revolution (in america and the world)

It would be foolish to conduct a class on war without considering both the merits and setbacks of revolutionary warfare in it's various forms. Admittedly war is violent, and violence is often a bad thing. But in the following discourse i hope to decide that revolutionary war is (at least in theory) a good thing.

There are many things that can cause a revolution. On the whole revolutions are started because a nations people are discontent with some aspect of that nations administration (cognitive dissonance). for example in the revolutionary war, the people of the colonies felt that there rights had been denied them. this can affect anything from changes in government power, (as in The French Revolution) to the complete withdrawl of a nation from a political body (The American Revolution). In both cases The revolutionary parties are overthrowing their government due to a percieved and probably realistic threat to their individual freedoms. "men are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights...life liberty and the pursuit of happiness"

in this case the revolutionaries are morally and pragmatically justified. They are securing basic rights that have been denied them by their government. But what about the case of unfounded mutiny? lets take the constant power struggles in Africa as an example, each one lead by that years hottest revolutionary. These struggles are often based on racism, and greed (it's arguable that the American and french revolutions were the same thing ,simply with a better coat of paint, but lets pretend they were noble causes for the sake of arguement).
In the case of misdirected anger (due to say, economic trouble) people are easily swayed by a leader to direct that anger at a perceived oppressor. and the noble instinct to revolutionary war is turned into a weapon of terrorism, as can be seen in the Hutu/Tutsi conflicts in Rowanda which have causes a state of near constant war since 1965.

It seems then, that there are two types of revolutionary war, One having a relatively noble cause, and the other being little more than terrorism in the name of justice. don't get me wrong terrorism in the name of justice makes for a good movie (V for vendetta), but i question it's morality.

War as a Sterotyped Action

War as a stereotyped action
The "stereotyped action" is an action that is repeated multiple times by a person in order to fulfill some form of inner need or desire. It is seen many times in cases of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and other mental illnesses. The action is preformed either unknowingly by the person or under full conscious direction in order to gain some form of mental or physical reward, although that reward is never achieved. Consequently, the act of doing something repeatedly and expecting a purely different result is accepted by many psychologists as insanity. Throughout human history a single stereotyped action has defined and shaped human existence. War.
Over and over again humanity has fought in countless wars. From the first inter-tribe wars our ancestors fought, to the modern "total war" mentality and large scale conflicts that engulf entire countries in battle. From news coverage, documentaries, and firsthand accounts, people have grown knowledgeable about the true horrors of war and the wreckage it leaves behind. War is often described as a tragedy, a horrific display of mankind's brutality, or a dark stain in the course of human history. So why is it that this action is repeated multiple times in multiple places across the globe? The consequences of war are well known and many people detest the idea of so much guaranteed loss for so little possible gain. Simple compromise may have avoided many of these altercations. Why do people always expect a different outcome when engaging war? The simple answer is insanity.
If it is so hard to believe that humanity as a whole can be insane, then look at smaller cases of the stereotyped action in people. Nail biting affects millions of people across the world; a person constantly whittles down their nail until it is to a point where the person feels mentally stable again. Although nail biting is a small illness, it still shows that one small mental trait can be shared by millions upon millions of people, even though there may be no contact between the individuals. War is only a larger scale nail biting phenomenon. It is an action which humans repeat, always expecting some form of liberation, justice, or wealth.
In the end it is always the same however. People will have asked why a war ever happened, land is made uninhabitable, and, as of less than 200 years ago, mental illnesses such as shell-shock become a soldier's standard (http://www.firstworldwar.com/atoz/shellshock.htm). If people know what is going to happen because of war and know the price of fighting possibly outweighing the rewards, why does it even occur at all? Why is this stereotyped action taking over rational human thought? The simple answer is, insanity.

References:
~Hart, Bernard. The Psychology of Insanity. Toronto, Canada: The Macmillan Co., 1916.
~Web M.D, "Nail-Biting - Topic Overview". Healthwise. 9/26/2009 .
~http://www.firstworldwar.com/atoz/shellshock.htm