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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (135173)	6/1/2004 4:54:59 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

That way, only those who want the job take it, the price is as cheap as can be had, the right quality people to do the job are found, nobody is forced to kill or be killed. What do you think? Nobel Prize for me for such an invention? Why not just take it to the next level and divide people up into citizens, and non-citizens... Citizens being those who have served in the military and the only ones who have earned the right to vote because they have actually fought for and defended the nation? Heinlein would agree.. Hawk

To: Maurice Winn who wrote (135173)	6/1/2004 5:32:05 PM
From: Jacob Snyder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

<The way it works is that people who want a service, such as defense of freedom, offer money to potential suppliers.> Oddly, I find myself more in agreement with Hawk than you. Your method works for providing most services, by not for this one. Let me give you a historical example: In the Roman Republic, early on, the inhabitants where mostly small farmers, free men who owned their own land. There was no standing army. When the Republic was threatened, the citizen-farmers had the obligation, as a civic duty, to defend the Republic by arms. All citizens were, by definition, potential soldiers. The army could not oppress the citizens, because the army was the citizens. As the Republic became corrupted and rich, and eventually an Empire, they evolved a system exactly as you propose. The small citizen-farmer class was gone, replaced by a slave economy, an urban lumpen proletariat, and a tiny elite who held all wealth and power. At first, wars were short, and close to Rome, so soldiers weren't paid. Or, rather, they were paid, with their freedom. Then, as the Empire needed huge standing armies far from Rome, the army became a professional class of paid life-time soldiers. And who were they? Often, they were barbarians, people who had only been very superficially Romanized. They were not the BestAndBrightest. Their interests and culture diverged from that of the Roman citizens. The Roman army, for the last several centuries, served the Roman elite, or served themselves. They destroyed freedom, rather than defending it. Hawk has it right. The defense of freedom is a universal obligation of citizenship, in a democracy. Shirk that duty, and someone will take your freedom away. So: 1. The only person who can be depended on, to defend your freedom, is you. 2. If you subcontract this work out, you have created a mercenary army who will inevitably oppress you. 3. You have replaced "Give me liberty, or give me death" with "What's the going rate, for people willing to die to maintain my life-style?"