Hello and welcome to the History Extra Podcast from BBC History Magazine, Britain's

bestselling history magazine.

I'm Ellie Corporn.

Why do we fight wars?

Well, today we've got a lecture from Margaret McMillan that might begin to answer that

question.

Margaret is the author of War, How Conflict Shaped Us.

And she originally gave this talk on her book as part of our virtual lecture series.

You can find out more about that at historyextra.com forward slash events.

I want to start with a picture which some of you will be familiar with.

It's a, it's by Albert Durer of the Great German Artists.

And it is the four hostmen of the apocalypse.

And among those hostmen who are of course supernatural creatures is war.

And you can see below the feet of the horses, those who suffer from the four hostmen, including

war, the civilians, the innocent bystanders, the people who are trampled down by what happens.

I'm talking tonight about war and why do we fight?

And it's not a subject that is a happy subject, but it's a subject I think that is very important.

It is something that we think about.

It is something that we wonder about.

It's something that we have many questions about.

St. Lana Alexiewicz, the great Belarusian writer, wrote in her book The Unwomently Face

of War.

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