Summary Of On War By Clausewitz

On War, the book by Clausewitz that describes 19 points of warfare and how they are all geared toward the idea of “perfect war”, is lined with a crucial flaw that derails the author's entire argument. Clausewitz identifies that war is fought and defended solely by nation-states, and that anything short of that is purely minor skirmishes and not worthy of being called wars. He also ignores the fact that inter-state wars are not considered “wars”, since only one side of the war was fought by the nation-state and the other purely just an unorganized rebel group. These flaws fail to identify anything pre-Westphalia as wars, since there were practically no nation-states, and thus Clausewitz argues that true wars didn’t occur till post-Westphalia.

For example, the Thirty Years war (that end with the Peace of Westphalia), was significant as often it is noted as one of the most disastrous and bloodiest wars in all of human history. The origins of the war are rooted in the numerous different states within the Holy Roman Empire (HRE) who disagreed on religious and territorial grounds launched the West into turmoil. This resulted in several different powers, like France and Spain, becoming involved into the fights and attempting to end the war. This war lasted for, not surprisingly, thirty years and around eight million in casualties. Conflicts between unorganized regions, like the states in the HRE, are defined by Clausewitz as purely small criminal activities, but are far from that as seen when these states organize and act like a nation-state can initiate massive damage. Overall, the idea that only nation-states can initiate and engage in war is preposterous because like nation-states they utilize the same principles of war such as tactics and culminating

This can be seen in significant rebellions where the defectors employ tactics and act as their own state. The best example of this would be the American Civil War, where the South seceded and formed the Confederacy. According to the Peace of Westphalia, the Confederacy would not be recognized as an official nation-state; although, they acted much like through establishing a government, forming a military and creating a currency. These acts were never officially recognized by the Union, since secession is technically impossible according to the U.S. Constitution, and thus the United States was never split. This flaw fails to recognise crucial turning points in history, such as the English Revolution where the monarchy of was stripped and a representative-republic was established. These enormous wars defined history moreso and had casualties greater than that of a Clausewitzian war, thus rebellions must be identified as wars