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The Gatling quote is hilarious. Did the inventor of the machine gun really think that each company of 100 men was going to be reduced to one guy with a Gatling

The Gatling quote is hilarious. Did the inventor of the machine gun really think that each company of 100 men was going to be reduced to one guy with a Gatling gun, and 99 of them send him to the battlefield by himself, saying "good luck buddy, let us know how it works out?" The army was going to be reduced by a factor of 100, and two tiny armies were going to face off while the majority of men of fighting age were going to sit at home and paint landscape paintings? Really?

mmcromp 8mo ago
I don't know if this is your point, but we're hearing the same stores with AI. Do these people really mean what they say or are they just lying to paint themselves as honorable
zmgsabst 8mo ago
But… it did do that. > that it would, to a large extent supersede the necessity of large armies, and consequently, exposure to battle and disease [would] be greatly diminished. Our force structure shifted towards logistics and infrastructure from combatants as we moved up the weapon complexity hierarchy. First automatic guns, then tanks, then airplanes. To a large extent, a tank or air crew is 50 guys waving off 1-5, while they sit back at base and do hobbies between bouts of mechanic labor. They’re not literally at home, but we do fight with small mechanized armies while most soldiers watch on from the base.
- AndrewKemendo 8mo ago
  Right It wasn’t over night but it did exactly what it intended and sped up a battle significantly as though you had multiples of troops compared to a musket firing line Then miniaturized it becomes the SAW
- closewith 8mo ago
  Yes, even for infantry, the tooth to tail ratio for deployed expeditionary armies is now 10-20:1. Even that's down from cold war ratios due to mechanisation and automation on the logistics side.
  - knollimar 8mo ago
    Huh isn't the tail bigger?
jdndbdjsj 8mo ago
Yet everyone is saying this about LLMs and coders
01HNNWZ0MV43FF 8mo ago
A little "How many people were soldiers in ancient Rome" type searches gave me these numbers... 16% of adult males in the Roman mid-republic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_army_of_the_mid-Republic#Social_impact_of_military_service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_army_of_the_mid-Republic...), call that 8% of adults of all genders. Wikipedia says that there's about 1.34 million people in active duty in the US military, out of about 342 million people, 21.5% of which are under 18. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_Sta..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces) I think that's 0.5%? Down from 8% in ancient Rome?
- applfanboysbgon 8mo ago
  That has little to do with technological advances, just the fact that the US is at an imperial peace; ie. it is under zero threat of invasion and is currently only engaged in small-scale imperial adventurism across the globe which does not require a large standing army. ~16% of adult Americans served in WW2, or ~33% of adult men.
  - closewith 8mo ago
    Is Iran enjoying an imperial peace, too? Even including Aative + reserves + paramilitaries, less than 2% of Iranian adults are in the military.
    - expedition32 8mo ago
      Iran hasn't fought a ground war since the (America backed) Saddam invasion.
      - closewith 8mo ago
        And what kind of advancement has allowed Iran to engage in numerous direct conflicts (ignoring the proxy wars) without engaging in invasion? At this point, I'm actually not sure if you're trolling or unironically don't get it?
closewith 8mo ago
US/Israel and Iran each have millions of military and military-industrial personnel, and yet the actual combat is being performed by a few thousand at most. There might a thousand people in uniform for each one directly engaging the enemy (flying a sortie, launching a missile, firing a torpedo) on any given day.
- orbital-decay 8mo ago
  That's because there's no ground invasion (yet).
  - closewith 8mo ago
    So these nations are at war, but the ground troops aren't invading in foot? Instead, they're in barracks or never raised to begin with? What relevance could this have to the quote from Gattling? Probably none at all.
    - orbital-decay 8mo ago
      Probably the same relevance as the type of war you're referring to (asymmetrical strike exchange). The war of conquest between countries of comparable population and military power Gatling referred to still needs a lot more people on the ground doing the actual takeover part.
      - closewith 8mo ago
        Nearly there! So how might a global and region powers engage in a war without engaging in territorial invasion? What kind of advancement might allow such a conflict to take place with only a tiny number of combatants?
Aerolfos 8mo ago
> and 99 of them send him to the battlefield by himself, saying "good luck buddy, let us know how it works out?" >The army was going to be reduced by a factor of 100, and two tiny armies were going to face off while the majority of men of fighting age were going to sit at home and paint landscape paintings? Really? Well, for a time greek city states did fight pretty much like this. Small armies of hoplites were raised outside harvest season, went out, fought almost show-battles with very few casualties, and tribute changed hands based on the results. Everyone went home for the harvest. I believe there's even instances where a battle wasn't fought at all in favour of two appointed champions dueling (origin of the popular fiction trope) It didn't last, but for a time the greek city states had a kind of equilibrium with relatively few resources (or people) spent on war.
- AllegedAlec 8mo ago
  > Well, for a time greek city states did fight pretty much like this. Small armies of hoplites were raised outside harvest season, went out, fought almost show-battles with very few casualties, and tribute changed hands based on the results. Everyone went home for the harvest. This is a view held by a small group, but is in no way the accepted view of it for historians. See the link for a blogpost of a military historian talking about the orthodox and heterodox schools of thought on this. https://acoup.blog/2025/11/14/collections-hoplite-wars-part-i-the-othismos-over-othismos/ https://acoup.blog/2025/11/14/collections-hoplite-wars-part-...

