Have a beautiful week. Sorry for not posting for three weeks in a row, but as you know I was preparing two ouvres d´art for a local art exhibition.  I need a lot of devotion and attention to my paintings.  Please pray these paintings can be sold at the exact price tag. I only sell what is 100% of my own inspirations. As I have explained it previously, I have not had one single cent of revenues for 7 years, and I do need some cash inflows to help me, to retrieve a bit to my parents (who have been living quite a bummer with me at their home), pay some old bills and continue with my plans for the execution of this blog version 2.0.

Eleonora Escalante Strategy Blog business model works under sponsorships, academic grants, and digital advertising. I have promised you to don´t charge for reading me. And in consequence, it is vital to attract the right sponsorships or paid digital advertising to my site. During the last two years, indirectly my parents have been sponsoring this blog (they have given me room and board, meanwhile I can start to monetize my publications). My thankfulness to Mom and Dad.

Win X Work in Progress – Aquarelle Exercise by Eleonora Escalante, 2019 

First things first. Let´s re-start again after 20 days off.
Today in our saga Revenge Strategy, it is the turn to name (not describe yet) some of the most ignominious and nasty wars in history which were based on personal revenge or a vengeance strategy.
Again, I am not validating this concept. I am rebuking it with each of these publications, but it is important for all of us to see evidence in history: the revenge strategy happens as “fecal matters happens”.  It is common. We have to revisit the harm and damage of these events in our history records because the brutality of the revenge strategy is simple destruction (for the offender and the re-avenger).

I would like to explore some of the most sounding cases of revenge strategy utilized in territory expansion or economic wars (conquering territories) or wars triggered by simple personal acts of revenge during the last millenniums. Currently and nowadays there is a beautiful example of commercial retaliation strategy between China and the United States of America, which I certainly will dedicate some time in future publications. All my posts are written from the point of view of a corporate strategist, not from the point of view of a historian or archaeologist. That is why I need their support to gather the facts (not the myths). Stay tuned, please.

Before proceeding further let me write some bemols to this article. (A Bemol is a musical Sign ♭ placed to the left of a note to indicate that the note undergoes this alteration during the whole beat).

• Not all revenge strategies are meant to cause warfare. A war is defined as a conflict that has claimed lives in between two countries or two opponent nations. Sometimes revenge strategies are looking forward to simply destroy a commercial entity, or the sources of funds of one region, or the vital economic resources for a country.
• A revenge strategy may or may not look for human beings’ destruction, but it provokes other types of damage or disruption. It can be a retaliation strategy to increase tariffs or a requital punishment to a country that has killed innocent people.
• During our 4,000 years of human history (since neolithic times), our societies all over the world have been entirely at peace for around ONLY 270 years of them, or just around 7% or our timeline history.
• Contrary to what you can think, societies have supported wars (in whatever form) not just as a revenge strategy, but because of other reasons which can be or not justifiable. What is worst, civilians are attracted to war (who of us doesn´t enjoy war fiction movies?). We tend to celebrate conflict as we watch a boxing show, looking to see the victorious one.
• War has been often regarded by observers as honorable and noble if it is used as a revenge strategy against an offender, wrongdoer or transgressor of certain limits or agreements. In consequence, particularly for certain countries leaders’, wars are legitimate. Can you believe it? Wars are seen correct, because more than a contest between nations, wars are a chance to compete and declare a victory against an offender particularly against dictators or terrorists.
• Causes of war are multiple: Do not be blind to consider the unique cause of conflict is an “eye for an eye” or revenge cause. According to the article “The 8 main reasons for war”, these causes can be:
  a) Economic Gain
  b)Territorial Expansion
  c) Religion Dominance
  d) Nationalism
  e) Revenge
  f) Civil
  g) Revolutionary
  h) Defensive
• The 5 Most Significant Wars In History, classified by the number of people who have died are:
  1. The American Civil War (1861-1865). Around 1 million people died in 4 years.
  2. The Taiping Rebellion (1850-1864). This war was fought between the Qing Dynasty and the millenarian sect Hong Xiuquan. waged from 1850 to 1864 between the established Manchu-led Qing dynasty and the Taiping Hong Xiuquan Heavenly Kingdom
  3. Spanish Conquest of the Aztec Empire (1519-1521). The death toll, which varies because of death by disease (smallpox).
  4. World War II (1939-1945). A Nazi racist dictator invaded another country, this country and allies fought the dictator, and then other countries bounced in. Finally, America killed Japanese civilians with atomic bombs.
  5. World War I (1914-1918). World War I has been the greatest war in history in terms of its significance strategy, not in terms of body count deaths.
• Even in game theory, we are thought and taught to use revenge strategies. There are academic lessons established for that. Since the Sun Tzu book “The art of war” to the most effective and most successful game theory called Tit for Tat. What is “Tit for Tat”?: The rule is to cooperate at first with a competitor and then respond to him by doing whatever he did first. If he cooperates with you, then you should cooperate with him. But if he tries to cheat, you should cheat back. If he then (learning his lesson, perhaps,) cooperates once again, you should cooperate again. But, if at some point he once again tries to take an unfair advantage, you should once again behave similarly. Of all the complicated strategies one could take in a game where two opponents are competing, Tit for Tat has proven to be the most successful. And if you see the pattern: the Tit for Tat game theory is simply an “eye for an eye” strategy. Of course, Tit for Tat is clearly offering and validating a kind of revenge. And it also allows for forgiveness, by validating cooperation and positive replication.

