[quote]Scrotus wrote:
ephrem wrote:
…lol @ thread!
Fuck you i was going for a three peat you son of a bitch[/quote]
Ha!
Ten in a row.
Timing is everything.
[quote]Chushin wrote:
orion wrote:
Well, Gentlemen, now that we have gone over my lack of logic, my personal shortcomings and terrible emotional scarring due to my origin, could we discuss the topic at hand, which is:
What constitutes a great army and, bonus points, what role should or does it play in a free society.
I am sure that men like you, not being weighed down by the intellectual and emotional shackles I must bear, will soar above me and at least inspire me with their intellectual achievements and the power of their arguments, even if I should not always be able to follow the meaning of their enlightened deliberations.
Christ, even I’M feeling sorry for you and your anti-US- based delusions. Granted you’re a pretty smart guy, but you are also quite obviously blinded by your brainwashed-in, hateful biases.
So, allow me to take a stab, in my own sophomoric way, at your question:
What constitutes a great army is the ability (preferably PROVEN, not imagined) to SUCCESSFULLY utilize force to achieve missions and goals assigned to it by its ultimate leadership (e.g, the citizenry).
Knowing you, I’ll now prepare for some smart-assed, arrogant response…
[/quote]
So if the Swiss Army achieved its mission to deter any attack on Swiss soil for centuries now, except for an unfortunate slip during the Napoleonic wars, how is it not a great army?
There is also the question why the US army, which has a far worse record when it comes to your definition, is perceived to be “greater”.
So according to you an army is a neutral tool, a hammer is a hammer, no matter who swings it.
So the next question would be how an armies “greatness” can lie outside of its control.
The Wehrmacht f.e. was a formidable army, very likely the best equipped and trained fighting force of its time, at least in the beginning and yet, how could they have achieved what was demanded of them?
[quote]Chushin wrote:
300andabove wrote:
Can i just add, PLEASE PLEASE do not take this guys take on the worlds great armies or the US in general as to what Europeans think about the US.
Unfortunately we have ALOT of socialism here, where people seem to equate power with badness.
And Orion if you are from Austria do you not owe your ability to speak freely to the country you seem hell bent on critisising ?
As i said before, why Britian/US ever bother trying to help people is fucking beyond me let mainland Europe destroy themselves, i like this island just bloody fine.
And if i get bored ill go to the US and have a fun time with them.
Much appreciated.[/quote]
You appreciate his rejection of my “socialist rejection of power!?!”
State power in this context, no less.
Oh Lord Jesus.
[quote]DrSkeptix wrote:
pushharder wrote:
msd0060 wrote:
The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality.
Nice post.
Orion, you so desperately want to be perceived here as an intellectual heavyweight but this thread proves you fail so miserably. Your logic and reasoning capabilities are seriously flawed and you’re getting your ass spanked grandly but you keep on flailing.
In that regard I hereby nominate you as the central European version of Lixy - a whiny little America-bashing bitch. So jaded that you actually have delusions of the Swiss Army being the greatest armed service ever. You actually deserve more pity than contempt.
Second the nomination.
Without the need to leave the depths of his bat-cave, 300 meters beneath the despised American Embassy, he has finished his revised history of the Navaho, is rewriting the biography of Lincoln–without reading a single reference!–and he has knows better than the German General Staff in 1938 the entire military situation in Czechoslovakia! He is near completion on his thesis by which the gold standard is to be re-established, all the better for us peasants to trade for Austria’s chief products, lederhosen and cookoo clocks. And in one more gratuitous attempt to insult the USA, who better than Orion to lecture us on the illusory prowess of the Swiss Army?
Hmmm…maybe more contempt than pity. Contempt is earned.[/quote]
There is the point that the general staff of the Wehrmacht actually was wrong, because when the Wehrmacht entered the Sudetenland they were greeted with flowers.
Then, the thesis you mentioned was pretty much written by Hajek, he received a Nobel price for it in 1974 .
The history of Lincoln needs no rewriting, you could look up his own words if you wanted to, regarding the secession of Texas
and his deal to uphold slavery to save the Union.
And, yes, finally, your idea of what we export is also completely wrong.
How does it feel to make so many factual errors that could easily be checked in one post? I mean, to yell your own ignorance from the mountaintops like that, are you even capable of embarrassment?
PS: But since you are probably not stupid, only ignorant, her is an ability to learn:
The ability to kill and destroy the enemy on any number of battlefields, around the world, would be a better measure of an army’s greatness.
