Just because Nazi's and Communists are no longer a threat doesn't mean there isn't a need for a large standing army. History has taught us that even during peaceful times there's always the threat of danger and I for one would rather be prepared than caught with our pants down.Uzique wrote:
i would rather axe the entire military budget, save for the necessary nuke/missile infrastructure, and put all the money into policing. and i hate police. but at least they have some direct, tangible benefit. the military? oh yeah, great, nice to know we have this HUGELY EXPENSIVE army sitting there in case ze germans get any funny ideas about the fourteenth reich.
So pretty much the case is 'out of sight, out of mind' for you. The military are on some distant base out of your personal line of sight so they don't exist, and the benefits they provide are thus invisible. And again, by arguing in favor of missiles and nukes, but against those you deem useless grunts, you are still accepting the fact that the military does provide benefits, even if they are intangible. But again, thanks for providing your expert opinion on national defense and how large of a military your nation (oh, and mine too) requires. Thanks.Uzique wrote:
no, cops make me feel safe at night because they're on the patrol, walking the beat, every day. they're paid to do a civil protection job and to keep the peace. a massive standing army of trained soldiers do not make me feel safe at night. they make me feel nothing. you vastly over-estimate the perceived 'benefit' of having a huge army. in any nation outside of the US of A, viz. any nation that isn't afraid of communists still invading or the chinese doing an operation d-day on the coasts of california, nothing feels 'safer' because they have an army. the police provide overt protection, in an every-day civilian and casual way, and that justifies their cost. they fight crime. they patrol the streets. they resolve disputes. what do the army do? sit in barracks costing a fortune, rarely ever deployed for a civil matter-- and when they are, people are MORE worried, not more safe, because they know the people that are enforcing the law on the streets are trained-to-kill, not employed to protect-and-serve.
i would rather axe the entire military budget, save for the necessary nuke/missile infrastructure, and put all the money into policing. and i hate police. but at least they have some direct, tangible benefit. the military? oh yeah, great, nice to know we have this HUGELY EXPENSIVE army sitting there in case ze germans get any funny ideas about the fourteenth reich.
Have you ever read Brave New World? Because that's essentially the world you would have to create in order to make communism work. You would have to override every aspect of human nature, from emotions like jealousy and anger, to survival instincts that separate us from lemmings irrationally going over a cliff together.Jenspm wrote:
I think you're missing my point completely. I'm saying that communism doesn't work in our modern society because people are greedy. Just look at what you're saying: "I wouldn't work". Neither would a lot of people, and me too, because we're all driven towards an idea were little work at high pay is the ideal. If we can get away from working for our money, we do so. Just look at the amount of people who cheat on their taxes.Jay wrote:
Greed? How about fairness? How about I keep what I earn? Why is it noble for me to work harder than the man next to me but receive an equal reward? Motivate me to continue working harder than him. Motivate me to work even at a fraction of what he is doing if it means that I still receive the same reward. Solve that, and you can have your utopia. Good luck.Jenspm wrote:
I think that's because you are born and bred in a capitalist society that promotes greed. Doesn't mean it's the only society that can ever work.
However, that's not to say that that is how we work by nature. Which is my point. 'Communism wouldn't work because I wouldn't work under communism' is a weak argument, because you're only seeing it form your current perspective in a current context.waheeey, excellent argument, bro. It's not even remotely relevant, but I still feel the need to correct it: my parents are paying nothing for my degree, the university is not private, but very much public, and oh no foreign country scary shit fuck.Jay wrote:
And coming from a rich kid whose parents are paying for him to attend a private university in a foreign country... that's too funny.
Oh, he whipped out the 'galt', he's really frustrated now. You and Macbeth are so cute.Uzique wrote:
galt it's really pointless arguing with you over the military's use because it is already well-documented here that you are just one big ball of hypocrisy and personal contradiction on the matter. hate big government? love the military. hate handouts and people that don't work for what they have? get cheap education cause of previous job. ok ok yeah.
Last edited by Jay (2011-12-05 05:39:27)
'history'? what does that even mean? we're in the late capitalist phase now. multinational capitalism. global capitalism. the global market is of far more importance (and of far more strategic interest) to nations than land-owning, or territory, or any such thing. furthermore, the advanced western powers have almost nil natural resources of a huge value, compared to other relatively powerless areas. nobody is going to invade the united kingdom in a mad scramble for our remaining coal seams, lets just put it that way. people are looking to history and speaking of invasion and the need for armed defense as if its still the 1960's. yo, here's a memo: communism died in europe 20 years ago. the chance of any major land-warfare based on ideology or 'conquest' is nil. everyone is playing the capitalism game now and seeking power through economic means, rather than the old-fashioned military means. capitalism has had three phases: market capitalism, monopoly/imperial capitalism (most of which the last century was), and now late capitalism. people don't throw huge 100,000+ man armies at a neighbour to try and skirmish some new land or some new strategic post anymore. you can make much bigger gains in a much smarter way by, say, securing lucrative contracts in the middle-east, or investing in government-infrastructure projects in africa (look at the chinese). the standing army is an anachronism, a bad hangover from the time when huge parades of marching men was a show of force and power.HudsonFalcon wrote:
Just because Nazi's and Communists are no longer a threat doesn't mean there isn't a need for a large standing army. History has taught us that even during peaceful times there's always the threat of danger and I for one would rather be prepared than caught with our pants down.Uzique wrote:
i would rather axe the entire military budget, save for the necessary nuke/missile infrastructure, and put all the money into policing. and i hate police. but at least they have some direct, tangible benefit. the military? oh yeah, great, nice to know we have this HUGELY EXPENSIVE army sitting there in case ze germans get any funny ideas about the fourteenth reich.
probably because the manifesto is essential reading for any first-year university student, and inevitably a few naive and impressionable ones fall under its utopian charms. keyword utopian.Jay wrote:
Aren't you the son of an oil company executive? Why are you trying to push communism as a valid economic theory?
