Session 22 - Understanding War

One of the most heated topics of discussion in the global arena is the cause for armed conflict; why do wars happen? The question, however, is more complex than it may seem at first. Since wars happen for a wide variety of reasons, there is really no one right answer to the question.

One of the most significant factors that contribute to such conflict is the eternal pursuit for power by all states in order to safeguard their national interests. Since each state, no matter how big or small, has a prodigious greed for power, they are always looking for ways to increase it. This results in overlapping interests, since many states wants the same thing, wars often decide who gets it. Overlapping interests also play a role in catalysing conflict when two entities often want the same resources. This was one of the factors that provoked the war of 1971, where Pakistan lost a part of itself because it was allegedly exploiting Bengals resources by using them primarily for West Pakistan.

Religion is also, but not often, a cause for war. Since different religions hold distinct ideologies, there results a conflict of ideas between two parties. Since the ideologies of the two are not coherent with eachother, there arises a difficulty in living in harmony. This is what seemed to be the leading cause for the birth of Pakistan in 1947. Since Muslims and Hindus were on entirely different pages when it came to their values, one often tried to supress the other.

What we can conclude is that that we have a habit not to learn from our mistakes. Not only is the way we treated the people in East Pakistan similar to the way India treated its Muslims (which was the fundamental reason Pakistan was created in the first place), it is also alarmingly analogous to the current situation of minorities in our country. If we do not change our discourse, it worries me that we might find Pakistan a participant in even more wars, causing it to split furthur into numerous entities with separate states for Muhajirs, Balochis, Shias and other restrained minorities.