War : Survivors, Memory, and Moral Responsibility (23)

Throughout recorded history, the world has never lacked for dominant powers—empires and states whose military might, economic reach, or cultural influence far outstripped their contemporaries. Yet no superpower has ever endured indefinitely. Each rose through a combination of geography, innovation, and political will, and each eventually succumbed to the same forces it had once wielded against others.

The Rise and Fall of Superpowers: A History Through the Ages

The Persian Achaemenid Empire (c. 550–330 BC)

Founded by Cyrus the Great, the Achaemenid Empire was the first to claim dominion over much of the known world, stretching from the Aegean coast to the Indus Valley. Its chief strength lay in administrative sophistication: rather than ruling by brute force alone, Persia allowed conquered peoples to retain their languages, religions, and customs, a system that kept vast territories pacified at relatively low cost. Its satrapy system decentralised governance whilst keeping wealth flowing to the centre.

Its greatest rival was the Greek city-state coalition, most memorably at the battles of Marathon, Thermopylae, and Salamis. Persia never fully subdued Greece, and this failure proved costly to its prestige. The empire ultimately fell not to Greece, however, but to Alexander the Great of Macedon, whose lightning campaign between 334 and 323 BC dismantled the empire in barely a decade. Internal dynastic disputes and an overstretched administrative system had already weakened the empire's coherence before Alexander arrived.

 

The Roman Empire (27 BC – 476 AD)

Rome's supremacy rested on three pillars: an unrivalled professional army, a sophisticated legal and administrative apparatus, and an extraordinary capacity to absorb and Romanise conquered peoples. At its height under the Pax Romana, Rome controlled the entire Mediterranean basin, much of Western Europe, and parts of the Near East. Its road network alone—spanning over 400,000 kilometres—was an instrument of both military power and commercial prosperity.

Rome's most persistent rivals were the Parthian and later Sassanid Persian empires to the east, with whom it fought for centuries over Mesopotamia and Armenia. Neither side ever decisively conquered the other. Rome's fall was gradual and internal as much as external: overextension, fiscal crisis, political instability, the increasing reliance on Germanic foederati in the army, and mounting pressure from migrating peoples all eroded the western empire from within. By 476 AD, the last western emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was deposed by the Germanic chieftain Odoacer — not with a bang, but with a tired administrative shrug.

 

The Islamic Caliphates (c. 632–1258 AD)

Within a century of the Prophet Muhammad's death (ﷺ), Arab armies had conquered a swath of territory from Spain to Central Asia — one of the most rapid imperial expansions in history. The early caliphates' strength was threefold: religious cohesion that unified previously fractious Arabian tribes; military dynamism born of that cohesion; and a readiness to absorb the learning of conquered civilisations, from Greek philosophy to Persian administration to Indian mathematics. Baghdad, under the Abbasid Caliphate, became the intellectual capital of the world.

The chief rival in the west was the Byzantine Empire, which successfully resisted Muslim expansion at Constantinople for centuries. The caliphates never fell to a single external blow; rather, they fragmented from within — through sectarian strife between Sunni and Shia factions, the rise of rival dynasties, and the gradual devolution of power to Turkic military commanders. The final, catastrophic blow came from without: in 1258, the Mongols under Hulagu Khan sacked Baghdad, reportedly killing the Abbasid caliph and ending the most prestigious institution in the Islamic world.

 

The Mongol Empire (1206–1368)

The Mongol Empire remains the largest contiguous land empire in human history, conquering from Korea to Poland within a single century. Its power derived from unsurpassed cavalry warfare, extraordinary logistical organisation, and a ruthless willingness to destroy those who resisted whilst rewarding those who submitted. The Silk Road, unified under Mongol protection, facilitated unprecedented trade and cultural exchange across Eurasia.

