The choice is between assured peace and certain ruin, even if no war actually occurs.

How can peace be assured?
It would be well for some of those with the requisite historical knowledge and insight to trace carefully the causes which have led to war in the past, to attempt a diagnosis of the disease which has again and again devastated the world.
A vain classification might perhaps be made into religious wars, dynastic wars, trade wars; but is there not one element common almost to all, namely, the will to power, the desire and intention of some man or set of men to impose their will on others, regardless of justice, which forbids the exercise of force to prevent each thinking, speaking, acting as he will, provided he does not injure the rights of others?
It was the assertion of a claim to dominate which led to the eighty years' war when Spain tried to impose her yoke on the Netherlands, and blended with desire for gain a crusade against the faiths which rejected the supremacy of Rome.

Was the Thirty years War a religious war or a struggle between rulers to assert and extend their powers?
Take any one of the series of long wars, such as those of Louis XIV.

or of Napoleon, under what head of such a classification do they fall?
Does not the common element above mentioned apply to all of them?
The urgency of taking definite steps to secure peace has been recognised already, much thought has been devoted to it, and schemes even in some detail have been suggested for dealing with it.

The idea of a League of Nations to secure peace is occupying the attention of many of the wisest minds and of the statesmen who hold the most responsible positions.