Internal Conflict

• An internal conflict is sometimes called intrastate war or civil war. By international norms, internal unrest officially becomes an intrastate conflict when there are two fighting forces and 1,000 battle deaths.
  
  

External Conflict

• An external conflict is a war that involves two or more countries and crosses a boarder. External conflicts in this case are called intrastate war or simply war. Again, there must be cumulatively 1,000 battle deaths.
  
  

History

• Civil and interstate wars have been around for the length of human history. However, in the years since the end of the Cold War, there has been a marked increase in the number of internal state conflicts as opposed to external conflicts between states.
  
  

Significance

• Defining a conflict properly is important because other countries need to how to deal with the problem. If a conflict is strictly internal, then they might be hesitant to intervene because of sovereignty issues.
  
  

Transnationalization

• There is a phenomenon called the transnationalization of conflict. It occurs when a conflict starts as an internal conflict and then becomes an external conflict. This usually happens when a country has poorly guarded borders and rebel groups can move into other countries.