Stephen,
I would not simplify the cause of major world conflict to be merely economically rooted just as it is not merely religiously based. Neither is poverty the causative agent. Rather, It would seem the poor succumb to leaders who have the power to create such conditions for their own self-serving purposes. The cause of major conflict is far more closely tied to the socio-political structure of society and its culture.

Desperately poor people in poor nations cannot organize wars, which are exceptionally costly. I would certainly agree with your second sentence, and say that the situations conductive to war involve political repression of dissidents, tight media control stirring up chauvinism, ethnic prejudices, religious fervor, and sentiments of revenge. The historical record, however, shows that poverty has rarely, if ever, been a pro-active factor, either in inter-state or intra-state wars. Even as late as 1929, well after ' the war to end all wars', it was freely predicted there would be no more war. And on what basis? Economists and statesmen were giving assurances that prosperity was permanent; "globally", it was said," we are living in a new era and poverty is all but banished from the earth."

As ever, war has been tantalizingly profitable for those national political leaders who have eschewed it. It is certainly a matter of social justice and morality we address the needs of the poverty stricken, but if we do this on mere economic grounds, we address neither the root cause of global conflict or poverty. The culture and politics of a national body, society or civilisation are primarily significant for peace, whether aligned to the religion of Islam, Christianity , Judaism, Buddhism etc.

As I've stated similarly, in your forum topic on the U.N., it is the concept of sovereignty - the legacy of the Treaty of Westphalia, as signed in 1648 and reinforced at the Congress of Vienna in 1815, that has bequeathed us our situation. The justice of this legacy should not have superimposed on it, with the trappings of a world government, an 'authority' inherently as corrupt as any other.