So my professor told me Democracies never go to war in class a few days ago

[Mr Khan]

PhoenixKing said:

Mr Khan said:

It's true there are certain mechanisms in a democracy to put brakes on a rush to war. This presumes that the people at large value peace, which is true to a certain extent. People know that war is hell, and in a society that has a full-scale democracy (that is, few factors to obstruct liberal democracy), people are going to favor no war over war, up to a certain point.

 

Your example about WWI does show that democracy can be undermined by war, but remember that the wheels of American democracy turned as hard as they could to prevent a declaration of war with Germany (we gave them every possible excuse to butt out, but they sent persistent signals that they already considered us enemies to a certain degree, including the Zimmermann telegram)

No, the excavaters of the Lucitenia found that there had been weapons on that ship and the Zimmerman Telegram has always been questionable.

And I believe people are forgetting the American civil war. The South declared themselves their own independant nation, had a government just like the Union, and could be argued to be more democratic because they encouraged Native Americans to join their cause to fight against the North.

The whole point of them having slaves is irrelevant because America had declared itself a democracy during its foundation in the late 1700s and had slavery as did other nations with democratic qualities.

When it comes to squabbling over definitions of a word, one has to question whether if they should even bother with such a long list. It seems like people make-up anything to deny the idea that a democracy has been at war with another democracy.

Civil War is a whole different field of study than international war.