The Mongols' most determined rivals were the Mamluks of Egypt, who famously halted Mongol expansion at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260 — the first significant Mongol defeat. The empire's undoing was, in part, its own vastness. It was divided into four successor khanates that frequently warred with one another. The Black Death, which spread with devastating efficiency along Mongol trade routes, decimated populations across the empire. By the mid-14th century, peasant rebellions in China had driven out the Yuan dynasty, and the Mongol moment had passed.

 

The British Empire (c. 1815–1914)

Following the Napoleonic Wars, Britain emerged as the world's undisputed hegemon — the first genuinely global superpower. Its dominance rested on naval supremacy (the Royal Navy controlled the world's sea lanes), industrial primacy (Britain was the workshop of the world), and financial power centred on the City of London. At its peak, the British Empire covered roughly a quarter of the Earth's land surface and governed a similar proportion of its population.

Britain's chief rivals shifted across the century: France in the early 19th century, Russia in the "Great Game" over Central Asia, and Germany by the century's end. The First World War, though Britain emerged nominally victorious, proved financially ruinous. The vast debts accumulated during two world wars transferred economic primacy to the United States, and the tide of anti-colonial nationalism that Britain had partly inspired through its own liberal ideology ultimately dismantled the empire from within.

 

The Cold War Superpowers: The United States and the Soviet Union (1945–1991)

The Second World War left two colossal powers standing above a prostrate world. The United States combined industrial output, nuclear weapons, a dominant navy and air force, the world's reserve currency, and a network of alliances that covered most of the industrialised world. The Soviet Union countered with the largest conventional army on earth, its own nuclear arsenal, and an ideological appeal that attracted allies across Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

Their rivalry — conducted through proxy wars, arms races, and ideological competition — defined the second half of the 20th century. The USSR's fall was fundamentally economic: a command economy that could not compete with Western consumer capitalism, compounded by the ruinous costs of the arms race and the catastrophic war in Afghanistan. Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms — intended to save the system — instead accelerated its collapse. By 1991, the Soviet Union had dissolved without a shot being fired between the two superpowers.

The Present and the Horizon

The United States has exercised unipolar dominance since 1991, underpinned by military expenditure exceeding that of the next ten nations combined, the dollar's status as the global reserve currency, and an unmatched network of alliances. Yet the 21st century has seen this dominance increasingly challenged. China's extraordinary economic rise has produced a rival with a comparable GDP and rapidly modernising armed forces. Russia, though economically weaker, retains a vast nuclear arsenal and a demonstrated willingness to use military force to reshape its neighbourhood.

Whether the current era produces a true successor superpower, a stable multipolar equilibrium, or prolonged instability between competing blocs remains the central geopolitical question of our time. History offers one reliable lesson: no dominance is permanent, and the seeds of decline are often sown at the very height of power.

The pattern that recurs across these millennia is striking: superpowers tend to fall not merely because rivals grow stronger, but because internal contradictions—fiscal overstretch, political fragmentation, ideological rigidity—weaken the foundations upon which external power ultimately rests.

[Part 24]
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War : Survivors, Memory, and Moral Responsibility (22)

The evening bulletin rolled out with all the pomp of a national emergency: “Breaking News: Minister discovers a groundbreaking secret—stoves can be turned off once food is cooked!” The anchor’s voice trembled as though announcing the cure for a century-old plague.

Viewers at home, however, were less awed. One quipped, “Thank you, Mr Minister, all this time we thought the stove must remain on until our grandchildren graduate.” The sarcasm spread like wildfire, turning the ministerial wisdom into a meme.

Soon, the logic was stretched to parody: advising citizens to close their umbrellas once the rain has stopped, or to remove their helmets after arriving home. The humour was not merely playful—it carried a sting. People muttered, “If we need reminding of something so obvious, either the nation is in a dire energy crisis, or the minister is in a dire idea crisis.”

Artists joined the chorus, penning verses that mocked the solemnity of the decree: O noble flame, you burn with pride, Guided by wisdom, ministerial guide. ‘Switch off when cooked!’—a decree so grand, as if stoves must blaze till night’s demand. Next command may surely be: ‘Close the fridge once you’ve grabbed your tea.’

