A Pilgrim’s Digression

Those who believe that peace can be obtained through war deny the facts of history. I say that not as an anti-war statement. Looking strictly at the facts of history, war leads only to more war. The Franco-Prussian War of 1870 led to World War I, which led to World War II, which led to the Cold War, Korea, and Vietnam. The Gulf War I and II could probably also trace their genealogy back to the World Wars, or at least the division of the Middle East by colonial powers such as England in the aftermath of the World Wars. Who knows how far you could go back beyond the Franco-Prussian war to trace out the family tree of the present conflict. Perhaps in the end all wars can be traced back to that one war for a beautiful woman, captured by a band of turks and carried off to fabled Ilium. Certainly, the current war between East and West finds its antecedent in the Trojan War.