HKB
Lastly, even in wars carried on without allies, the political cause of a war has a great influence on the method in which it is conducted.
If we only require from the enemy a small sacrifice, then we content ourselves with aiming at a small equivalent by the war, and we expect to attain that by moderate efforts. The enemy reasons in very much the same way. Now, if one or the other finds that he has erred in his reckoning that in place of being slightly superior to the enemy, as he supposed, he is, if anything, rather weaker, still, at that moment, money and all other means, as well as sufficient moral impulse for greater exertions are very often deficient: in such a case he just does what is called “the best he can;” hopes better things in the future, although he has not the slightest foundation for such hope, and the war, in the mean time drags itself feebly along, like a body worn out with sickness.
Thus it comes to pass that the reciprocal action, the rivalry, the violence and impetuosity of war lose themselves in the stagnation of weak motives, and that both parties move with a certain kind of security in very circumscribed spheres.
If this influence of the political object is once permitted, as it then must be, there is no longer any limit, and we must be pleased to come down to such warfare as consists in a mere threatening of the enemy and in negotiating.
That the theory of war, if it is to be and to continue a philosophical study, finds itself here in a difficulty is clear. All that is essentially inherent in the conception of war seems to fly from it, and it is in danger of being left without any point of support. But the natural outlet soon shows itself. According as a modifying principle gains influence over the act of war, or rather, the weaker the motives to action become, the more the action will glide into a passive resistance, the less eventful it will become, and the less it will require guiding principles. All military art then changes itself into mere prudence, the principal object of which will be to prevent the trembling balance from suddenly turning to our disadvantage, and the half war from changing into a complete one.
B. War as an Instrument of Policy
Having made the requisite examination on both sides of that state of antagonism in which the nature of war stands with relation to other interests of men individually and of the bond of society, in order not to neglect any of the opposing elements, an antagonism which is founded in our own nature, and which, therefore, no philosophy can unravel, we shall now look for that unity into which, in practical life, these antagonistic elements combine themselves by partly neutralising each other. We should have brought forward this unity at the very commencement, if it had not been necessary to bring out this contradiction very plainly, and also to look at the different elements separately. Now, this unity is the conception that war is only a part of political intercourse, therefore by no means an independent thing in itself.
We know, certainly, that war is only called forth through the political intercourse of Governments and nations; but in general it is supposed that such intercourse is broken off by war, and that a totally different state of things ensues, subject to no laws but its own.