Switzerland’s army does little to nothing. You might say it’s a great thing that their political system and conduct of international relations ENABLES the army to function in this way. (arguments against this too) But that has nothing to do with the ‘greatness’ of army. How do you measure the sucess of an army that doesn’t ever go into battle or military missions?
[quote]orion wrote:
Chushin wrote:
orion wrote:
Well, Gentlemen, now that we have gone over my lack of logic, my personal shortcomings and terrible emotional scarring due to my origin, could we discuss the topic at hand, which is:
What constitutes a great army and, bonus points, what role should or does it play in a free society.
I am sure that men like you, not being weighed down by the intellectual and emotional shackles I must bear, will soar above me and at least inspire me with their intellectual achievements and the power of their arguments, even if I should not always be able to follow the meaning of their enlightened deliberations.
Christ, even I’M feeling sorry for you and your anti-US- based delusions. Granted you’re a pretty smart guy, but you are also quite obviously blinded by your brainwashed-in, hateful biases.
So, allow me to take a stab, in my own sophomoric way, at your question:
What constitutes a great army is the ability (preferably PROVEN, not imagined) to SUCCESSFULLY utilize force to achieve missions and goals assigned to it by its ultimate leadership (e.g, the citizenry).
Knowing you, I’ll now prepare for some smart-assed, arrogant response…
So if the Swiss Army achieved its mission to deter any attack on Swiss soil for centuries now, except for an unfortunate slip during the Napoleonic wars, how is it not a great army?
[/quote]
What earnest attacks on Swiss soil were mounted? I’m asking. I don’t really know. But I suspect very few. Seems to me that it was Switzerland’s conduct of politics and international relations that kept it safe. Not a powerful army that succesfully combatted enemies.
[quote]jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
Chushin wrote:
orion wrote:
Well, Gentlemen, now that we have gone over my lack of logic, my personal shortcomings and terrible emotional scarring due to my origin, could we discuss the topic at hand, which is:
What constitutes a great army and, bonus points, what role should or does it play in a free society.
I am sure that men like you, not being weighed down by the intellectual and emotional shackles I must bear, will soar above me and at least inspire me with their intellectual achievements and the power of their arguments, even if I should not always be able to follow the meaning of their enlightened deliberations.
Christ, even I’M feeling sorry for you and your anti-US- based delusions. Granted you’re a pretty smart guy, but you are also quite obviously blinded by your brainwashed-in, hateful biases.
So, allow me to take a stab, in my own sophomoric way, at your question:
What constitutes a great army is the ability (preferably PROVEN, not imagined) to SUCCESSFULLY utilize force to achieve missions and goals assigned to it by its ultimate leadership (e.g, the citizenry).
Knowing you, I’ll now prepare for some smart-assed, arrogant response…
So if the Swiss Army achieved its mission to deter any attack on Swiss soil for centuries now, except for an unfortunate slip during the Napoleonic wars, how is it not a great army?
What earnest attacks on Swiss soil were mounted? I’m asking. I don’t really know. But I suspect very few. Seems to me that it was Switzerland’s conduct of politics and international relations that kept it safe. Not a powerful army that succesfully combatted enemies.[/quote]
But I have seen it posted quite often that it was Bush´s heroic administration that prevented a second 9-11.
Regardless what I think of that claim, why can´t the same people posting this not accept that the same yardstick could also be applied to the Swiss armed century who managed to avoid an attack for centuries?
Also, Germany overran Europe, with the exception of Switzerland. It could not have been her neutral status, because other neutral countries were conquered in weeks, if not days.
[quote]orion wrote:
DrSkeptix wrote:
pushharder wrote:
msd0060 wrote:
The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality.
Nice post.
Orion, you so desperately want to be perceived here as an intellectual heavyweight but this thread proves you fail so miserably. Your logic and reasoning capabilities are seriously flawed and you’re getting your ass spanked grandly but you keep on flailing.
In that regard I hereby nominate you as the central European version of Lixy - a whiny little America-bashing bitch. So jaded that you actually have delusions of the Swiss Army being the greatest armed service ever. You actually deserve more pity than contempt.
Second the nomination.
Without the need to leave the depths of his bat-cave, 300 meters beneath the despised American Embassy, he has finished his revised history of the Navaho, is rewriting the biography of Lincoln–without reading a single reference!–and he has knows better than the German General Staff in 1938 the entire military situation in Czechoslovakia! He is near completion on his thesis by which the gold standard is to be re-established, all the better for us peasants to trade for Austria’s chief products, lederhosen and cookoo clocks. And in one more gratuitous attempt to insult the USA, who better than Orion to lecture us on the illusory prowess of the Swiss Army?
Hmmm…maybe more contempt than pity. Contempt is earned.
