INTL 500 LIBERTY UNIVERSITY War and Security Assignment DJ_2024.pdf

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 1

War and Security Assignment

Damon Goodloe Jr

Liberty University

INTL 500

David Holt

11/25/2023

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 2

Abstract

In each individual state is important to have high level of security as a means to defend

cause said wars. Is there a direct correlation between certain behaviors and war or is they’re only

a threat of war once peace relations fall apart. Will there ever be a time in our history where war

is not even on the table, or are peace treaties just a facade that exist in-between times of war that

just sit there to give a nation a chance to get the leg up on another nation to start a war?

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 3

“One of the central concerns of all foreign policy makers as well as scholars studying

international relations is that of state (or “national”) security.” (Mingst & McKibben 2022) Each

individualized state has to always be concerned with protecting themselves. States or individual

nations have their own personal interests, secrets, and most importantly they contain citizens of

their nation that they must be sure to protect and look after. The biggest thing that states protect

against is war, but states also have many other threats that they must continuously contend with.

the need of the nation to ensure the safety of the state’s interest, secrets, and citizens from harm

by those threats. Capability: the actual ability of the state to provide that protection. As time has

gone on the need for security has expanded as a means to combat against the different types of

war that now exist with the increases in information and technology. As we have grown as a

world and learned more and more about technology so have militaries and state governments so

it is important that they have the ability to navigate these things from cyberwar, to the traditional

physical attacks of war. We will have to really go deep into the inner workings of the theories

and policies that create and mitigate the effects of war.

The first question that we must first solve is what exactly is war? There has yet to be a

definitive definition of war by scholars of international theory, but they have however concluded

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 4

“First, a war involves organized, deliberate violence by an identifiable political authority.

Second, wars are relatively more lethal than other forms of organized violence. Third, and

finally, for an event to count as a war, both sides must have some real capacity to harm each

other, although the capacity need not be equal on both sides.” (Mingst and McKibben 2022)

There are many different types of war, causes of war, laws of war, and ways to prevent war and

managing of state security. The main types of war are interstate war, intrastate war, conventional

Interstate wars are also extremely important in international relations because it can have an

impact on trades, tariffs, and many other things that have an impact on countries outside of just

death counts. “In the decades following the end of the Napoleonic Wars, a sustained reduction in

transportation costs and political barriers to trade spurred the integration of international

commodity and factor markets in a process that has come to be known as the first wave of

globalization.” (Karlsson & Hedberg, 2021) This shows an example of how interstate wars can

lead to certain positive changes and goes to show that while it may be viewed negatively not all

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 5

wars are inheritably negative. There are times when wars are indeed needed, and that has shown

throughout the history of the building of different nations.

One of the most well known and need intrastate wars in our history is the American Civil

War. This war is known throughout history as the war that eventually led to the freeing of slaves

in America. This was such a huge and controversial time in our history as it was well known that

the south wanted to keep things the status quo and remain within their right to continue to own

and use slaves as they saw put. The electing of President Lincoln posed a potential threat to the

war as inevitable simply due to the fact that the international system is anarchic. Realist believe

that since there are no superior authority state over other states, there is no one who can truly

determine how things can be solved or resolve disputes therefore eventually leading to war.

While liberalist believe that the cause of war stems from the behavior of individual states. So

which ideology is correct? Is one view right over another or is there a combination of these two

that can lead to the answer of the causes of war?

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 6

theories that are believed to be causes of war, are power transition theory, democratic peace

theory, and commercial peace theory. It is important for those who study international theory to

understand the difference between these theories and understand them in practice because there

is a very probable chance that if a war is indeed started one of these theories is the reason behind

it. The first theory that comes from the realist ideology is power transition theory. “The theory

posits that it is not only mismatched material power that tempts states to war, but also the

stem from the power transition theory. If we go back one chapter to chapter 5, we talked about

the differences in “hard power” and “soft power”. Hard power was the exploiting of resources to

try to bend other states to conform their interest, while soft power was merely a persuasion

technique to do so. In both of these examples though the states are still trying to use power to

gain a strategic advantage in their place of hierarchal dominance. This constant need for power

by each respective state is an example as to why theories can be used to understand the managing

of state security, if you understand what is important to a respective state then you have a

fundamental understanding of what their respective security will view as important to protect.

The two different peace theories that exist in an effort to explain managing state security

in regards to war democratic peace theory and commercial peace theory both have similarities

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 7

democracies rarely (if ever) go to war with other democracies.” (Mingst and McKibben 2022)

The belief with this theory is simple it is believed that democracies have the ideals they share of

compromise and cooperation that would prevent them going to war as there are alternatives to

solving issues within the states other than resulting to violence. The second belief in this theory

is that there already exist constraints within the democratic state that keeps war from being an

option. “Commercial peace theory focuses on interdependence between states. This theory posits

bloodshed if it is within the framework of war, but I do not believe that God works in that

manner. I believe that he set forth for us to live amongst each other in peace and harmony and

that he would never view war as an option especially given the context that wars are generally

fought for reason such as control over resources and power, this would be viewed in very

negative favor by God as it was known the God favored the less fortunate throughout the bible so

there is no way that he would reflect fondly of states going to war to seize things such as oil and

or diamonds or any materialistic things. I believe however that we cannot use either of these

peace theories as a mean to determine how to manage our national security. The reason behind

and do as they are supposed to do. It is simply against human nature to not preserve one’s own

life. That is the entire basis behind these peace theories is that everyone will just live peacefully

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 8

and harmoniously together with no issues and that unfortunately is just not real life. Relying on

DPT is what was believed pre–World War two but that did not work out properly as Germany

looked to establish themselves as a new power. This led to the beginning of World War two and

is just another point in favor of the power transition theory.

Laws of War were designed in an attempt to make sure that when States did in fact go to

war they were operating under the same rules across the board. To the average person this may

not even be something that was known, I did not know prior to the studying of international

ensure that states were not going to war for senseless reasons and causing damages and

casualties that can not be undone. The list of criteria need for just war theory is simple there has

to be just cause, the leaders need to have the right intentions, they must have exhausted all

potential other options, and lastly once the war is over, they must rapidly remove all personnel

from the war zone. Once it has been established that the war is inevitable that is when the rules

for the war are then established. The biggest rule that must be followed is noncombatant

immunity which is basically protections for citizens who are not involved in the war.

Damon Goodloe War and Security Assignment 9

I believe that these laws of war have had some successes throughout international

relations the issue however is that it does not stop superpowers. The laws of war can only be

applied if the two states involved actually come to an agreement that they are both going to

follow the rules that are being set forward. If you have a superpower who decides that they want

to have more power and control then historically the rules have not applied and stopped

anything. I believe the laws of war are mere suggestions of war in all honesty because there has