But do those outnumber the "Einstein being bored as patent clerk" type situations? How many bright minds people died as children or soldiers in those wars? Does war spur inventions, or does it concentrate forces and effort to put things into production that were invented by minds that had to have some peace, sleep and food, at some point, to come up with the kernels of what the war machinery turns into weapons and supplies?

It's probably a bit of both, IMO. I don't doubt that pressure and threats to survival can also make people snap out of ruts they have been in, and look for something beyond what they already know. But I still would say you can have inventions without war, but you cannot have them when there is nothing but war. And my argument would be that the extreme of that would be someone who gets screamed at and beaten from the moment they were born, and lives in constant state of war. They will not be able to find the rest and perspective to invent things, they may not even survive.