That's not necessarily true. The point of war is to force control. You can force control without killing people. Economically, psychologically, digitally, etc. Killing people is one of the ways but not the only way to wage war.

The point of war is enforcing your will through violence. You can skip the violence, but then bullies would essentially be unrestricted.

the point of war is to get past bargaining frictions and make it clear what a mutually acceptable settlement looks like

> The point of war is to kill people.

You could have a war that's entirely based around infrastructure damage, and you could warn people away from incoming attacks.