On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace

In his book On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace, Donald Kagan attempts to develop general theories for why nations go to war. Unlike Paul Kennedy, who focused on domestic political influences, Kagan emphasizes the international motivations that lead nations into war. But he uses only five wars in his analysis — the Second Punic War, the Peloponnesian War, World War I, World War II, and the Cuban Missile Crisis. This unfortunately turns out to be too small of a sample size, despite Kagan’s impressive command of each conflict.