Since race is a superficial distinction, the term 'race war' is generally used by people for whom the superficial nature of skin color bears significant symbolic value. The term may refer to specific violent acts or to general overt or covert hostilities between ethic groups.
See ethnic warfare, race, racism, ethnicity
The concept of a 'race war' is a core rallying cry for racist extremist groups. In general, their members claim a understanding of religious scripture of a deeper level than others have. They also make direct or symbolic associations between elements in religious scripture and elements in human cultures present today with the added aspect of advocating a survivalist agenda, separated by racial identity. In 1987, the White Patriot Party declared that a Race War had begun. Some white supremacist groups advocate a Racial Holy War.
When Charles Darwin formulated his Origin of Species, he could not have forseen, that though it would find disfavor as a contradiction of religious scripture, it would also be perverted in the minds of some as basis for eugenics, or agendas supporting ethnic superiority.
The Nazis made claims of an existing long-term covert race war instigated by the Jews against "Aryans" European cultures, and this became, in part, political justification to begin a campaign of overt anti-Jewish operations, leading to genocide.
Charles Manson and his followers are believed to have planned and executed the 1969 Sharon Tate murders in an attempt to inititate a race war they called Helter Skelter.
see also: xenophobia, genocide, hate speech, anti-Semitism, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, white supremacy