Is war unique to humans? The Gombe chimpanzee war lasted 4 years and was more brutal than humans

The battle of the orangutans

We often say orangutan to refer to three animals, the first is the orangutan, which is the most distant from humans, separated from us about 14 million years ago.

The second is the gorilla, the one that grows all muscular and pounds its chest, and it separated from us about 10 million years ago.

The last is the chimpanzee, which is taxonomically part of the human family and is the closest member of all orangutans to humans, separating from them about 4 million years ago.

The study of chimpanzees is therefore crucial to the study of the early years of human evolution.

Jenny Goodall, a world-renowned chimpanzee researcher, was rooted in the African jungle for more than 50 years studying chimpanzees.

In spending time with chimpanzees, Goodall discovered that chimpanzees are smarter and crueler than humans think.

To be precise, what humans would do, chimpanzees would do as well.

Goodall once observed a four-year war between two chimpanzee populations that became known as the Gombe Chimpanzee War.

Chimpanzee researcher Jenny Goodall

In 1970, Goodall spent 10 years working in Africa's Gombe rainforest, getting along well with the local Kasakera chimpanzee family.

Unfortunately, however, the leader of the Kasakra family died, leaving the chimpanzees without a leader, and they engaged in a power struggle over the position of leader.

The chimpanzee is a polygamous creature, and the male leader leads the group, enjoying mating rights and access to all resources first.

Of course, there are other males in the group, and they are divided into different classes according to their power.

Chimpanzee group

Goodall believed that after the death of the chief, the most powerful chimpanzee should inherit the throne and lead the chimpanzees to a new life, however, the CasCascaramily turned her perception upside down.

At first, there was indeed a male chimpanzee Humphrey inherited the throne of the chief, but not every chimpanzee obeyed it, so the Casacra family split.

Some of the chimpanzees chose to follow Humphrey, and they were called the New Casacra family by Goodall, located in the north of the original territory.

The other part set up its own family, the Maha family, which occupied the southern part of the original territory.

Jenny observed the chimpanzees

Obviously, after the separation, the resources that both sides could enjoy shrank, so there was constant friction between the two sides, but they could barely live on.

It wasn't until 1974, four years after the separation, that Goodall noticed that the six male chimpanzees of the new CCascarafamily were often together and seemed to be discussing something among themselves.

Goodall followed the six chimpanzees closely in the following days and found that one day they conspired to kill a male chimpanzee of the Maha family.

The incident was like a fuse that ignited the war, and the Maha family gathered all its members, including seven males, three females, and some juvenile chimpanzees.

Chimpanzees fighting

They all rushed to the battlefield to fight with the new Cascara family, but in vain, the new Casacra family has 8 males and 12 females, the more numerical advantage, the Maha family all destroyed.

Originally Gudauer thought it was over, but the next scene that happened made her remember it for life.

The victorious chimpanzees gnawed on the bodies of the defeated, smearing their blood all over their bodies as if in celebration.

They also bite off the genitals of the defeated, with their feet on the head of the defeated corpse, this scene does not feel familiar.

Yes, humans in history have done the same thing.

Chimpanzees face the corpses of their companions

Goodall felt very sad that they once belonged to a family, playing together in the forests of Gombe, but in the end, it was such an end.

Jenny Goodall published a paper on what she had seen and heard, and it immediately became a worldwide sensation. People didn't think chimpanzees could be so cruel until they were so smart.

Goodall did not let this incident stop her research on chimpanzees, and she continued to observe the new Cascara family.

In 1981, seven years after the Gombe Chimpanzee War, a family of chimpanzees named Kaland invaded the territory of New Kasakera.

As a result of the Gombe War that year, New Kasakera was so badly wounded that they were far outnumbered by the enemy, and eventually, the leader, Humphrey, was bitten to death by the other side, and the family had to retreat and the old territory changed hands.

The war between chimpanzees

Rise of the Goa'uld

Goodall found that different chimpanzee families possess their intelligence and that in some chimpanzee groups the leader is so brutal and dictatorial that then family members will plot revolts behind the scenes.

University of Minnesota zoologist Michael Wilson observed 18 chimpanzee groups in Africa and counted the number of dead chimpanzees, he found that two-thirds of the dead chimpanzees inside died of fratricide.

Chimpanzees also have a sense of territorial expansion, and expansion is not fundamentally related to a shortage of food.

Struggle among chimpanzees

In some cases, chimpanzees fight each other not for food, but simply for power.

Chimpanzees are cruel in their treatment of their kind, leaving few survivors and even immature chimpanzees untouched.

Chimpanzees are omnivores who actively prey on monkeys in the African jungle. In Uganda's Kibale District National Forest Park, the local colobus monkeys are nearly endangered because they are hunted by chimpanzees.

Perhaps in the future, they will become extinct by chimpanzees. Perhaps thousands or tens of thousands of years ago, there was another type of monkey living here, and they may have been exterminated by chimpanzees.

Chimpanzees eating monkeys

These are very similar to the human experience, after the human out of Africa, the animals of other continents have become extinct one after another.

Even the ancestors of domestic animals, horses, and cattle, have disappeared in the wild.

Chimpanzees can be very cruel when dealing with animals that disagree with them, even if the other party is from the same group as themselves.

With humans now destroying chimpanzee habitats, will chimpanzees one day take humans to heart and retaliate against them sometime in the future, with Rising of the Planet of the Apes becoming a reality?

Will chimpanzees take revenge on humans?

The battle between humans and gorillas

On whether war will break out between chimpanzees and humans, many researchers on orangutans, including Goodall, believe this is unlikely.

First, although chimpanzees are the closest animals to humans, they are separated from us by a 2% genetic divide, and it is this 2% that determines that they are inside the zoo and we are outside the zoo.

Secondly, chimpanzees have not evolved to walk upright, and they consume energy three times faster than humans, which means that moving forward the same distance, humans consume less energy than chimpanzees.

Humans and chimpanzees

Finally, chimpanzees only use tools, not make them, and even if they learn to make them now, they are unlikely to surpass humans.

If chimpanzees did have to fight humans, then they would lose badly. Humans do not fight chimpanzees out of a desire to protect nature and preserve animal diversity, and the fact chimpanzees do not harm basic human interests.

Goodall, who knows chimpanzees very well after spending up to half a century with them, said chimpanzees weigh the pros and cons and bully the weaker side.

No chimpanzee has ever clashed with her because the chimpanzees know that humans are taller and more agile than they are and that humans will give them food, so they have no reason to be enemies of humans.

Chimpanzees weigh the pros and cons

Conversely, when faced with other, weaker populations, such as monkeys, chimpanzees will bully at will because they know that monkeys are dumber, and smaller, and still make good food.

Chimpanzees are too much like humans, not only in their positive aspects, being curious, thinking, and using their intelligence, but also in their negative aspects, such as brutality, killing and anger, and entanglement with interests.

Perhaps, these are the evolutionary traces left on them and we, our ancestors, also step by step to the top of the food chain.

Then the ancient humans that once existed, Homo erectus, Neanderthal, Denisovans, etc., all fell at the feet of our ancestors.