Defence spending - your opinion wanted!

[Scuby]

I've been asked to consider what influences countries to spend money on defence, and what affects the levels of expenditure.

Now I have lots of ideas, but i'm lacking in ideas for why we shouldn't spend on defence. Obviously there are arguments about priorities, and some may consider education to be more worthy than defence, but apart from the changing priority between other public expenditure, can anyone think of any reasons not to invest in defence?

Now I expect there are some who will consider all military spending to be bad and all should be stopped, but I can't see any logic as to why that should be so.

I don't care about your own position, and really don't want to get into a huge debate about the merits of war vs diplomacy or anything like that, but if anyone does have any suggestions as to why we shouldn't invest in defence i'd be really interested to hear them.

Cheers

David

[SimonK]

Article 12 of the Costa Rican constitution

" The Army as a permanent institution is abolished. There shall be the necessary police forces for surveillance and the preservation of the public order.

Military forces may only be organized under a continental agreement or for the national defense; in either case, they shall always be subordinate to the civil power: they may not deliberate or make statements or representations individually or collectively "

So its seems at least one country dosn't belive in military spending. Of course it may be that thier police force looks remarkably like an army!

Simon

[Paul Oliver]

Hmm Police as Army don't really work as you need to look at an Infantryman's mission (bearing in mind the whole aim of the Army is to get this Infantryman into a position to dominate and hold the battlefield).

"To close with and kill the enemy using his rifle, bayonet and grenades, knowing where to be at what time and with the right equipment and knowing what fire support is available to him."

I don't think the majority of police forces fit this profile and would suggest that any that do are not really the ones we want, ahhh except maybe in some inner city areas

[ahar]

Just trying to work out whether you're doing Politics, Sociology, an Economics module of another course or some kind of combination.....

As I remember from my forays into those subjects there were a few reasons you might want to junk defence spending. One is if you're Canada or in a position like Canada. They have a very powerful and very friendly neighbour. No other country can easily invade them due to the geography - their only real neigbours are the US, Greenland, Iceland and Russia. No one would dare try and invade as the US would open a whole can of 'whupass' on whoever was stupid enough. If relations with the US ever got so bad thay they decided to invade, there isn't anything that Canada could do no matter how much they spent on defence. As long as you have a domestic police force that can handle emergencies and the odd looney with a gun and rocket launcher there's not much reason to have an army.

Luxembourg and Belgium are in this position - surrounded on all sides by very friendly neigbours who are that much bigger that if they decided to attack they wouldn't stand a chance not matter what they did. As long as your police force could handle civil emergencies I see no need for an army.

The other I can remember is in the vein of Costa Rica above - if your civil apparatus of state is militaristic, then you may not need an army. Of course, then the debate may be whether or not you need a police force rather than defence force....

HTH

Andy

[Andy the Coastie]

Defence spending

It goes down every year, and is bloody awful for the fighting man.

Every man & women that fights to protect our shores from evil tw**s.

The goverment should be spending more than whats needed by the troops on the ground, as in giving them the VERY best , tried and tested equipment, packing them away to fight with all equipment ready for the job and plenty of it. Then when someone is hurt , pay them the pensions they deserve and look after with welfare services second to none.
SAME goes for our emergency services .

best way would be to stop all the benefits given out to SOCIAL SCUM and relocate the money to where it's needed.

Troops fighting in WW II were better off , than what our lads get today , if you look hard at the wide picture.

[Ian@1904]

History, Japan and Germany are very reluctant to be seen as being aggressive in a military way.

[SimonK]

Originally Posted by Paul Oliver

Hmm Police as Army don't really work as you need to look at an Infantryman's mission (bearing in mind the whole aim of the Army is to get this Infantryman into a position to dominate and hold the battlefield).

"To close with and kill the enemy using his rifle, bayonet and grenades, knowing where to be at what time and with the right equipment and knowing what fire support is available to him."

I don't think the majority of police forces fit this profile and would suggest that any that do are not really the ones we want, ahhh except maybe in some inner city areas

OK this is classic NATO general war, unfortunatly 80% of the worlds armys spend more time on 'internal security' rather than worrying about external threats. In this situation an army and a heavy handed police force can look very similar.

Back to the original question, reasons not to have armed forces.

The defense industry to support a countries armed forces soaks up a lot of talented manpower that could be more usefully employed elsewhere.

whos going to invade us anyway? (just got this bit of paper off that nice Herr Hitler saying we can be friends) assumes no interest in the world beyond the isle of wight, or like Luxembourg you have no option.

The armed forces were created to enforce/ support trade. The real power in the world is commercial. Waving a big gun around might impress your girlfriend but if you don't behave we will buy you. This argument falls down when the barbarians tear up the rule book and trash the place.

Sorry about the rambling, really shouldn't post after the pub.

Simon

[calski]

Technology as a whole also benefits from an increase in Defence spending. R & D increases through Defence research so you could argue that without the war mongering industries, we wouldn't advance (or have advanced) like we have.

[Scuby]

Originally Posted by ahar

Just trying to work out whether you're doing Politics, Sociology, an Economics module of another course or some kind of combination.....

Management science actually.... but this question was nothing to do with that. Had an interview today for sponsorship to do a Masters, and they asked me to find out about the factors where that affected defence spending and that kind of thing. Most were fine, but I couldn't understand the logic of saying that nations shouldn't invest in defence at all, so a couple of the ideas here helped me see different points of view.

Thanks all

David

[Mr T.]

Originally Posted by SimonK

Article 12 of the Costa Rican constitution

" The Army as a permanent institution is abolished. There shall be the necessary police forces for surveillance and the preservation of the public order.

All very well and good if you want to model yourself, nationally, on a banana republic...and we're all aware of just how well Central & South American countries' 'police forces' treat such mundane items like freedom of speech, human rights and the maintenance of law and order for the man in the street who's not paying his wages or protecting him under corrupt patronage?

Originally Posted by SimonK

Military forces may only be organized under a continental agreement or for the national defense; in either case, they shall always be subordinate to the civil power: they may not deliberate or make statements or representations individually or collectively "

So written to keep, as should always be the way, armed forces from these places (Pinochet's Chile, anyone?) committing their weekly coups d'etat before further committing their habitual rounds of making any detractors go 'missing'.

Also, only having forces assembled/trained/mustered/stood to at a time of national crisis, such as being under attack, means that your forces are ill-prepared to prosecute that war - which, ironically, leaves your country open to being overrun/invaded by an aggressor with the result of you having no say on how you spend your national budget, be that defence, education etc.

Originally Posted by SimonK

So its seems at least one country dosn't belive in military spending. Of course it may be that thier police force looks remarkably like an army!

Simon

Bingo - these places merely end up with (what passes for) an army/armed forces by an another name: The Balkans, 90% of Central/South America et al.