Last edited by Uzique (2011-12-05 05:43:00)
It's not my lifeblood. I don't even tell people that I was in the military in real life. I either get awkwardness from people who protested the wars, or I get embarrassed by backslapping idiots, or I get stupid questions like 'did you kill anyone?'. More hassle than it's worth.Uzique wrote:
but lol okay, you get riled up and jump down my throat because i'm insulting your life blood. hey man i've already said i'm all down for the military's civil benefits of letting some poor irish son of a dopefiend from the wrong side of boston get into college and leave the pits behind. but that's still indirect benefit, and it's still a waste of money. calm down.
Explain how a nation or group of nations executes coercive diplomacy without a military force.Uzique wrote:
lets be honest here: the only way our military pays for itself is by generating short-term industrial-military production (which benefits big defense corporations and the government pot) and by returning its investment in a roundabout way by opening up new foreign countries (and their resources) to either a) the free-market, western investors and private enterprise and/or b) lucrative government deals and seizures. the military as it is as an organisation, being footed by the taxpayer, is a huge ripoff. no nation needs a standing army of that size for defense thesedays. it's not the middle-ages. furthermore we've all formed massive economic blocs because of the free-market; our neighbours are no longer land-grabbing threats. what the fuck are you afraid of, galt? cuban commandos? russian bombers flying over the artic and parachuting down crack soviet squads with ppsh's and vodka? mexican drug cartels trying to seize some new crack-slinging turf from your government? be real. you're a waste of money.
galt it's really pointless arguing with you over the military's use because it is already well-documented here that you are just one big ball of hypocrisy and personal contradiction on the matter. hate big government? love the military. hate handouts and people that don't work for what they have? get cheap education cause of previous job. ok ok yeah.
It sounds like you have all the answers and you're loved by millions of people from many different faiths and cultures so in that case you have nothing to worry about riding on your mass transit system and flying from your airports. You should have no worries about backpacking into Iran or enjoying the lovely beaches of Somolia. Cheers!Uzique wrote:
i'm sorry but please clarify for me where the enemy is that wants to kill us so badly on multiple fronts. cause i'm sat here in london and i'm not seeing any enemies on any fronts trying to kill me, or hating what i stand for. i'm a bit confused here. and i'm not saying we stockpile nukes - far from it - i'm just saying that missiles and technology, more generally, are a better strategic investment when it comes to defense than keeping all these hundreds of thousands of full-salaried men on 'ready' status indefinitely. any large-scale defensive effort nowadays (which will never even be called upon, but nevermind) will be resolved through technology, not massive land armies. no major power will even invade another using a land army, let alone will the other have to defend themselves using huge ground deployments (which is what we are talking about here - defense, as i must stress to feos). your post really confuses me because it seems to be full of this uniquely american paranoia that there are people out there carving your name into ak-47 bullets. these threats to your homeland security DO NOT EXIST.
Homeland defense isn't the sole purpose of the military. Never has been.Uzique wrote:
explain to me how coercive diplomacy is homeland defense.
have you just missed the discussion? we're debating the use of the military for DEFENSE. jay's "helping you sleep at night" line.FEOS wrote:
Homeland defense isn't the sole purpose of the military. Never has been.Uzique wrote:
explain to me how coercive diplomacy is homeland defense.
You advocate for the dismissal of the military writ large, because there is no threat of invasion.
So answer the question.
Last edited by Uzique (2011-12-05 06:22:48)
Oh, I've read the posts.Uzique wrote:
have you just missed the discussion? we're debating the use of the military for DEFENSE. jay's "helping you sleep at night" line.FEOS wrote:
Homeland defense isn't the sole purpose of the military. Never has been.Uzique wrote:
explain to me how coercive diplomacy is homeland defense.
You advocate for the dismissal of the military writ large, because there is no threat of invasion.
So answer the question.
so i don't have to answer your question at all, fuck off, and read the posts before chiming in with such an arrogant tone.
I think our military is the adequate size for the role we have taken upon ourselves. The way your posts read you'd think we have a military large enough to liberate mainland Europe again.Uzique wrote:
hang on, i said we don't need a military because it's expensive and its traditional roles - that of defense and acquiring power - are both outmoded. we use the market to wield influence and power nowadays, and the threat of ground invasion is nil. your 'refutation' involves us using "coercive diplomacy" to solve other people's problems, which i am not interested in at all.
They are members of NATO and the UN Security Council. They have commitments.Spark wrote:
hardly applies to the uk though.