Thus, a simple household habit was elevated to the status of national policy, and the people responded not with obedience but with laughter—laughter that revealed both their wit and their weariness.

After the nation recovered from the shock of discovering that stoves can, in fact, be turned off after cooking, a quiet unease lingered. If such revelations are deemed headline-worthy, one wonders what other truths lie buried beneath bureaucracy and broadcast. But while we chuckle at the theatre of domestic absurdity, the world beyond our kitchens burns with a far crueller flame.

Not all fires are culinary, and not all crises can be extinguished with a flick of a switch. As satire gives way to solemnity, we turn our gaze from the stove to the battlefield—to the human cost of war, where lives are not merely inconvenienced, but shattered.

The Human Cost of War

A Critical Examination of Suffering, Devastation, and Memory

War is among the most consequential and destructive phenomena in human history. Whilst political discourse frequently centres on military strategy, territorial gains, or ideological victory, such framings often obscure what is perhaps the most profound dimension of armed conflict: its human cost. From the battlefields of the First World War to the protracted civil conflicts of the twenty-first century, the burden of war falls disproportionately upon ordinary people — civilians who never took up arms, families separated by violence and fear, and communities shattered by forces beyond their control. This essay examines three interrelated dimensions of the human cost of war: the suffering and displacement of civilians, the economic devastation that conflict engenders, and the enduring psychological and intergenerational trauma that outlasts the cessation of hostilities. Together, these dimensions reveal that the true cost of war is not measured in territory or treasure, but in the immeasurable toll exacted upon human lives and dignity.

 

Civilian Suffering and Displacement

One of the most visible and immediate human costs of war is the suffering inflicted upon civilian populations. In contemporary armed conflicts, civilians bear a disproportionate share of the casualties. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has repeatedly documented that in modern warfare, civilians account for the vast majority of war-related deaths and injuries, a stark reversal of earlier patterns in which combatants constituted the primary casualties (ICRC, 2010). The bombardment of cities, the use of landmines, and the deliberate targeting of civilian infrastructure — including hospitals, schools, and water supplies — have become hallmarks of twenty-first-century conflicts, from Syria to Yemen.

Forced displacement is among the most devastating consequences of armed conflict. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported that by the end of 2022, forcible displacement worldwide had surpassed 100 million people for the first time in recorded history, driven largely by ongoing conflicts in Ukraine, Afghanistan, Syria, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (UNHCR, 2022). Displaced populations face acute vulnerabilities: loss of livelihoods, disruption of education, inadequate access to healthcare, and heightened exposure to sexual and gender-based violence. Women and children are particularly at risk; the UN has repeatedly noted that girls in conflict zones face drastically elevated rates of child marriage, exploitation, and exclusion from schooling (UNICEF, 2021).

The Syrian civil war, which erupted in 2011, serves as a sobering case study. By 2020, the conflict had displaced over 13 million people — approximately half the country's pre-war population — either internally or as refugees abroad (Human Rights Watch, 2020). Civilian infrastructure was systematically targeted; the World Health Organisation documented hundreds of attacks on medical facilities throughout the conflict, rendering the healthcare system near-inoperable in many regions (WHO, 2018). The deliberate destruction of civilian environments is not merely collateral damage but, in many instances, a calculated instrument of warfare designed to break the will of entire populations.

Beyond physical harm, civilian suffering encompasses profound violations of human dignity. The experience of war strips people of agency, security, and belonging. As Kaldor (1999) argues in her seminal analysis of 'new wars', contemporary armed conflicts are characterised not simply by military confrontation but by the deliberate destruction of civilian society as a political objective — making the suffering of non-combatants not incidental but intrinsic to the logic of modern warfare.

