04-02-2017, 02:46 PM
(04-02-2017, 01:09 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:(04-01-2017, 07:52 PM)Ragnarök_62 Wrote: Like the title sez, the US spends way too much on the MIC.
Looking at this pic, I advocate cutting the MIC spending by 2/3's. That's about 400 million that can be put to way better use.
On the other hand, looking at total military personnel including reserves and paramilitary, the US has only the seventh largest military in the world.
The truth is somewhere in between.
![[Image: largest-defense-budgets.png]](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5848c7efc534a569f5f24890/t/58b6c21f17bffc4933391626/1488372255423/largest-defense-budgets.png)
We have a capital-intense military. We prefer cannons to cannon-fodder, so to speak. We far prefer inflicting casualties to taking them. That's what one expects in First World countries, the worst countries to face in major wars. Think of Finland in the Second World War -- the Finns achieved a 30-1 kill-to-loss ratio against the Soviet Union, a country still preferring cannon fodder to capital.
Poorer countries can simply give a rifle to infantry and tell the infantry to keep firing until commanded to cease firing once the war starts. Very often the infantrymen end up being killed before they get any order to cease firing. Such is the reality of All Quiet on the Western Front, a reality that none of the participants of the "Great" War of a century ago want to endure again.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.