There is NO statistical correlation between economics and war, multiple other factors come first

It is a cherished truism among numerous Western officials: international commerce reduces the risk of war. This idea motivated the British parliamentarian Richard Cobden when he championed the repeal of tariffs on grain in 1846. In 1918, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson called for "the removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions" as part of his blueprint for world peace. Cordell Hull, the longest-serving U.S. secretary of state, argued in 1948 that "unhampered trade dovetailed with peace." Such thinking persisted during and after the Cold War. In the 1950s, France and Germany sought to mesh their economies, partly in hopes of preventing another disastrous conflict between them. After the Iron Curtain fell, many European politicians saw greater economic links with Russia as helpful for creating a cooperative diplomatic relationship. The United States and its allies worked to integrate China into the world economy for similar reasons. U.S. President Bill Clinton, for example, declared that admitting Beijing to the World Trade Organization would "plainly advance the cause of peace in Asia." And yet scholarly research has not confirmed that such thinking is accurate. Before 1990, academics vigorously debated the question but largely in the abstract: there was a marked dearth of empirical research on the links between the global economy and conflict. The past three decades produced an explosion of empirical studies examining this relationship, but the findings were a mishmash. Today, there is enough research to offer some answers, but they are hardly straightforward. The notion that more trade and globalization inherently curtail war turns out to be mistaken, yet so is the inverse. The relationship between the global economy and international security is, instead, mixed. Some factors matter, and others don't. The types of economic ties that are meaningful appear to have both stabilizing and destabilizing effects. Trade, for example, sometimes dampens conflict and sometimes fuels it. The globalization of production -- that is, the dispersion of economic activity by global firms across borders -- has a stabilizing effect among great powers, but it increases the likelihood of conflict among developing countries. International financial flows -- the cross-border purchase of bonds, stocks, currencies, and so on -- -have no clear effect at all. Washington does not seem to have digested this reality. American leaders once seemed to believe that a policy of economic engagement with China had only upsides for U.S. security; today's leaders seem to think this policy was an abject failure. But policymakers must understand that both views are wrong. If the United States wants to prevent war, it should adopt a nuanced, modulated approach to economic engagement with China -- curtailing it only when significant risks exist. Commerce is not helpful for advancing peace, nor is it detrimental. It is both.