Economic Devastation

The economic cost of war is immense and multifaceted, affecting not only the belligerent nations but also regional neighbours and the broader global economy. Direct costs include expenditure on military operations, weapons procurement, and the immediate destruction of physical infrastructure. Indirect costs, which are often far greater, encompass lost productivity, reduced investment, capital flight, disruption of trade, and long-term impairment of human capital. The Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) estimated that in 2022 alone, the global economic impact of violence — encompassing conflict, crime, and insecurity — amounted to approximately $17.5 trillion, equivalent to roughly 12.9 per cent of global GDP (IEP, 2023).

The destruction of physical capital is one of the most immediate economic consequences of war. Bombardment and ground combat reduce cities, factories, transport networks, and agricultural land to rubble, often in a matter of days. The cost of reconstruction in post-conflict societies is staggering. A World Bank assessment estimated that rebuilding Syria's war-damaged infrastructure would require over $250 billion, a sum far exceeding the country's annual GDP even before the conflict began (World Bank, 2017). Similarly, the wars in Iraq between 1990 and 2011 resulted in decades of economic regression, with GDP per capita remaining far below pre-war levels well into the 2010s (Bilmes & Stiglitz, 2008).

Agricultural economies are especially vulnerable. In Yemen, which was already one of the poorest countries in the Arab world before the outbreak of civil war in 2015, the conflict devastated farming systems, destroyed irrigation networks, and displaced rural communities. By 2021, the United Nations warned that Yemen was on the verge of the worst famine the world had seen in decades, with over 16 million people facing acute food insecurity (UN OCHA, 2021). The destruction of food production capacity has long-lasting consequences: even after a ceasefire, communities may struggle for years to restore agricultural output, perpetuating cycles of poverty and malnutrition.

War also exacts severe costs on human capital — the skills, health, and productive capacity of a population. Conflict forces schools to close, disrupts medical systems, and kills or disables workers in their prime years. Research by Collier and Hoeffler (2004) demonstrates that countries emerging from civil war face not only immediate economic contraction but also severely diminished growth prospects for years thereafter, as the erosion of institutions, infrastructure, and trust compounds the direct losses of the conflict period. The economic consequences of war are thus not confined to its duration; they ripple outwards and forwards in time, locking societies into prolonged underdevelopment.

Trauma, Memory, and Intergenerational Impact

The psychological wounds of war are perhaps the least visible yet the most enduring of its human costs. Survivors of armed conflict are exposed to a constellation of traumatic experiences — witnessing death and atrocity, losing loved ones, suffering physical injury, enduring displacement and deprivation — each of which carries substantial mental health consequences. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, anxiety, and complicated grief are prevalent among both combatants and civilian survivors. A landmark study published in The Lancet estimated that approximately one in five people living in countries affected by conflict suffer from a mental health condition, including depression, anxiety, PTSD, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia (Charlson et al., 2019).

Children are disproportionately harmed by exposure to conflict. The developing brain is especially sensitive to chronic stress and trauma; early adverse experiences can alter neurobiological development, impairing cognitive function, emotional regulation, and social development. UNICEF has repeatedly documented the devastating impact of war on children's mental health, noting that exposure to violence is associated with heightened rates of behavioural disorders, learning difficulties, and social withdrawal (UNICEF, 2021). In conflict-affected regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia, millions of children grow up with severely compromised psychological foundations, their potential circumscribed by experiences no child should endure.

The concept of intergenerational trauma has become central to understanding the long-term human cost of war. Research in epigenetics and developmental psychology suggests that the effects of traumatic stress can be transmitted across generations, shaping the psychological profiles of children who were never themselves exposed to the original conflict. Studies of Holocaust survivors and their descendants have provided some of the most compelling evidence for this phenomenon; Yehuda et al. (2016) found measurable epigenetic changes in the offspring of Holocaust survivors, suggesting that extreme trauma may leave biological, as well as psychological, imprints on subsequent generations.

