History and Critical Analysis

Key events that shaped the trajectory of the violence tournament.

The tournament that gave Europe global dominance also produced staggering costs.

Between 1815 and 1914, western Europeans spent only 26 years at war per century, down from 115 years in 1650-1815.

State-funded tournaments produced Europe's military lead, but private adventurers did most of the actual conquering. Cortés, Pizarro, da Gama, and the East India Company all operated with minimal government oversight.

Europe's political fragmentation and low-cost resource mobilisation were not products of geography or superior culture.

China, the Ottoman Empire, and eighteenth-century India all had frequent warfare and access to gunpowder weapons. None sustained military innovation at Europe's pace.

Three major factors explain Europe's success in military innovation:

In 900 AD, western Europe was poorer, more violent, and more backward than China, India, or the Muslim Middle East. By 1914, Europeans controlled 84 percent of the world's land surface.

An examination of Belgium's colonial venture in the Congo — its origins, its atrocities, and its enduring shadow over Central Africa today

How a small kingdom built the first global empire – and why its ghost still haunts two continents.