There is the point that the general staff of the Wehrmacht actually was wrong, because when the Wehrmacht entered the Sudetenland they were greeted with flowers.
Then, the thesis you mentioned was pretty much written by Hajek, he received a Nobel price for it in 1974 .
The history of Lincoln needs no rewriting, you could look up his own words if you wanted to, regarding the secession of Texas
and his deal to uphold slavery to save the Union.
And, yes, finally, your idea of what we export is also completely wrong.
How does it feel to make so many factual errors that could easily be checked in one post? I mean, to yell your own ignorance from the mountaintops like that, are you even capable of embarrassment?
PS: But since you are probably not stupid, only ignorant, her is an ability to learn:
[/quote]
Grateful for the Nobel reference. And when are you packing your tux for Stockholm?
Let’s see, regarding the Wehrmacht: if they were greeted with flowers, it was only after the forced capitulation of Cz. Had there ben no capitulation at Munich, Halder et al. may have been absolutely correct in their estimate of Cz 's might relative to the Wehrmach. No, sorry, Orion they were right and history is there and no, sorry, you are wrong.
Oh, never mind. There is no point in correcting your distortions.
To try to explain the joke to its object is pointless.
Send me a signed copy of your history of the Navahos…
[quote]orion wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
orion wrote:
Chushin wrote:
orion wrote:
Well, Gentlemen, now that we have gone over my lack of logic, my personal shortcomings and terrible emotional scarring due to my origin, could we discuss the topic at hand, which is:
What constitutes a great army and, bonus points, what role should or does it play in a free society.
I am sure that men like you, not being weighed down by the intellectual and emotional shackles I must bear, will soar above me and at least inspire me with their intellectual achievements and the power of their arguments, even if I should not always be able to follow the meaning of their enlightened deliberations.
Christ, even I’M feeling sorry for you and your anti-US- based delusions. Granted you’re a pretty smart guy, but you are also quite obviously blinded by your brainwashed-in, hateful biases.
So, allow me to take a stab, in my own sophomoric way, at your question:
What constitutes a great army is the ability (preferably PROVEN, not imagined) to SUCCESSFULLY utilize force to achieve missions and goals assigned to it by its ultimate leadership (e.g, the citizenry).
Knowing you, I’ll now prepare for some smart-assed, arrogant response…
So if the Swiss Army achieved its mission to deter any attack on Swiss soil for centuries now, except for an unfortunate slip during the Napoleonic wars, how is it not a great army?
What earnest attacks on Swiss soil were mounted? I’m asking. I don’t really know. But I suspect very few. Seems to me that it was Switzerland’s conduct of politics and international relations that kept it safe. Not a powerful army that succesfully combatted enemies.
But I have seen it posted quite often that it was Bush´s heroic administration that prevented a second 9-11.
Regardless what I think of that claim, why can´t the same people posting this not accept that the same yardstick could also be applied to the Swiss armed century who managed to avoid an attack for centuries?
Also, Germany overran Europe, with the exception of Switzerland. It could not have been her neutral status, because other neutral countries were conquered in weeks, if not days.[/quote]
Bush’s administration’s prevention of further attacks (assuming you accept that proposition) has noting to do with the might of the U.S. armed forces either. Our intelligence and counter-terrorism units, yes. If preventing attacks is the yardstick you want to go by, say Switzerland has the greatest GOVERNMENT. This has no bearing on the might of the army.
An army is either measured by successful military conquest OR top-notch defense against relentless attacks of the nation. The government’s success in avoiding either does not mean the army did anything.
Maybe if you posted something about how the army ITSELF avoided attack or defended the country against onslaughts, you’d have a point.
Napoleonic era
In 1798 the armies of the French Revolution conquered Switzerland and imposed a new unified constitution. This centralised the government of the country and effectively abolished the cantons. The new regime, known as the Helvetic Republic, was highly unpopular. It had been imposed by a foreign invading army and destroyed centuries of tradition, making Switzerland nothing more than a French satellite state. The fierce French suppression of the Nidwalden Revolt in September of 1798 is an example of the suppressing presence of the French army and the local population’s resistance to the occupation.
When war broke out between France and its rivals, Russian and Austrian forces invaded Switzerland. In 1803 Napoleon organised a meeting of the leading Swiss politicians from both sides in Paris. The result was the Act of Mediation which largely restored Swiss autonomy and introduced a Confederation of 19 cantons. Henceforth much of Swiss politics would concern balancing the cantons’ tradition of self-rule with the need for a central government.
