Stephen Van Evera - Causes Of War

World peace - the great unattainable goal by humanity, rests on the premise of two paths. The first path is the path of the USA and its allies. To basically forge and keep alliances creating a western liberal hegemony, but alas it is not peaceful, because what is created is, in fact, a war machine that has siphoned trillions of dollars into over the last hundred or so years. The second method is by China. Have little or no alliances and create your military in a way that frightens other states so that the nation's military basically becomes a deterrent to others and there can be more resources to face existential threats that pose greater risks to humanity (like climate change.) It should also be noted that China has not spent a single cent on a war for the last 50 or so years. A military can do many things, like plant trees and care and rescue people if a natural disaster took place. It is not solely used for fighting wars.

Stefan Zweig - Mary Queen Of Scots

Throughout Scottish history, the chiefs had an air of superiority. A Clansmen gave his life to the chief, rather than the king, but there was also the case where a chief would coerce his men with the threat of violence. Disbanding the clan system was disbanding the Scottish Highland way of life, and the final straw was the Disarmament Act. Many men hoarded swords in the rooves of their croft, waiting for the day the Stuarts would return. To successfully conquer the Scots was to disarm them and take away their powerful chiefs, and then barbarically colonise them and treat them as subhuman. The highland cause was a lost cause because the highlanders were coming up against what would be the greatest empire the world has ever seen, The British Empire. But one thing is certain, My late grandfather told me, the further north you got, the stronger the alliance with the government was, so it is not the case that all the highlanders fought for the Stuarts, the Clan Gunn and Clan Sutherland were from the north and fought for the government with honour.

John J. Mearsheimer - The Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams And International Realities

In the age of now, the Anthropocene, society in the global world is in a post-Global Financial Crisis world, where the failings of capitalism were shown. The capitalism economy is still impacting the world in severe global emissions and one the greatest emitters in the world is actually the great sacrificial death machine, the US army. Realism and Marxism have never been more important than now, and when it comes to the international actors, being states in the neo-realist lens, to be in a state is to have power and a state offers security and protection. You can only see how non-state peoples struggle, like the Rohingya and other stateless peoples. States are selfish, they are the bullies. To live in a state is to have power. Classical realism still has a purpose as seen in Syria where there is still an evil dictator overwhelmed by the power and will use it to make others suffer at their hands. The way to understand the world's problems is a shift towards a neo-classical realist lens.

Nigel Tranter - The Flockmasters

Scotland not only fused the Picts with the Gaels to become the Scots, but the Norse also had a considerable influence on power within the Highlands. Notable Norse-Gael names are McLeod and McDonald, which can all trace their clan origins to Vikings. There were parts of Scotland conquered by the Norse, the isles and even mainland territory like Caithness and Sutherland, these remained in the Norwegian crown's possession for a few hundred years right up to the 15th century. There is even some speculation of whether the Norse who discovered America actually hailed from Scotland. They were known as great seafarers taking slaves to as far Constantinople, with records showing Pictish slaves taken to modern day Turkey. The Norse had a considerable impact on modern-day Scotland, even today the title of Lord of the Isles, once held by Angus Og MacDonald, is now held by the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles.

Jenny Wormald - Mary Queen Of Scots

Many people do not realise that when Kenneth MacAlpin inherited the throne of the Picts, the kingdom of Dal Riata was on the decline. They had been ravaged and pillaged by the Vikings for some years and the dominant force in Scotland were the Picts. This is why the early kings of Alba, Scotland, are listed as kings of the Picts. It is even under speculation whether Kenneth was even part of the Scotti. It is not written anywhere of who his father was, and it is not written anywhere in solid proof of whether the Picts really did practice matrilineality. There was a Gaelicisation of the Picts, one can see that in the list of the kings, the only surviving document of the Picts, and Bede the master and sources that there is on this matter of the early history of the Picts is all that is known. Bede states that the Picts took Gaels for wives, so they must have been half Gael half Pict for longer than just the succession of MacAlpin.

J.H. Elliott - Scots & Catalans: Union & Disunion

One of the most overlooked and often unremembered aspects of Scottish history is the people of the highlands were refugees and migrants en masse. We are talking millions of migrants traveling to the far corners of the world. They had an immense impact on places like New Zealand, with Dunedin actually being a Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, and the whole city of Dunedin is actually based on the street layout of Edinburgh. There were 2.6 million migrants leaving in only a number of years, 600,000 of these went to England. Remarkably Scotland has probably learned a thing or two about immigration after seeing her sons and daughters flung to the far corners because Scotland has taken in a third of the UK's Syrian refugees in the last couple of years.

T. M. Devine - To The Ends Of The Earth: Scotland's Global Diaspora, 1750-2010

Scotland has many stories, some which invoke the brave to the macabre. Sawney Bean was a real-life cannibal who lived in Scotland in the 16th century, the head of a forty-five member clan that preyed on over a thousand people as they set up traps to intercept messengers who were passing by and took the bodies back to their lair to consume. Also, whisky is seen as quite the lavish drink for most, but it was originally the drink for the underclasses. Claret was the drink of choice for the upper classes. Somerled who was the progenitor of Clan Donald also has five hundred thousand descendants, second only in the volume of living descendants to the 'big daddy' of living descendants, the famous Mongol ruler Genghis Khan.

John & Noreen Hamilton - Scottish History: Strange But True

When Charles Edward Stuart went south in England after Prestonpans and the victory, he mustered troops in Manchester called the Manchester Regiment. They disbanded by the time the army got back after the retreat. The retreat happened because there were reports by a spy of a ''ghost army'', which frightened the clan chiefs. The spy alerted the chiefs about an incoming army, so they fled back to Scotland after reaching Derby. Charles was adamant that they should progress to London, but the chiefs had been spooked. Also, John O'Sullivan, the third in command was a terrible tactician and so Charles had many clowns in his ranks. He was essentially let down by his own men, such is the nature of leaving a council of arrogant fiends fiercely object to the main goal. Charles was a military man and had grown up watching battles as a child.

Nigel Tranter - The Story Of Scotland

One of the very great myths of Culloden and the Scottish plight was the fact they were outgunned. This is not the case, as they had more cannon than the government forces. There is a myth, a great romanticised notion that the Highlanders were equipped with a targe shield and a Scottish broadsword, otherwise known as a basket-hilt broadsword. The Clan chiefs were equipped like this, whereas the clansmen were equipped with a musket, because they were found on the battlefield of Culloden after the carnage ensued. There were also French troops fighting, well, Irish and Scottish in the French Service including Irish Piquets and the Fitzjames Horse, who wore breastplate armour. The Irish Piquets wore red coats but apart from this were exactly like French Soldiers.