Clausewitz held war targets a real enemy, not an abstraction

Evidence

Constitutive of the community, the enemy is not the other. Carl von Clausewitz suggested as much when, though once again limiting the question of the enemy to the thinking of war, he wrote that “war is not waged against an abstract enemy, but against a real one.” Indeed, for Clausewitz war engages a known enemy and seeks to constitute the enemy as an extension of one’s will. The first definition Clausewitz offers of war is therefore “an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will.” — Gil Anidjar, The Jew, the Arab, 405

Categorization

Category: Definitional Content

Related

• Clausewitz defines war as force compelling the enemy to our will (similarity 0.97)
• The enemy question must be separated analytically from the question of war (similarity 0.88)
• The enemy is not definable solely through war (similarity 0.82)
• In modern war, hatred shifts from individuals to nations, standing in for personal enmity (similarity 0.80)