War

"Wars usually begin when two nations disagree on their relative strength, and wars usually
cease when the fighting nations agree on their relative strength. Agreement or disagreement emerges from the shuffling of the same set of factors. Thus each factor is capable of promoting war or peace... When nations prepare to fight one another, they have contradictory expectations of the likely duration and outcome of war. When those predictions, however, cease to be contradictory, the war is almost certain to end." - Geoffrey Blainey, The Causes of War (1988)