mmcromp 8mo ago

I don't know if this is your point, but we're hearing the same stores with AI. Do these people really mean what they say or are they just lying to paint themselves as honorable

zmgsabst 8mo ago

But… it did do that. > that it would, to a large extent supersede the necessity of large armies, and consequently, exposure to battle and disease [would] be greatly diminished. Our force structure shifted towards logistics and infrastructure from combatants as we moved up the weapon complexity hierarchy. First automatic guns, then tanks, then airplanes. To a large extent, a tank or air crew is 50 guys waving off 1-5, while they sit back at base and do hobbies between bouts of mechanic labor. They’re not literally at home, but we do fight with small mechanized armies while most soldiers watch on from the base.

AndrewKemendo 8mo ago
Right It wasn’t over night but it did exactly what it intended and sped up a battle significantly as though you had multiples of troops compared to a musket firing line Then miniaturized it becomes the SAW
closewith 8mo ago
Yes, even for infantry, the tooth to tail ratio for deployed expeditionary armies is now 10-20:1. Even that's down from cold war ratios due to mechanisation and automation on the logistics side.
- knollimar 8mo ago
  Huh isn't the tail bigger?

jdndbdjsj 8mo ago

Yet everyone is saying this about LLMs and coders

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 8mo ago

A little "How many people were soldiers in ancient Rome" type searches gave me these numbers... 16% of adult males in the Roman mid-republic (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_army_of_the_mid-Republic#Social_impact_of_military_service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_army_of_the_mid-Republic...), call that 8% of adults of all genders. Wikipedia says that there's about 1.34 million people in active duty in the US military, out of about 342 million people, 21.5% of which are under 18. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_Sta..., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces) I think that's 0.5%? Down from 8% in ancient Rome?

applfanboysbgon 8mo ago
That has little to do with technological advances, just the fact that the US is at an imperial peace; ie. it is under zero threat of invasion and is currently only engaged in small-scale imperial adventurism across the globe which does not require a large standing army. ~16% of adult Americans served in WW2, or ~33% of adult men.
- closewith 8mo ago
  Is Iran enjoying an imperial peace, too? Even including Aative + reserves + paramilitaries, less than 2% of Iranian adults are in the military.
  - expedition32 8mo ago
    Iran hasn't fought a ground war since the (America backed) Saddam invasion.
    - closewith 8mo ago
      And what kind of advancement has allowed Iran to engage in numerous direct conflicts (ignoring the proxy wars) without engaging in invasion? At this point, I'm actually not sure if you're trolling or unironically don't get it?

closewith 8mo ago

US/Israel and Iran each have millions of military and military-industrial personnel, and yet the actual combat is being performed by a few thousand at most. There might a thousand people in uniform for each one directly engaging the enemy (flying a sortie, launching a missile, firing a torpedo) on any given day.

orbital-decay 8mo ago
That's because there's no ground invasion (yet).
- closewith 8mo ago
  So these nations are at war, but the ground troops aren't invading in foot? Instead, they're in barracks or never raised to begin with? What relevance could this have to the quote from Gattling? Probably none at all.
  - orbital-decay 8mo ago
    Probably the same relevance as the type of war you're referring to (asymmetrical strike exchange). The war of conquest between countries of comparable population and military power Gatling referred to still needs a lot more people on the ground doing the actual takeover part.
    - closewith 8mo ago
      Nearly there! So how might a global and region powers engage in a war without engaging in territorial invasion? What kind of advancement might allow such a conflict to take place with only a tiny number of combatants?

Aerolfos 8mo ago

> and 99 of them send him to the battlefield by himself, saying "good luck buddy, let us know how it works out?" >The army was going to be reduced by a factor of 100, and two tiny armies were going to face off while the majority of men of fighting age were going to sit at home and paint landscape paintings? Really? Well, for a time greek city states did fight pretty much like this. Small armies of hoplites were raised outside harvest season, went out, fought almost show-battles with very few casualties, and tribute changed hands based on the results. Everyone went home for the harvest. I believe there's even instances where a battle wasn't fought at all in favour of two appointed champions dueling (origin of the popular fiction trope) It didn't last, but for a time the greek city states had a kind of equilibrium with relatively few resources (or people) spent on war.

AllegedAlec 8mo ago
> Well, for a time greek city states did fight pretty much like this. Small armies of hoplites were raised outside harvest season, went out, fought almost show-battles with very few casualties, and tribute changed hands based on the results. Everyone went home for the harvest. This is a view held by a small group, but is in no way the accepted view of it for historians. See the link for a blogpost of a military historian talking about the orthodox and heterodox schools of thought on this. https://acoup.blog/2025/11/14/collections-hoplite-wars-part-i-the-othismos-over-othismos/ https://acoup.blog/2025/11/14/collections-hoplite-wars-part-...