This sounds laughable, but makes a lot of sense if you think about it. Humans need an natural enemy to operate efficiently in a society, and what is easier to unite and organize the people as something that is as massive as a "war"? It pushes everyone into the same side; the other easy organizing tool is race, since there are only a few races and you can't really change your skin color. Adding to the 1984 quote, humans are hierarchical by nature and if "continuous war" is not waged by the state, then we ourselves will wage ourselves against another group (so defeating said country is not in our interest); with more destructive and deunifying results. Be it democrats, republicans, SUV drivers, oil consumers, Israel vs Palestine supporters etc etc.
