'beginning a war' is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it when describing the start of a war conflict. For example: The Prime Minister made the controversial decision to begin a war with the neighboring country.
On Nov. 1, 1954, as the French celebrated All Saints Dayy, the rebels struck, beginning a war of massacre and mutilation, summary executions and rape.
In 1500, on the initiative of Lithuanian defectors, Ivan's armies seized a number of important border towns, thus beginning a war that ended somewhat inconclusively in 1503 with a truce that extended Ivan's border considerably to the west.
In recent memory, the year 1979 gave us the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, beginning a war that still goes on today and appears endless; Saddam Hussein's assumption of total power in Iraq; the Iranian revolution, with the elevation of Ayatollah Khomeini to Supreme Leader and the start of the hostage crisis; and soaring inflation, unemployment, and interest rates in America.
He was not afraid of tough questions and accusations and sometimes he was rather convincing – especially when he was talking about how the west can't demand to set the moral "rules" for the rest of the world after beginning a war without reason in Iraq.
In the early 1970s, the Moro National Liberation Front MNLFF) began a war of secession against the Philippine government.
In August 1992 Georgia, itself in near anarchy, began a war in Abkhazia.
On this date began a war, an unsolicited occupation and the mass murder of our people.
He told me that he believes India could begin a war with Pakistan and not face a possible nuclear retaliation.
It's long past time that we began a war of words against that which is "lawful but awful".
The 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel has just begun, a war Hezbollah provoked by crossing the border and kidnapping two Israeli soldiers.
Yet since 9/11 we have begun a war that may draw our soldiers into many battles involving intimate killing.
