discipline posted:the capital class has gutted the US military and replaced them with mercenaries that go to foreign countries to pay and train locals to kill one another as contras to create great vacuums of population around resource rich areas, creating the greatest displacement of people due to violence in recorded history. then they will import the poor to work the rigs, huddled in forts against the roving contra hordes outside. russia and china are trying to hold the line but we are all about to be annihilated. I'm moving to south america. viva la lucha.
I dont particularly want to be annihilated but what choice do I have
discipline posted:gutted the US military
um
RedMaistre posted:Have you read Geopolitical Economy: After US Hegemony, Globalization, and Empire by Radhika Desai, discipline? You may find it interesting, and perhaps even comforting, to read at the present conjunction.
i met her briefly the other day, she seems nice. 
HenryKrinkle posted:discipline posted:gutted the US military
um
As I have said before, the decline America's ability and willingness to engage in conventional projections of force abroad is one of the more positive signs of the time.
NoFreeWill posted:places that don't look bad on the global drought map and have nice fascist governments
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/dimitrov/works/1935/08_02.htm
RedMaistre posted:HenryKrinkle posted:discipline posted:gutted the US military
um
As I have said before, the decline America's ability and willingness to engage in conventional projections of force abroad is one of the more positive signs of the time.
yeah, it'll make it easier for Europe to finally expel the military occupation, throw off its economic and political shackles and reassert control over the ancestral lands of its indigenous peoples
swirlsofhistory posted:RedMaistre posted:HenryKrinkle posted:discipline posted:gutted the US military
um
As I have said before, the decline America's ability and willingness to engage in conventional projections of force abroad is one of the more positive signs of the time.
yeah, it'll make it easier for Europe to finally expel the military occupation, throw off its economic and political shackles and reassert control over the ancestral lands of its indigenous peoples
If the Western Europeon nations decide to follow the path of De Gaulle further than De Gaulle himself ever went, good for them. Because as the General himself realized, Europe can not stand up without greater co-operation with Moscow and greater outreach to the Global South. The more that it seeks to achieve greater autonomy from Washington, the closer it will be drawn to its fellow neighbors on the World Island by the ties of commerce and a shared need for a continental peace which the Atlantic empire not only does not provide, but actively undermines.
Germany seems to realize that even now, to a certain extant.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/09/12/us-mideast-crisis-syria-germany-idUSKCN0RC0LM20150912
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/09/resolving-ukraine-conflict-150913050855537.html
HenryKrinkle posted:https://www.cia.gov/library/reports/general-reports-1/Demo_Trends_For_Web.pdf
i killed myself around page 66
RedMaistre posted:HenryKrinkle posted:discipline posted:gutted the US military
um
As I have said before, the decline America's ability and willingness to engage in conventional projections of force abroad is one of the more positive signs of the time.
i was objecting to the notion that the US military was somehow "gutted" in terms of finance and capability, which is ridiculous. if that's not what discipline was saying then i apologize for misinterpreting.
http://breakingdefense.com/2015/07/army-details-cuts-alaska-georgia-texas-hit-hardest/
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/07/07/army-plans-to-cut-40000-troops/29826423/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lt-gen-clarence-e-mcknight-jr-/military-cutbacks_b_8048414.html
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/hagel-propose-downsizing-army-smallest-size-decades/
...part of the whole general transition away from "labor intensive" soldiering that has been at work since Vietnam (arguably since Korea).
“What concerns me the most is really that we’ll engage in wishful thinking that’s motivated mainly by budget constraints,” (McMaster) said. “You get the army that the people are wiling to pay for in a democracy, and it’s our job to do our best with it.”
The “wishful thinking” that McMaster fears is what he calls “four fallacies” about future conflicts that promise “easy solutions”:
“The return of the revolution in military affairs,” a theory thought discredited in Iraq — “it’s like a vampire,” he said — with its promise that long-range sensors and precision strikes will let air and sea forces win wars cleanly and bloodlessly (for us) on their own.
“The Zero Dark Thirty fallacy” that we can solve our problems almost bloodlessly with Special Operations raids, “something akin to a global swat team to go after enemy leaders.”
What might be called the Mali Fallacy (my words, not his) that we can rely on allies and local surrogates to do the fighting on the ground while the US provides advisors and high-tech support.
The problem here, of course, is that it’s awfully hard to make the case that we are likely to wage another large-scale, long-duration ground war any time soon. No one wants to do it, the Army included, but many Americans don’t even want to think about it, and many more don’t want to pay for the capabilities required to do it. And while the Army provides a wide array of capabilities for operations ranging from advising to disaster relief to missile defense, its crucial — and costly — contribution to the national defense is the sheer size and staying power it provides for major war.
“There are political reasons behind many of the fallacies that H.R. McMaster put on the table,” said Brookings scholar William Galston, a former Marine who now specializes in domestic politics. “The worst phrase in American politics right now is ‘boots on the ground.'”
The current mood reminds Galston of the years just after Vietnam, when “it took us the better part of a decade to get over the psychological and political consequences,” he said. (And at least then we had an obvious Soviet threat to justify a large land force). Whatever eternal verities military theory might hold about the decisive role of land power, he said, “realistic thinking about our defense future ought to take the sentiments of the American people into account....
http://breakingdefense.com/2014/02/the-army-force-cuts-3-truths-4-fallacies/
Edited by RedMaistre ()
discipline posted:the capital class has gutted the US military
c_man posted:getting rid of conscription was probably the biggest blow against the antiwar movement
even if this were true there's still the separate argument that forcing people (who can't afford to go to college or bribe a doctor) to kill for imperialism is kind of appalling on its own. i mean of course we would all like to see no one killing for imperialism but forcing people into it isn't an ethical way to change minds and i doubt it really would have emboldened the antiwar movement enough to make a difference on policy.
...and if people were protesting the war solely because of the draft they probably weren't great comrades to begin with.
HenryKrinkle posted:c_man posted:getting rid of conscription was probably the biggest blow against the antiwar movement
even if this were true there's still the separate argument that forcing people (who can't afford to go to college or bribe a doctor) to kill for imperialism is kind of appalling on its own. i mean of course we would all like to see no one killing for imperialism but forcing people into it isn't an ethical way to change minds and i doubt it really would have emboldened the antiwar movement enough to make a difference on policy.
...and if people were protesting the war solely because of the draft they probably weren't great comrades to begin with.
it wasn't so much "protesting the war" as "refusing to fight or obey orders" and "shooting their own officers" that was a function of the draft
HenryKrinkle posted:c_man posted:getting rid of conscription was probably the biggest blow against the antiwar movement
even if this were true there's still the separate argument that forcing people (who can't afford to go to college or bribe a doctor) to kill for imperialism is kind of appalling on its own. i mean of course we would all like to see no one killing for imperialism but forcing people into it isn't an ethical way to change minds and i doubt it really would have emboldened the antiwar movement enough to make a difference on policy.
...and if people were protesting the war solely because of the draft they probably weren't great comrades to begin with.
yeah i basically agree but idk what you're going for here. im not making an argument for bringing back conscription if that's what you think. i just think its pretty clear that the liberal arm of the anti-war movement, that is, the part that gets the most media play and has the most direct influence on the actual activity of the government, draws lots of support from veterans affairs and US casualties. they're not reliable precisely because they fall off the more asymmetrical the losses are.
discipline posted:can I pay you to house my cat for a few weeks
Is it friendly with other cats? I can ask my ppl. My number's the same. Hold a cadre bruncheon in my building before u go, I got a projector & shit
swampman posted:I got a projector & shit
catchphrase
