When we apply what we have learned

When we apply what we have learned about Thucydides' treatment of the beginning of the first ten-year war to the prob¬lem of the beginning of the second, the solution to that problem is relatively simple. We need only to recognize two things: that Thucydides does not require a military action for the arche of a war and that Thucydides does not consider the breaking of a treaty to be necessarily the arche of a war. The treaty may be violated before or after the beginning of the war or even before and after the beginning of the war. In short, the violation of a treaty has no necessary connection with the arche of a war. With these two points in mind, let us reexamine Thucydides' remarks about the beginning of the second ten-year war.