Ending Hostilities: Towards A New Beginning

In a world fractured by ideological, territorial, and psychological wars, the impulse to retaliate is almost instinctive. We are fed narratives of vengeance, of honour reclaimed through battle, and of dignity restored through destruction, whether it be the Trojan War, the Invasion of Iraq, or the recent skirmish between India and one of its neighbours. 

Yet, history consistently reveals a sobering truth: hostilities, when sustained, become cyclical and cancerous. They multiply wounds instead of healing them. They decimate generations. And worst of all, they harden hearts. This is evident in the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict.

One seductive strategy in the playbook of conflict resolution is the idea of overwhelming force — to so thoroughly crush the opponent that the very idea of rebellion becomes unthinkable. 

The Romans did this with Carthage. Hiroshima and Nagasaki stand as 20th-century echoes of this mindset. However, such victories (the final solution) come at an unbearable price — not only in lives lost, but also in the poisoned well of future relations.

Let us consider an analogy of antibiotics: if the ‘enemy’ is not completely annihilated, then the survivors grow resistant. They mutate. They adapt. And when they rise again, they carry with them a deeper resentment — an immunity to previous forms of control. Thus, the tactic of complete destruction is both morally corrosive and strategically flawed.

Hostilities do not disappear with the signing of a treaty or the silencing of guns. They go underground, morphing into intergenerational memory — wounds passed down in whispered stories and subtle exclusions. 

The partition of India, the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, the Rwandan genocide — all of these have shown how the aftermath of violence outlives its immediate perpetrators. 

Historical wrongs are rarely forgotten; even when the sword is sheathed, the mind remembers.

Just one little spark can set things in motion. Whether it's a border skirmish, a provocative speech, or the defilement of a monument, the past can suddenly come rushing back, reigniting its embers into vibrant bonfires. What may seem dormant is often more alive than we realise.

What adds complexity to the nature of hostilities is the influence of unseen hands — the system, the structure, and the ideology that underlie the visible enemy. It's tempting to demonise the soldier, the terrorist, or the protester. Yet, these individuals are often just instruments of broader socio-political frameworks.

The real challenge then is this: how does one disarm not just the fighter but the forces that manufacture fighters? Ending hostilities requires not just ceasefires but systemic recalibrations. It requires asking hard questions about nationalism, capitalism, coloniality, and all the scaffolding that props up the stage of war.

Across history, humanity has experimented with multiple approaches to end hostilities. 

Each comes with its own promise — and peril.

Military Victory
Pros: Provides a clear endpoint; asserts dominance; creates deterrence.
Cons: Breeds resentment; unsustainable; rarely addresses root causes.

Diplomatic Agreements
Pros: Preserves life; facilitates compromise; promotes economic collaboration.
Cons: Fragile; often imposed without consent from the grassroots; may ignore power 
asymmetries.

Truth and Reconciliation Commissions
Pros: Acknowledges pain; builds narrative ownership; fosters collective healing.
Cons: Can become symbolic if not followed with tangible action; risks re-traumatisation.

Grassroots Peacebuilding
Pros: Long-term, builds trust, empowers communities.
Cons: Slow; susceptible to sabotage from vested interests.

Economic Integration
Pros: Ties fates together; shifts focus from conflict to commerce.
Cons: Can deepen inequalities; risks becoming another form of control.

To truly end hostilities, we need more than strategies. We need a new language—one that transcends enemy and ally, us and them, justice and revenge.

This new grammar draws from the ancient Indian idea of Ahimsa — not non-violence as passivity, but as active engagement with empathy. It aligns with the African philosophy of Ubuntu — “I am because you are.” It resonates with Martin Luther King Jr.’s idea that “we must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”

Such a grammar requires us to view the other not merely as a threat but as a mirror. Every war begins with the dehumanisation of the other. Every step toward peace starts with their re-humanisation.

Ending hostilities is not just an external project. The battleground also lies within — in the narratives we cling to, the identities we armour ourselves with, and the pain we refuse to release. It demands an “inner disarmament.” This is not weakness, but the deepest kind of strength — to step out of inherited hatred, to speak when silence is easier, and to forgive when memory claws at the soul.

Ending hostilities is not solely the work of politicians; it involves storytellers, therapists, teachers, religious leaders, businesspeople, and everyday citizens. It requires anyone willing to envision a world defined not by past wounds, but by future possibilities.

As the poet Yehuda Amichai once wrote:
“From the place where we are right, flowers will never grow in the spring.
The place where we are right is hard and trampled like a yard.
But doubts and loves dig up the world like a mole, a plough.
And a whisper will be heard in the place where the ruined house once stood.”

Let us then move from the hardness of righteousness to the tenderness of dialogue. Let us allow doubts and loves to plough the soil where old battles lie buried. And let us build not new empires, but new beginnings.

Only then can hostilities end. And something sacred begins.