Without any exception known to me, militarist authors take a highly mystical view of their subject, and regard war as a biological or sociological necessity, uncontrolled by ordinary psychological checks or motives. When the time of development is ripe the war must come, reason or no reason, for the justifications pleaded are invariably fictions. War is, in short, a permanent human obligation.

William James (1842-1910) American psychologist and philosopher

Essay (1910-02), “The Moral Equivalent of War,” Popular Science Monthly, Vol. 77 (1910-10)
    (Source)