A Civil War is a war between organized groups within the same nation state or republic, or, less commonly,

between two countries created from a formerly united nation state. The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies.[1] The term is a calque of the Latin bellum civil, which was used to refer to the various civil wars of the Roman Republic in the 1st century BC.

Conventional War - A conflict between nation states, fought by uniformed members of the various belligerent powers' militaries, and subject to the Geneva Convention, among other treaties and international laws. Requires a formal declaration of war.

Guerilla / Insurgency / Unconventional Wars - These asymmetrical conflicts usually pit a conventional military force of considerable strength against an ununiformed, unconventional force, which employs hit and run tactics and relies heavily upon spy-ops and public opinion operations. The goal of the insurgent is not so much to win the war, but to prevent the other side from winning, and to impose enough cost upon the other side to eventually convince the conventional military power to withdraw. In some ways, much of the American Revolution was of this sort.

A Religious War (Latin: bellum sacrum) is a war caused by, or justified by, religious differences. It can involve one state with an established religion against another state with a different religion or a different sect within the same religion, or a religiously motivated group attempting to spread its faith by violence, or to suppress another group because of its religious beliefs or practices. The Muslim conquests, the Crusades, the Reconquista, and the French Wars of Religion are frequently cited historical examples.

A World War is a war affecting most of the world's most powerful and populous countries. World wars span multiple countries on multiple continents, with battles fought in multiple theaters. The term is usually applied to the two conflicts of unprecedented scale that occurred during the 20th century: World War I (19141918) and World War II (1939 1945). However, it is also sometimes applied to earlier wars and to a hypothetical future war.

A Nuclear warfare (sometimes atomic warfare or thermonuclear warfare) is a military conflict or political strategy in which nuclear weaponry is used to inflict damage on an opponent. Compared to conventional warfare, nuclear warfare can be vastly more destructive in range and extent of damage, and in a much shorter time frame. A major nuclear exchange could have severe long-term effects, primarily from radiation release, but also from the production of high levels of atmospheric pollution leading to a "nuclear winter" that could last for decades, centuries, or even millennia after the initial attack. A large nuclear war is considered to bear existential risk for civilization on Earth. Importantly however, despite modern civilization being at risk, assuming weapons stockpiles at the previous cold war heights, analysts and physicists have found that billions of humans would nevertheless survive a global thermonuclear war.

A Proxy War or Proxy Warfare is a war that results when opposing powers use third parties as substitutes for fighting each other directly. While powers have sometimes used governments as proxies, violent non-state actors, mercenaries, or other third parties are more often employed. It is hoped that these groups can strike an opponent without leading to full-scale war.

Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, often violent, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no legally binding, criminal law definition. Common definitions of terrorism refer only to those violent acts which are intended to create fear (terror); are perpetrated for a religious, political or, ideological goal; and deliberately target or disregard the safety of non-combatants (civilians). Some definitions now include acts of unlawful violence and war. The use of similar tactics by criminal organizations for protection rackets or to enforce a code of silence is usually not labeled terrorism, though these same actions may be labeled terrorism when done by a politically motivated group. The writer Heinrich Bll and scholars Raj Desai and Harry Eckstein have suggested that attempts to protect against terrorism may lead to a kind of social oppression.

Total war is a war in which a belligerent engages in the complete mobilization of fully available resources and population. In the mid-19th century, scholars identified total war as a separate class of warfare. In a total war, there is less

differentiation between combatants and civilians than in other conflicts, and sometimes no such differentiation at all, as nearly every human resource, civilians and soldiers alike, can be considered to be part of the belligerent effort.

The American Revolutionary War (17751783), the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War in the United States, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Thirteen Colonies, but gradually grew into a world war between Britain on one side and the newly formed United States, France, Netherlands and Spain on the other. The main result was an American victory and European recognition of the independence of the United States, with mixed results for the other powers.