How do intractable conflicts come to an end?

The Israel-Gaza war is dominating the news at the moment, but rather than exploring its roots, I wanted to discuss other examples of seemingly intractable conflicts and how they come to an end. What examples from your research would you like to highlight?

- Matt Elton

Rana Mitter Firstly, we would all hope for a resolution of these conflicts, in the Middle East and elsewhere. What history allows us to do is to look at the longer perspective and understand that sometimes conflicts that have gone on for years or even decades can eventually be resolved, and that sometimes it’s external factors and sometimes it’s internal factors that enable that to happen.

As a historian of modern China, I can offer two examples that provide a contrast. One is the relationship between India and China ever since the former gained independence in 1947 and the latter saw the establishment of Mao’s regime in 1949. Growing tensions between the two came to a head in 1962 with a small but very vicious war, and there have been border disputes ever since. This territorial dispute between the two Asian giants has never actually been resolved because of an issue of geography: there is an area of the Himalayas which is essentially most of the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, but which China argues should be Chinese territory. The two sides have never managed to resolve that dispute.

That’s in contrast with another example in which a seemingly endless conflict did come to an end: China’s war with Vietnam. In February 1979, China and Vietnam went into a short but very bloody war in which tens of thousands were killed on both sides. Across the following decade there were continuing border battles. Eventually, in 1990, a secret conference held in the Chinese city of Chengdu brought a resolution and in 1991, China and Vietnam signed a lasting border agreement. It’s an example of the way in which a resolution can sometimes be found to seemingly intractable conflict.

Hannah Skoda