2.
Suppose you were to total up all the
wars over the past two hundred years
that occurred between very large and
very small countries. Let’s say that one
side has to be at least ten times larger in
population and armed might than the
other. How often do you think the bigger
side wins? Most of us, I think, would put
that number at close to 100 percent. A
tenfold difference is a lot. But the actual
answer may surprise you. When the
political scientist Ivan Arreguín-Toft did
the calculation a few years ago, what he
came up with was 71.5 percent. Just
under a third of the time, the weaker