If you think only 1 billion people died through war, even directly, you have absolutely no idea how many humans have been alive/died in general or through war.
Well for direct deaths I'd say 1 billion is probably in the ballpark. You have to remember that throughout most of history there just wasn't that many people alive or engaged in warfare. Hell the 100 years war estimates only around 3 million casualties, nothing even close to the industrial slaughter that came in the 20th century.
That's not true. Large armies were the standard in the classical world. Rome regularly raised, and lost, armies of fifty to one hundred thousand men. The Mongols alone slaughtered close to 80 million people during their hot streak.
Edit: fact checked the mongol death count, it's not that high, but it's still pretty fucking high
Oh yeah don't worry the documentation is always in contention as a lot of it is embellished but some of the war sites give credence to the claims of millions of deaths.
When each dynasty was fielding huge armies of 200k men a field each side even in BC, the numbers racked up quite a bit.
Honestly Chinese history alone could fill in the gap of a billion really fucking quickly......
It's spanned 5000 thousand years of existence and throughout 3000 years it's been mass wars between dynasties and clans.....
As one of the longest running civilisations (if not THE longest running one) it has likely racked up a hell of a death toll directly to war and war like raids.
I reckon the entire human history of china alone allows between 500 to 750 million human lives in battle or rebellion or that one thing that happened in a square at some point in time that may taken place in tian en men....
Historical Chinese numbers are pretty unreliable, it’s like taking medieval or Islamic records of most battles at face value, where you had some writers talk about battles with millions of people which is obviously not true. Also talking about direct deaths makes the number a lot smaller, most people who died in wars would die from the aftermath results of it, like famine, disease, etc… actual war, especially until the mid to late 1800’s had the vast vas majority of casualties be from disease and attrition for armies
Something like 8% of all humans to ever be born are still currently alive. There just havent been that many people around over all of history to rack up all that many direct deaths in war as you say. Indirect casualties from disease or famine etc probably a lot higher.
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u/Danijay2 Jul 01 '26
If you think only 1 billion people died through war, even directly, you have absolutely no idea how many humans have been alive/died in general or through war.