In 1815 the Congress of Vienna fully re-established Swiss independence and the European powers agreed to permanently recognise Swiss neutrality. The treaty marked the last time that Switzerland fought in an international conflict. The treaty also allowed Switzerland to increase its territory, with the admission of the cantons of Valais, Neuchâtel and Geneva ? this was also the last time Switzerland’s territory expanded.
The portion above is from Wikipedia.
As for the first world war, there are different reasons from different sources main one I had seen was that the country was split on their support. The French speaking regions supported France, and the German speaking regions of course supported Germany. Nothing about invinciblity here, just trying to prevent their own country from falling apart. For WWII, there were many reason’s too, and the domestic reason they stayed out of the first world war is the same, but with them having an Italian speaking region, I’m sure they were even more worried about the country falling apart.
It is well known that there were plans to invade Switerland, but they weren’t really an important target with nothing to offer. They weren’t part of the Allies, so of course the Allied countries were more important targets, also Germany had occupied much of Europe and if was successful against the Allies, the Swiss would have been invaded and easily defeated. Plus, It is known that the Swiss government was paying the Germans to not invade them.
It also seems that they follow the neutrality agreement from the treaty fully only because they are a small country that would be stupid to try and start fights with a neighboring country on their own, and even if they were attacked they’d get walked over by just about anyone know matter how well they think they can defend themselves.
George Washington once said that the government that governs best is the one that governs least.
In that same spirit, I would postulate that the greatest army for a free republic is one that can never be used as a tool of oppression against the populace at large.
Switzerland has one of those, because… wait for it… the populace at large is the army.
Is the “unlimited power of the sword” in the hands of the people, as Tench Coxe trusted in God that it would ever remain?
Or is it in the hands of somebody else?
(Edited: Thomas Paine, not George Washington. Duh)
[quote]DrSkeptix wrote:
orion wrote:
DrSkeptix wrote:
pushharder wrote:
msd0060 wrote:
The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality.
Nice post.
Orion, you so desperately want to be perceived here as an intellectual heavyweight but this thread proves you fail so miserably. Your logic and reasoning capabilities are seriously flawed and you’re getting your ass spanked grandly but you keep on flailing.
In that regard I hereby nominate you as the central European version of Lixy - a whiny little America-bashing bitch. So jaded that you actually have delusions of the Swiss Army being the greatest armed service ever. You actually deserve more pity than contempt.
Second the nomination.
Without the need to leave the depths of his bat-cave, 300 meters beneath the despised American Embassy, he has finished his revised history of the Navaho, is rewriting the biography of Lincoln–without reading a single reference!–and he has knows better than the German General Staff in 1938 the entire military situation in Czechoslovakia! He is near completion on his thesis by which the gold standard is to be re-established, all the better for us peasants to trade for Austria’s chief products, lederhosen and cookoo clocks. And in one more gratuitous attempt to insult the USA, who better than Orion to lecture us on the illusory prowess of the Swiss Army?
Hmmm…maybe more contempt than pity. Contempt is earned.
There is the point that the general staff of the Wehrmacht actually was wrong, because when the Wehrmacht entered the Sudetenland they were greeted with flowers.
Then, the thesis you mentioned was pretty much written by Hajek, he received a Nobel price for it in 1974 .
The history of Lincoln needs no rewriting, you could look up his own words if you wanted to, regarding the secession of Texas
and his deal to uphold slavery to save the Union.
And, yes, finally, your idea of what we export is also completely wrong.
How does it feel to make so many factual errors that could easily be checked in one post? I mean, to yell your own ignorance from the mountaintops like that, are you even capable of embarrassment?
PS: But since you are probably not stupid, only ignorant, her is an ability to learn:
Grateful for the Nobel reference. And when are you packing your tux for Stockholm?
Let’s see, regarding the Wehrmacht: if they were greeted with flowers, it was only after the forced capitulation of Cz. Had there ben no capitulation at Munich, Halder et al. may have been absolutely correct in their estimate of Cz 's might relative to the Wehrmach. No, sorry, Orion they were right and history is there and no, sorry, you are wrong.
Oh, never mind. There is no point in correcting your distortions.
To try to explain the joke to its object is pointless.
Send me a signed copy of your history of the Navahos…[/quote]
Did I not write regarding that topic that CZ´s “might” was irrelevant since it was a divided country with a large, geographically unified German population?
A population that lived in the very same area that you feel could have been defended against the Germans, on German territory by a nation that was yet again divided between Slovaks and Czechs.
They had absolutely no will to fight.
Zero, zilch, nada.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
George Washington once said that the government that governs best is the one that governs least.
In that same spirit, I would postulate that the greatest army for a free republic is one that can never be used as a tool of oppression against the populace at large.
