Schumpeter argued that territorial ambition, the desire for colonial expansion, and the warlike spirit in general were not the inevitable consequence of the capitalist system, as the Marxists would have it. Rather, they resulted from residual, precapitalist mentalities that unfortunately were strongly embedded among the ruling groups of the major European powers. For Schumpeter, capitalism itself could not possibly make for conquest and war: its spirit was rational, calculating, and therefore averse to risk-taking on the scale implicit in warmaking and in other heroic antics.
