War against a foreign country only happens when the moneyed classes think they are going to profit from it.

The line expresses a materialist critique of foreign war: it frames war not as an unavoidable clash of ideals or national destinies, but as a policy choice shaped by economic incentives. “Moneyed classes” points to elites with capital and influence—industrialists, financiers, and allied political actors—who can benefit from armaments production, resource access, contracts, or geopolitical leverage. The claim is deliberately sweeping, functioning as polemic: it highlights how propaganda and patriotic rhetoric can mask underlying profit motives and class interests. Read this way, the quote aligns with Orwell’s recurring suspicion of power and the ways institutions manufacture consent, even when the costs of war fall disproportionately on ordinary people.