Switzerland has one of those, because… wait for it… the populace at large is the army.
Is the “unlimited power of the sword” in the hands of the people, as Tench Coxe trusted in God that it would ever remain?
Or is it in the hands of somebody else?
[/quote]
I think that Heinlein was not too far off in Starship Troopers.
On the one hand I think conscription is an abomination, on the other hand a citizen soldier is probably the ideal solution for a republic.
Alas, how to combine the two in an universal democracy where the temptation to have free ride is just too great?
Conscript armies make wars of aggression harder and yet are a form of slavery, voluntary armies are nor a form of slavery and allow for elite specialists and yet can easily be used for all kinds of military adventures and tend to turn on their own civilian population sooner or later.
[quote]orion wrote:
I think that Heinlein was not too far off in Starship Troopers.
On the one hand I think conscription is an abomination, on the other hand a citizen soldier is probably the ideal solution for a republic.
Alas, how to combine the two in an universal democracy where the temptation to have free ride is just too great?
Conscript armies make wars of aggression harder and yet are a form of slavery, voluntary armies are nor a form of slavery and allow for elite specialists and yet can easily be used for all kinds of military adventures and tend to turn on their own civilian population sooner or later.
[/quote]
Heinlein trusted neither in conscription nor in “universal democracy.”
The citizen army that he envisioned in Starship Troopers was composed entirely of volunteers. Nobody conscripted them, and nobody compelled them to stay. They could quit anytime they wanted, even two seconds before a drop, and the only penalty they would receive would be that they would never be eligible to vote.
That’s another important point: there would be no “citizen-soldiers.” One can’t attain citizenship until after completion of military (or other) service, so one is either a soldier, or a citizen, or neither.
Mobile Infantry training was also designed to weed out the psychopathic and sociopathic thugs that a dictator would need if he wanted a tool of oppression. I think a would-be tyrant armed with a Heinleinian army would find his tool dissolving before it was able to herd a single civilian into the re-education camps.
The Heinleinlian idea isn’t bad, but ich vorziehe das schweizer Modell.
[quote]Varqanir wrote:
orion wrote:
I think that Heinlein was not too far off in Starship Troopers.
On the one hand I think conscription is an abomination, on the other hand a citizen soldier is probably the ideal solution for a republic.
Alas, how to combine the two in an universal democracy where the temptation to have free ride is just too great?
Conscript armies make wars of aggression harder and yet are a form of slavery, voluntary armies are nor a form of slavery and allow for elite specialists and yet can easily be used for all kinds of military adventures and tend to turn on their own civilian population sooner or later.
Heinlein trusted neither in conscription nor in “universal democracy.”
The citizen army that he envisioned in Starship Troopers was composed entirely of volunteers. Nobody conscripted them, and nobody compelled them to stay. They could quit anytime they wanted, even two seconds before a drop, and the only penalty they would receive would be that they would never be eligible to vote.
That’s another important point: there would be no “citizen-soldiers.” One can’t attain citizenship until after completion of military (or other) service, so one is either a soldier, or a citizen, or neither.
Mobile Infantry training was also designed to weed out the psychopathic and sociopathic thugs that a dictator would need if he wanted a tool of oppression. I think a would-be tyrant armed with a Heinleinian army would find his tool dissolving before it was able to herd a single civilian into the re-education camps.
The Heinleinlian idea isn’t bad, but ich vorziehe das schweizer Modell.[/quote]
That however means conscription. To force someone in to an army because you think it would be best for “society”.
While I would actually agree in this specific case I hold no love for this line of thinking.
I think the “if you are not prepared to fight for your country you ought not to vote” approach is best, but there is no way way to get this done in a democracy where everybody is allowed to vote on this issue.
[quote]orion wrote:
That however means conscription. To force someone in to an army because you think it would be best for “society”.
While I would actually agree in this specific case I hold no love for this line of thinking.
I think the “if you are not prepared to fight for your country you ought not to vote” approach is best, but there is no way way to get this done in a democracy where everybody is allowed to vote on this issue.
[/quote]
The Swiss have chosen to conscript themselves for the last 500 years.
One would think that if they ever felt oppressed by the “slavery” of conscription into the militia, they would have voted to end the practice long ago.
There is also the case of the Roman Republic:
While it lasted, they often had inexperienced leaders that wasted the lives of Roman soldiers.
Marius reforms, and his example to be made consul over and over and over again made the army much more professional and arguably more successful, “greater” if you will, and yet that probably was one of the nails in the Republic´s coffin.
So, what good did the “better” army do to Rome, and would they not have been better off in the long run by an army that was not so “great” but merely adequate?