Great point about the evils done in the <i>name</i> of freedom.<p>I recently spoke at length with an older man who was deeply involved in Vietnam before the Kennedy and Johnson escalations.  At the time they focused on killing specific communist leaders and training the South Vietnamese -- pretty much low-key guerilla tactics.  But after Diem was assassinated the full military-industrial complex was engaged and they all had a party with Other People's Money.<p>True about the US civil war.  Slavery was part of it.  A burgeoning abolitionist movement, both in the north and south, threatened the institution of slavery.  Many southerners feared slave revolt ("servile insurrection"), and many northerners feared an influx of freed slaves.  The advent of mechanized agriculture was also making slavery obsolete.  The other part was tariffs.  If the south seceded, the north would be hard up for revenue.  Even the governor of New York was talking about secession, and battles were fought in downtown Manhattan.<p>The industrial and technological change of which you speak also made the US civil war particularly bloody.  They fought battles the old way, facing off in lines, but did it with vastly improved weaponry.  That's how you got over 20,000 people killed in a single day at Antietam.<p>I am very happy to see increased awareness of the perils of force.  The 21st century is bound to be a happier, freer time.   (wink ... gulp)