Jerry Pournelle, the late Science Fiction writer and editor, wrote this in one of his series of “There Will be War” collections of short stories.

“One must wish for peace; it is a religious duty to pray for peace; but if that is all one does, one is not likely to get it. A very long time ago the human race learned a bitter truth: if you would have peace, you must be prepared for war. The late Herman Kahn in his classic Thinking About the Unthinkable” modified that ancient Roman dictum to “if you would have peace, understand war”; which is what we are trying to do in this series of stories and essays about the future of war. If these books need justification, that will serve well enough.

“Since 1945 there has been peace of a sort; at least there has been no global war. The cost of that peace has been pretty high, in money, in combat casualties, and in nations like Poland and Hungary and Cambodia and Vietnam sacrificed to “visions of a new society.” The costs will still be high in the future. Eternal vigilance remains the price of liberty, of course; but military preparedness also requires eternal rethinking of the basics.

“George Santayana said that those who refuse to learn from history are condemned to repeat it. I add that those who refuse to think about the future may not have one.”

Since Jerry Pournelle wrote that back in the 1980s – more than 30 years ago – his words have proven true again and again. The “War on Terror” was not (is not?) a truly global war in the way that the First and Second World War, or even the Cold War, was global. Yet hundreds of thousands of men and women have died and trillions of dollars have been spent and destroyed in decades of combat and attacks by all sides. Indeed, there will be war. Then, now, and in the future. Until the Lord comes back. (And there are people who believe when the Christ returns there will still be war.)

Those of us who love liberty – including those of us who love God and understand human liberty is one of His many gifts to His creation (but not just us) need to remember this: there will be war. Even if we are freed from all forms of human government, there will be those humans who will try to again push us into slavery. Even if virtually all people abjectly submit to this, there will be those who love God and liberty (or just liberty) enough to resist – which means violence. And will likely result in war.

What is war? One online (Bing) dictionary has this definition: ‘a state of armed conflict between different nations or states or different groups within a nation or state” but we here at TPOL would suggest that neither one (or more) nations or states is necessary. War is violence between organized groups: whether governments or gangs or voluntary, informal groups seeking to defend themselves against other groups. (Usually, if there is just one (or two) aggressor we tend to call it crime, but not war. And if there is only one person, or a very small group, being attacked by an organized group, we call it “law enforcement.” It is difficult, sometimes, to clearly distinguish between crime and war.)

But the point is that much as we who are followers of Christ, and we who are lovers of liberty, believe that freedom from government allows for there to be more peace in our societies. But to maintain that peace requires that at least some of us must be prepared for war. Just as we must be prepared to fight for liberty.