It’s not for the same reason the Spartans, Persians, Macedonians, Romans and Mongols fought. Postmodern Americans and Europeans may believe wars of conquest are obsolete. They may even see war itself as an aberration, an unnatural disruption of what they have convinced themselves is the “normal” state of peaceful coexistence. But our enemies — who are fighting for power, to defeat a rival civilization, to vanquish hated “others” — are doing what warriors have done since time immemorial. We are the historical oddballs.
My Scripps Howard column explores this idea a little further.