> knife's edge of peace

This phrasing reminded me of a comment I favorited a while ago, so I went through my favorited comments and found it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5847789

"It took thousands of years of human civilisation before we got relatively benign governments. Power structures are not inherently benign; they must constantly be pressured to prevent malignant people using them to leverage their actions. A non-authoritarian government is an historical anomaly. It's a ball balanced on top of a hill, pushed there by the deaths of millions, and kept there by the vigilance of those who care.

Please start caring."