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Kanji for War
The kanji most commonly used for "War" are 戦、軍、兵.
戦
Kanji that mean War
戦 (sen / ikusa / tatakau) is war and battle — the halberd radical 戈 doing the work. 戦争 (sensō) is war the noun; 戦う is to fight; 作戦 is a strategy; and the great medieval age of civil war is the 戦国時代, the Warring States — source of half of Japanese drama. The character also serves every peaceful struggle: 挑戦 is a challenge, 観戦 is watching the game.
軍 (gun) is the army — a chariot 車 under a cover: the force in the field. 軍隊 (armed forces), 将軍 (shōgun — “general of the army”, the title that ruled Japan for seven centuries), 軍師 (the strategist behind the general). 兵 (hei / tsuwamono) is the soldier — two hands gripping an axe — and Bashō’s most famous battlefield haiku rests on it: 夏草や兵どもが夢の跡 — “summer grass: all that remains of warriors’ dreams”.
The tradition’s wisdom leans away from the subject: Sun Tzu’s 兵法 teaches that the highest victory needs no battle at all.
Words using War kanji
Everyday Japanese vocabulary built from the characters above.
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戦争
せんそう
war; fighting; fierce competition
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軍事
ぐんじ
military affairs
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核兵器
かくへいき
nuclear weapon
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戦後
せんご
postwar period; period after Second World War
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海軍
かいぐん
navy; naval force
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兵器
へいき
arms; weapon; ordnance
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作戦
さくせん
tactics; strategy; military operation
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軍縮
ぐんしゅく
reduction of armaments; disarmament
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兵士
へいし
soldier
Before you use War kanji
戦 reads as "battle/war" but also, honestly, as "struggle" — athletes and patients both use 戦う of their fights, which softens it on skin. 軍 reads institutional (army), 兵 as the common soldier with Bashō's melancholy attached. If your meaning is the fight in you rather than warfare, 闘 (fighting spirit — 闘志) says precisely that.