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That's a poor argument for taking warfare out of the hands of democratically elected governments, no matter how aloof you may feel them to be, and putting it in
by michaelchisari 9y ago
That's a poor argument for taking warfare out of the hands of democratically elected governments, no matter how aloof you may feel them to be, and putting it in the hands of unaccountable private corporations, who by definition have no mechanism of popular recourse.
- Consultant32452 9y agoHow could the private corporation not be accountable to the nations in which it exists? They are building, selling, and training those personnel somewhere. They're still getting their money from the governments. The difference is the disillusionment of the people.
- michaelchisari 9y agoWho says these private corporations are tied to specific nations?
- Consultant32452 9y agoAm I being too obtuse by pointing out that a corporation, by definition, requires the legal framework of a nation to even exist? I'll point out again that these private forces need to have their training facilities somewhere, buy their weapons somewhere, etc.
- michaelchisari 9y agoNot obtuse, but I do think you are being naive.
- Consultant32452 9y agoWe have private corporations today manufacturing our nuclear weapons and that has worked out fine without them "going rogue." Historically, private fighting forces are not unique or unusual in any way. So what exactly am I being naive about?
- EGreg 9y agoHow effective was the democratic process in preventing the Vietnam war, the Iraq war, the destruction of Libya, the arming of rebels in Syria, the "inadvertent" loss of humvees and tanks to ISIS, and so on? Is there less terror around the world than when we started the war on terror? We have 30x the number of bases than the rest of the nations of the world combined! Our military budget is larger than the next 19 countries, many of whom are allies. Is this also a result of the US population's wishes and hitting the target goals? Perhaps if your paycheck had a list of where your taxes are going, like they do in France, you'd see just how much discretionary spending goes towards the military, and the taxpayers would send a message to Congress that enough is enough. And the public army faces no market competition, so the Pentagon can't account for $8.7 trillion with a T dollars - yet our politicians always say that our army is always running out of funds and we need to increase our funding to support the national defense.
- michaelchisari 9y agoAll of this is an argument for greater accountability and democratic control of our military. It is not an argument for a radical experiment with the free market and military force.
- EGreg 9y agoWe've tried that, with diminishing returns. Prove to me that more of the same will suddenly give us more accountability. Politicians always say "we just didn't have enough money, give us more". However the definition of (institutional) insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a better result. I am not talking about replacing the military with the free market. I am talking about shrinking it. Yes using democratic means. But good luck with that! More people should read Smedley Butler. https://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html https://www.ratical.org/ratville/CAH/warisaracket.html
- michaelchisari 9y agoI know about Smedley Butler. I've also read Noam Chomsky, and I share his position that a democratic institution, for all of its many faults, is always preferable to a tyrannical, autocratic or authoritarian one.