas of World History, Dorling Kindersley Publishing Inc., 2001
[Stearns] Peter N. Stearns (Editor), The Encyclopedia of World History, 6th edition, Houghton Mifflin Co., 2001
[Trevelyan] George Macaulay Trevelyan, A Shortened History of England, Penguin Books, 1942
[Roberts] J. M. Roberts, The Penguin History of the World, Penguin Books, 1995
[Schivelbusch] Wolfgang Schivelbusch, The Culture of Defeat: On National Trauma, Mourning, and Recovery, 2000, translated by Jefferson Chase, Metropolitan Books, Henry Holt and Company LLC, 2001
This is an analysis of the French religious wars from 1467 to 1714. This evaluation came out of a lengthy online discussion where I was challenged to show that my methodology applied to these wars.
Each war is evaluated honestly, with no reference to cycles. However, more work really needs to be done to fill in some blanks.
Louis XI defeats Charles the Bold (1467-1491). Louis united Burgundy, Anjou, Provence and other provinces with the French crown. Needs more information, but appears to evaluate to a crisis war which merged together the timelines of several provinces.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Charles VIII's expedition to Italy (1495-6). Charles conquered Naples, but quickly withdrew. Evaluates to non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: ?
Invasion of Emperor Maximillian (1513). Battle of the Spurs named after the hasty flight of the French. [Stearns] Evaluates to non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
French-Habsburg wars (1515-59). "Charles V, Emperor from 1519-56, ruled Spain, Flanders, and much of Italy as well as the Habsburg lands of Central Europe. He was opposed by the German princes, especially the Protestant ones, and Francis I and Henry II of France, who pursued the claims of their predecessors to Italy. Constant wars wasted many lives and much money, but gained nothing. In 1556, Charles V abdicated, dividing his empire between his brother and his son." [DK Atlas, p. 194] This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Religious Wars (1562-98 ). In analyzing a period this long, 36 years, I would look for a climax - something that's clearly remembered, and changed history. There are two candidates: St. Bartholomew Night's massacre (1572) and the Edict at Nantes (1598). So, it makes sense, at least for purposes of investigation, to split this long period into two parts.
Religious Wars Part I (1562-73). There were several wars between the Catholics and Huguenots (Protestants) during the 1560s, with an increasing level of conflict and acts of brinkmanship. In 1572 a decision was made to kill all the Huguenot leaders. This led to the Massacre of St. Bartholomew on August 24, 1572, when Catholics massacred some 1,000 to 2,000 Huguenot civilians in Paris in a single night. During the next two months, some 10,000 to 100,000 civilian Huguenots were slaughtered throughout the country, often in their own homes. This massacre is an important event in history to this day. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
Religious Wars Part II (1573-98 ). After 1573, with their leaders killed, the Huguenots reorganized into a political organization, and the war turned into a "permanently organized revolt." [ http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07527b.htm ]. The wars ended with a political document, the Edict at Nantes, which granted freedom of worship to Huguenots. This evaluates as a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
France in 30 Years War (1635-48 ). The war ended with the Peace of Westphalia, agreed in 1648. It was called the "Peace of Exhaustion" by its contemporaries. It settled by treaty the boundaries between France and its ally Sweden on the one hand and the Habsburg possessions on the other hand. About 250 separate German states were recognized as sovereign. This evaluates as a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
The Fronde (1648-53). The nobility revolted against Cardinal Mazarin. The Fronde ended and Mazarin returned to power. Little had changed. [Stearns 326] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
Second Anglo-Dutch War (1666-67). France allied with Holland. Ended with restoration of territories. [Stearns 328] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
War of Devolution (1667-68 ). Louis XIV's war with Spain over his wife's inheritance. Settled by Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. [Stearns 328] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
War against the Dutch (1672-78 ). Settled by Treaties of Nimwegen, which divided up the region, with gains by France. [Stearns 315] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
Invasion of Spanish Netherlands (1683-84). Temporary truce in 1684. [Stearns 315] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685). There was no war.
