So long as national States exist and fight each other, only inefficiency can preserve the human race.
 Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy (1945). copy citation

Context

“So long as there is international anarchy, it is by no means clear that increase of efficiency in the separate States is in the interest of mankind, since it increases the ferocity and destructiveness of war. Every argument that he adduces in favour of government, in so far as it is valid at all, is valid in favour of international government. So long as national States exist and fight each other, only inefficiency can preserve the human race. To improve the fighting quality of separate States without having any means of preventing war is the road to universal destruction. * Quoted from Burckhardt, Renaissance in Italy, Part VI, Ch. II. † Ibid.” source