Were ideological differences more damaging than competition over scarce natural resources in international conflicts? Explain your answer. (159-164)

When countries do not see eye to eye with each other, international conflicts will arise. When there is international conflict, countries may go to war and there will be damages like lost of life (social damages) and destruction of infrastructure like roads and railways and factories and buildings (economic devastation)

There are many reasons why countries do not agree with each others. For example, they may have different ideological differences or they may fight over scarce natural resources like fish.

After World War 2 ended, the Cold War started with US promoting the democratic capitalist system while the USSR believed in the communist system. This ideological difference led to several international conflicts for example the Korean War. North Korea, supported by Russia believed in the communist system while South Korea supported by USA believes in democracy.

Both North and South Korea were attempting to re-unify Korea under their respective governments. North Korean wanted to be communist while South Korea want to remain a capatlist society. As they could not see eye to eye with each other, the Korean War started in 1950 and lasted like 1953. Therefore ideological difference can lead to international conflict.

During the Korean War from 1950 to 1953, a lot of damages occurred. For examples, a lot of civilians and soldiers died during the war and building, road and railways were also destroyed. Therefore, when international conflict arises from ideological differences, it can bring about a lot of damages.

Sometime when two countries claimed that they have rights over scarce resource like fishing ground, international conflict will arise. For example, Britain and Iceland fought the Cod War in 1975 over the fishing ground. Iceland declared the 200-mile economic exclusion zone which means that other countries cannot enter the water near Iceland to fish.

This international conflict resulted because Britain did not recognize Iceland’s clime over the 200-mile limit and continue to fishing in these water. The conflict lasted for a few months and few shots were fired, but several ships were rammed and some damage occurred but few people died. Luckily, the conflicted ended in 1976 as Britain and Iceland were able to come to an agreement. The agreement said that Britain was only allowed 24 fishing boats inside the 200 mile at any time.

Therefore when countries fight over scarce resources, international conflict will arise. When this take places, there will be damages. In this case, boasts were damaged and some people were killed.
In the examples that were provided, international conflict that arise due to ideological difference like the Korea War showed that the damages were more damaging than when countries fought over scarce resources like the Cod War between Iceland and Britain.

However, whenever international conflict arises for whatever reasons, if it is not solve quickly, the damages will be more than if the conflict is solved quickly. Therefore because the Korean War lasted for 3 years, the damages were more than the Cod War which lasted for about one year.

So weather the conflict is due to ideological differences or due to competition over scare natural resources as long as the conflict is not resolve quickly, the damage will be enormous.