War of the League of Augsburg (1688-97). Louis tried to prevent the success of the Glorious Revolution. France was engaged on all her land frontiers in operations against Spain, Holland, and the German Princes, and even so she held her own; neither side won any sensational victories. Ended with the indecisive Treaty of Ryswick. [Trevelyan, 363-64, 369] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: high - determines N
War of the Spanish Succession (1701-14). France began the war with every apparent advantage except sea power, already holding vast terroritories when the war began. "But contrary to all expectation, the allies, who in the previous war had seemed no painful inch to gain, chased the French out of every one of these lands with the exception of Spain. These tremendous victories, as compared to the stalemate of the previous war, can be accounted for in no small degree by the military genius of Marlborough...." [Trevelyan, 370] The war ended with Treaty at Utrecht, which defined many of the borders of Europe that hold to this day. Western political geography was thus set for a long time, owing much to the need felt by all statesmen to avoid for as long as possible another conflict such as that which had just closed. For the first time a treaty declared the aim of the signatories to be the security of peace through a balance of power. [Roberts, 584-86] This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
Resolution: Treaty at Utrecht - supports C
The following identifies crisis wars in Southern Africa starting in 1817. This work is far from complete. Many of the wars have been identified, and the crisis wars have been tentatively identified as the Mfecane and the Anglo-Boer war. But these evaluations require additional sources and evaluations before we can be certain.
The Mfecane - The Crushing (1817-28 )
The Zulus were a tribe in the northern portion of what is now South Africa. The Zulus went from obscurity to world reknown as a result of Shaka, born in 1787, who became the tribal chief in the early 1800s.
Shaka revolutioned tribal warfare: "During his reign he revolutionized warfare ... by replacing the throwing spear with the stabbing assegai and by developing radical new tactics. Use of the short, stout assegai meant that warriors could no longer throw their spears and run, but had to close with their foes. His army in fighting formation was likened to the head of an ox; from either side of the main body came "horns," troops that ran ahead to envelope the enemy. He organized his regiments by age groups; no man could marry until he had washed his assegai in the blood of an enemy. Footwear was forbidden, and to make sure his warriors' feet were tough, he required them to dance on thorns; those whose dancing was not vigorous enough were clubbed to death." [Byron Farwell - http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/mil/html/mh_059900_zuluandthezu.htm].
 |
(This picture shows Skaka's stabbing assegai on the top, contrasted to the throwing spears on the bottom.)
Leading an army of 40,000 to 80,000 warriors in the early 1800s, Shaka merged with or conquered a number of nearby tribes, killing more than a million men, and by 1818 became Emperor Shaka the Great, head of the Zulu Kingdom. At the point, the Mfecane began in earnest. Genocidal warfare broke out among the tribes that the zulus had defeated, turning much of the region into a wasteland. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: significant - supports C
Genocidal violence: high - determines C
Politicization: low - supports C
Zulu vs Boer Voortrekkers (1837-38 ). Zulus kill Boer Voortrekkers in a meeting, and also also attacked trekker encampments. Other Boers defeated Zulu army, and created the Republic of Natal. [Stearns] Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: ?
British vs Boers in Natal (1842-43). British annexed Natal. Evaluates to non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: low - supports N
Politicization: ?
Zulu kingdom civil war (1856). "Civil war in Zulu kingdom established the supremacy of the Usuthu faction and the right to succession of Cetshwayo, while Mpande remained king." [Stearns] This needs more information, since civil wars are sometimes hard to evaluate. In this case, it sounds like the civil war was led from the top, rather than from the people. Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Orange Free State vs Sotho (1865-66). "War between the Orange Free State and Moshoeshoe's Sotho resulted in cession of most of Sotho state's arable land." Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Ndebele civil war (1868-71). "Lobengula became Ndebele king after a civil war over succession to Mzilikazi." I really need more information about this war.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Last Cape-Xhosa war (1877-78 ). The last Cape-Xhosa war resulted in famine and defeat for the Xhosa. More information needed.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
British vs Zulu kingdom (1879). Zulus attacked British, British win decisive victory after rushing in reinforcements. [This is like the Gulf War after Iraq invaded Kuwait.] Evaluates to non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: near-forgotten - determines N
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Zulu civil wars (1879-87). Defeat by British led to a series of civil wars in the former kingdom. British annexation of Zululand in 1887. Need more information because there may be a partially diverged timeline for the zulus since the Mfecane.