Memory, too, plays a complex role in the legacy of war. Collective memory — the shared narratives through which communities remember and interpret past conflicts — can be both a source of resilience and a driver of ongoing tension. As Halbwachs (1992) argued, memory is not merely individual but socially constructed and maintained; nations and communities organise their identities around the memories of past wars, sometimes in ways that perpetuate grievance and hinder reconciliation. The selective commemoration of conflict — who is remembered as hero or victim, which atrocities are acknowledged and which are suppressed — shapes political cultures and can fuel renewed cycles of violence. The Rwandan genocide of 1994, the Srebrenica massacre, and the ongoing disputes over the memory of colonial wars all illustrate how unresolved historical trauma can destabilise contemporary societies.

Mechanisms for addressing wartime trauma and fostering collective healing are therefore not merely therapeutic concerns but vital political imperatives. Truth and reconciliation commissions — such as those established in South Africa after apartheid and in Rwanda following the genocide — represent institutional attempts to grapple with the memory of atrocity and lay the groundwork for social reconstruction. Whilst such mechanisms are imperfect and contested, they recognise a fundamental truth: that sustainable peace requires not only the cessation of hostilities but the careful, sustained work of psychological and social recovery (Hamber, 2009).

Conclusion

War exacts a cost upon humanity that transcends the calculations of military strategists and political leaders. The suffering and displacement of civilians, the economic devastation visited upon nations and communities, and the deep psychological wounds that persist across individuals and generations together constitute a toll that no diplomatic victory or territorial acquisition can justify. As this essay has demonstrated, the human cost of war is not a regrettable side effect of political conflict but its most consequential dimension. Understanding this cost — through rigorous scholarship, honest commemoration, and genuine engagement with the experiences of those who suffer — is a moral as well as intellectual imperative. Only by confronting the full human reality of war can humanity hope to build the political will necessary to prevent it.

References

Bilmes, L. J. dan Stiglitz, J. E. (2008) The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.

Charlson, F., van Ommeren, M., Flaxman, A., Cornett, J., Whiteford, H. dan Saxena, S. (2019) 'New WHO prevalence estimates of mental disorders in conflict settings: a systematic review and meta-analysis', The Lancet, 394(10194), hlm. 240–248.

Collier, P. dan Hoeffler, A. (2004) 'Greed and grievance in civil war', Oxford Economic Papers, 56(4), hlm. 563–595.

Halbwachs, M. (1992) On Collective Memory. Disunting dan diterjemahkan oleh L. A. Coser. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Hamber, B. (2009) Transforming Societies after Political Violence: Truth, Reconciliation, and Mental Health. New York: Springer.

Human Rights Watch (2020) World Report 2020: Events of 2019. New York: Human Rights Watch.

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) (2010) International Humanitarian Law and the Challenges of Contemporary Armed Conflicts. Jenewa: ICRC.

Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) (2023) Global Peace Index 2023: Measuring Peace in a Complex World. Sydney: IEP.

Kaldor, M. (1999) New and Old Wars: Organised Violence in a Global Era. Cambridge: Polity Press.

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) (2022) Global Trends: Forced Displacement in 2022. Jenewa: UNHCR.

United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA) (2021) Yemen Humanitarian Crisis. New York: UN OCHA.

UNICEF (2021) The State of the World's Children 2021: On My Mind – Promoting, Protecting and Caring for Children's Mental Health. New York: UNICEF.

World Bank (2017) The Toll of War: The Economic and Social Consequences of the Conflict in Syria. Washington, DC: World Bank Group.

World Health Organisation (WHO) (2018) Attacks on Health Care in Syria. Geneva: WHO.

Yehuda, R., Daskalakis, N. P., Bierer, L. M., Bader, H. N., Klengel, T., Holsboer, F. dan Binder, E. B. (2016) 'Holocaust exposure induced intergenerational effects on FKBP5 methylation', Biological Psychiatry, 80(5), hlm. 372–380.

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