This paper presents a rigorous philosophical inquiry into the deep structure of war, challenging entrenched assumptions underpinning the dominant military paradigm. McMurtry demonstrates that prevailing concepts of “national security,” “self-defense,” and “just war” rest on unexamined metaphysical premises that normalize mass homicide as a rational necessity. By exposing the fallacies of equating national interest with militarized aggression and conflating security with destructive power, the paper argues for a fundamental reframing of war. McMurtry distinguishes between pathological wars — those that annihilate human life and capacities — and enabling wars, which target disabling patterns such as disease, corruption, and environmental degradation without destroying life. He contends that the primary enemy is not other nations or peoples but the institutionalized military system itself, which perpetuates cycles of violence, fear, and economic exploitation. The paper proposes a redirection of collective energies towards non-military modes of “war” that liberate human and ecological potential, challenging the conflation of survival with domination and opening a horizon of transformative alternatives for global peace.