Historically significant war: ?
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: ?
Boer revolt against British (1880-81). After four months, British recognized the republic in the Treaty of Pretoria. Evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: Forgooten - determines N
Genocidal violence: ?
Politicization: Yes - supports N
South African War / Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902). "At the outset, Boers had the military advantage of numbers and knowledge of terrain. Britain had only 25,000 men available. By Feb. 1900, the tide of battle favored British forces. By November, the Boers turned to guerrilla tactics, frustrating British army strategy. In Jan. 1901, Gen. Herbert Kitchener used a scorched earth policy to counter Boer guerrillas. Some 120,000 women and children were confined in concentration camps, where poor sanitation and malnutrition contributed to high mortality (around 20,000 died). British journalist J. A. Hobson, covering the war, developed a new theory of imperialism. At the end of the war, the British had 300,000 troops in South Africa against 60,000-70,000 Boers. By the Treaty of Vereeniging (May 31, 1901) the Boers accepted British sovereignty but were promised representative government. The British promised 3 million to enable the Boers to rebuild their farms." [Stearns] Evaluation: This is very much like the Vietnam war, with heavy British antiwar sentiment, except that the Brits were able to overwhelm the Boers with massive reinforcements. This evaluates to a non-crisis war for the British and a crisis war for the Boers.
Historically significant war: Yes - Supports C
Genocidal violence: Yes - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
This is an analysis of three Roman periods, based on evidence from buried coin hoards.
This came about because a reader of my book challenged it on the basis that Rome didn't follow the 80-year timeline. As evidence, he provided the following page from a book, Michael Crawford, The Roman Republic, 2nd Edition, Harvard University Press, 1993, p. 162:
 |
This table shows how many Roman coin hoards were found with coins in various four year periods. During times of war, people tend to bury their gold coins for safety, and come back for them later. Thus, the number of gold coin hoards tells us when the wars were.
The person challenging my book pointed out that the three periods with highest activity were 218-201, 91-64, and 55-35. He said that these periods did not run in 80 year cycles, proving that my book must be wrong.
I did an analysis, and found that the first two are crisis periods, but the third is an awakening period, which is consistent with Generational Dynamics.
This indicates that coin hoards were buried during awakening periods as well as crisis war periods.
Here's a summary of the analysis:
Second Punic War (218-201 BC). Hannibal marched his Carthaginian army through southern France and headed for Rome, defeating one Roman army after another along the way. The war raged on for years, until 202 when Hannibals army was annihilated. Carthage was to accept Rome's terms of surrender, and the unfaithful Italian allies were punished as well. Evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: Yes - Supports C
Genocidal violence: Yes - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
Social War, Civil War, Mithridatic Wars (91-64 BC). Italian allied states formed their own republic, Italia, and declared war on Rome. Rome attempted to undermine Italian solidarity by extending Roman citizenship to all Italians (unraveling strategy), but the war continued. Before the war was over, 50,000 had died on each side and Italy was devastated. [Stearns] A further civil war in Rome resulted in much further bloodshed. This evaluates to a crisis war.
Historically significant war: Yes - Supports C
Genocidal violence: Yes - determines C
Politicization: Low - supports C
Rioting in Rome, Civil War, Caesar assassinated (55-35 BC). Caesar "crossed the Rubicon" and thus initiated a short-lived civil war. Caesar made Cleopatra ruler of Egypt -- gender issues are often important during awakening periods. Caesar carried out other foreign campaigns, achieved power in Rome, and was assassinated in 44. This evaluates to a non-crisis war.
Historically significant war: No - determines N
Genocidal violence: No - supports N
Politicization: High - determines N
Resolution: Fizzled - supports N