THE PURPOSE OF WAR IS NOT TO KILL, BUT TO CAUSE PEOPLE TO DIE. When soldiers die, this allows human beings (members of nation-states) to build memorials honoring the dead.

The deaths of soldiers and memorials built to honor dead soldiers proves the existence of one's nation-state and demonstrates how devoted people are to their nation-state.

Death proves the reality of the sacred ideal. Death is the way a nation validates their sacred ideal. The endless slaughter of the first world war, for example, was undertaken with the purpose of building war memorials, testifying to the reality of the nation-state.

 THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING IS IN THE DYING.

Human beings die and kill to prove the reality of their sacred ideals. The nature of the entity or idea for which human beings die and kill is fungible. The mechanism is the same, regardless of the nature of the idea or entity or ideal: Death--and memorials erected in the name of those who have died—testify to the reality of the idea or entity or ideal. Death and memorialization perform a validation function.

Human beings have died and killed for:

“A theory is the more impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises, the more different kinds of things it relates, and the more extended its area of applicability.” Albert Einstein