{"id":177989,"date":"2023-07-31T09:56:40","date_gmt":"2023-07-31T14:56:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/?p=177989"},"modified":"2026-09-07T14:29:47","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T19:29:47","slug":"podcast-916-why-we-fight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/character\/manhood\/podcast-916-why-we-fight\/","title":{"rendered":"Podcast #916: Why We Fight"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>We often suppose that wars are fought over things like resources, border disputes, and ideologies. My guest calls this &#8220;the spreadsheet approach to war&#8221; and argues that, in reality, such factors only come in as justifications for the much deeper drives at play.<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Mike Martin is a Senior Visiting Fellow in the Department of War Studies, King&#8217;s College London&nbsp;and the author of&nbsp;<i><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/458N67E\">Why We Fight<\/a>.&nbsp;<\/i>Today on the show, he draws on his background in biology and experience serving in the British army to offer an explanation as to why individuals and nation-states go to war. Mike argues that there are two fundamental impulses behind the drive to war: the drive for status and the drive for belonging. We discuss these motivations and how leaders and ideologies corral and amplify them. We end our conversation with how this view of war could prevent conflicts and allow them to be fought more successfully, and also be a lens for how to help men flourish in a healthy way.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We often suppose that wars are fought over things like resources, border disputes, and ideologies. My guest calls this &#8220;the spreadsheet approach to war&#8221; and argues that, in reality, such factors only come in as justifications for the much deeper drives at play. Mike Martin is a Senior Visiting Fellow in the Department of War [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":194790,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[502,42387,156],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-177989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-character","category-manhood","category-podcast"],"featured_image_urls":{"large":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916-538x280.png","medium_large":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916-768x432.png","aom":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916-372x230.png","reactor-320":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916-320x180.png","reactor-640":"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916-640x360.png"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v28.4 (Yoast SEO v28.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Podcast #916: Why We Fight | The Art of Manliness<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/character\/manhood\/podcast-916-why-we-fight\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Podcast #916: Why We Fight | The Art of Manliness\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We often suppose that wars are fought over things like resources, border disputes, and ideologies. My guest calls this &#8220;the spreadsheet approach to war&#8221; and argues that, in reality, such factors only come in as justifications for the much deeper drives at play. Mike Martin is a Senior Visiting Fellow in the Department of War [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/character\/manhood\/podcast-916-why-we-fight\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Art of Manliness\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/artofmanliness\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-07-31T14:56:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-09-07T19:29:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/beta.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/916.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1280\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Brett &amp; Kate McKay\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@artofmanliness\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@artofmanliness\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Brett &amp; 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