At probably the most elementary level, weapons serve as extensions of human features, augmenting strength, reach, and lethality. The initial weapons, created from rocks, wood, and bone, were ancient yet successful devices for shopping and self-defense. Over millennia of innovation and refinement, these rudimentary instruments offered way to more particular accessories made for certain purposes. The advent of metallurgy ushered in a fresh time of rivalry, as bronze and iron weapons provided superior energy and toughness compared to their organic predecessors. The blade, probably the most well-known of hand-to-hand weapons, surfaced as a symbol of martial ability and power in cultures across the planet, from the katana of feudal China to the broadsword of medieval Europe.

As civilizations pistole softair and encountered each other, the exchange of understanding and systems resulted in more diversification and style of weapons. The development of siege motors such as catapults and trebuchets allowed besieging armies to breach the good defenses of prepared cities, while advancements in metallurgy and engineering gave rise to age gunpowder and firearms. The introduction of firearms revolutionized combat, moving the balance of power away from the elite knight class towards mass armies of conscripted soldiers. From the arquebus to the musket to the weapon, firearms developed quickly, becoming increasingly precise, trusted, and lethal with each successive innovation.

Yet, while the lethality of weapons improved, therefore also did the degree and vitality of armed conflict. The carnage of the Napoleonic Conflicts and the industrialized slaughter of World Conflict I bore witness to the harmful possible of modern weaponry, as unit weapons, artillery, and chemical weapons altered battlefields into charnel properties of death and destruction. The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the close of Earth Conflict II noted a cooling new page in the annals of warfare, showing the scary power of nuclear tools to annihilate whole cities in an instant.

In the post-war era, the growth of nuclear arsenals on the list of world's superpowers ushered in a time of good certain destruction, in that the specter of nuclear war loomed large over the planet. The Cold War standoff involving the United Claims and the Soviet Union spawned a global arms race, as both parties wanted to outmatch one another in terms of nuclear capacity and main-stream military might. The development of intercontinental ballistic missiles, nuclear submarines, and other distribution programs more escalated tensions, raising the stakes of any potential struggle to unprecedented levels.