But this, in fact, is what actual war looks like these days: Sometimes it’s a volley of 300 missiles and drones, and sometimes it is lean, targeted, and carried out covertly. Gone are the days of vast conquering armies and conventional military confrontations between two parties. So long as experts, the government, and the media worry only about a kind of war that is obsolete, it cannot see the war right in front of our faces.

Great article on the evolving face of warfare and how, as long-range and unmanned systems replace on-the-ground and manned conflict, people are assuaged into treating missiles and bombs being lobbed between countries as something “other” than war.

  • t3rmit3@beehaw.orgOP
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    3 months ago

    If the ultimate goal of a war is to force one nation or group to surrender to another through military might

    I don’t think it is the ultimate goal of war, that’s overly restricting the definition based on, as I said, this conception of war as only being these wide-ranging conflicts (really, what “total war” refers to). Many wars have been fought purely over control of land or resources, where surrender or government toppling was never the goal.

    war, noun, ˈwȯr (1): a state of usually open and declared armed hostile conflict between states or nations

    Merriam-Webster