• A revenge strategy doesn´t mean to declare a military war or warfare. It can be deployed in multiple reasoning. For example a revenge strategy can use different tactics, such as a lack of business ethics for operating with the public regulation entities; or lack of truth-telling, misinformation and lying; pollution of the environment; corruption; selling confidential information; whistle-blowing; privileged greed; employee-employer relations; sexual discrimination against women; sexual harassment, multinational corporations abuse of power in developing nations. There are several revenge tactics that can be utilized to destroy an opponent or an offender. The trade wars are one of these tactics, which seem to me will be used more and more in the future than warfare.

Vengeance look. Source: Shutterstock

As of next week, we will visit the following examples of revenge strategies:
1. Genghis Khan revenge against the Kwarezmid Empire
2. The Anglo-Dutch Wars (1652–1784)
3. The Opium Wars (1839–1860)
4. The Banana Wars (1898–1934)
5. The Boston Tea Party Conflict (1773)
6. Germany´s second world war led by Adolf Hitler (1939-1945)
7. Pearl Harbor Revenge (WWII)
8. Smooth–Hawley Tariff Act (1930), a United States Act implementing protectionist trade policies
9. Anglo-Irish Trade War (1932–1938)
10. Trade war over genetically modified food (2010–2011)

Conclusively, and as a cherry on top of our ice cream, we will close this saga with the most contemporary last example of trade wars. The most prevailing one of all: The China-USA Trade War. Accompany me during the following months. Thanks!

“Don’t hold the gelid sword of revenge with your icy cold hands, revenge serves no purpose and has no masters”.

Sources of reference utilized to write this article:

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/archaeology-and-history/magazine/2016/05-06/cortes-tenochtitlan/

https://owlcation.com/social-sciences/The-Main-Reasons-For-War

https://www.history.com/news/6-wars-fought-for-ridiculous-reasons

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fighting-fear/201403/getting-even-revenge

Disclaimer: Illustrations in Watercolor are painted by Eleonora Escalante. All the presentation slides shown on this blog are prepared by Eleonora Escalante. Nevertheless, all the pictures or videos shown on this blog are not mine.  I do not own any of the lovely photos or images posted unless otherwise stated.   

Published by eleonoraescalantestrategy

Corporate Strategy Artist, San Salvador, El Salvador View all posts by eleonoraescalantestrategy