Re: AC defense, part I: Defending a free nation
I've had a little time to read over the article and this seems like a rehash of everything that's gone on here.
1) Centralization is bad- I don't get this one. It's not as if an invading army can just take over Wash DC or NORAD and the US military surrenders. There is no head you can cut off to kill the body here, every unit has standing orders. More over, a de-centralized nation may be harder to conquer but it seems easy to occupy, and it's likely that that occupation won't create very good living conditions for your people.
2) The US doesn't have competition- This is half true. They aren't competing with PMC (Private Military Companies) but they do contract out the designs and production of weapons to the private sector. Different companies compete for the contracts. This seems pretty close to the competition that the "free market" projects.
3) Decentralized command structure v. Chain of command- Another rehash of the old "who's in charge" question. Seems dangerously impractical to allow for a lack of command. Now I'm not someone that buys the "the free market will do it (end of explanation)" reason, so maybe that's why I have a hard time here.
4) The lack of large-scale unity re: Invasion- This one always gets me, and to his credit he mentions it with the Alex the Great example. If we just break down US into AC territories that miraculously use the current state borders as guides, then it seems unlikely that they'd all band together to help if one is being attacked. Maybe a few will, but it seems unlikely given what we know about people today that it would work.
All in all, I'm for less regulation and more competition in almost every single aspect of our lives, but the military so far isn't one of them.
Cody
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