War has been a common form of interaction between independent polities since they first arose in the mists of history. There is evidence of organized warfare more than 10,000 years ago in the ruins of Jericho. The recorded history of the great early empires, including Assyria, Egypt, Chou China, Mongolia, and Persia is in large part a chronicle of organized violence. As Quincy Wright (1965) notes, the polities of the Mediterranean basin and Europe between 700 BC and the mid-seventeenth century AD sustained themselves in large part through subduing neighbors, defending themselves against “barbarians,” and protecting their trade routes through armed conquests and more defensive measures. Where they failed in these tasks, they often collapsed or were conquered by their competitors. The polities of China during the “Warring States” period (403–221 BC) were similarly “fighting states” constantly faced with security dilemmas and the backdrop of war in their daily lives. As one illustration, Duke Huan of the state of Ch'in went to war twenty-eight times in a reign lasting forty-three years (Li, 1965: 50). Although punctuated by short periods of peace, the Chinese polities during the “Warring States” period and the Greek city-states between 492 and 404 BC were in almost constant multilateral wars. Bilateral armed contests of some kind were taking place within these domains on an annual basis.