[pvn]

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Yes, they have *standing* orders. But without the head, they can't get *new* orders. And without that adapatbility, a lot of the usefulness is squandered. These units *can* operate independently, but they are *tuned* for operating with information, orders, etc coming from above.

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The problem here is that they're still getting orders. You and others have made it seems as if there exists a commander-in-cheif that makes all the calls and if he's killed the rest of the armed forces just run around like chickens without heads. This just isn't the case, in this information age and with the complete chain of command in place right now, there is no "head" to cut off. This is neither weakness nor really a strength, just functionality. It may have been in the middle ages when seeing the king killed on the battlefield meant game over, but certainly not now.

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I'm going to have to come back to this.

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But this isn't "competition" in the usual sense, any more than my local city government farming out a monopoly contract for garbage collection is. I still *have* to pay for the monopoly garbage vendor.

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I see it as being almost identical, the only difference is that instead of you and I getting to pick differnt options, it's chosen for us by our repersentitives.

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Exactly. If we both want something different, one of us is going to get disappointed. That's a pretty big difference. Further, in a free market, I can appoint an agent to act on my behalf, but in this case, other people are picking my agent for me.

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As for the "I still have to pay part", now we're arguing theory, different topic. Again I'm for almost total deregulation, so the evils of taxes aren't unknown to me.

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Theory? You mean taxes for defense haven't actually been observed in the wild?

WTF?

"I'm for 'almost' total opposition to murder, but I still want to be able to kill a few people."

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Decentralized =/= non-existent.

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Of course, but the point I was making is that if there are multiple companies (and in every projection I've heard of, the numbers range from 5-10 to hundreds) there isn't a way to integrate them all quickly. This should be obvious given what we know about people, namely that we can never agree. You think companies are wasteful now, wait until they are forced to bicker over things like this.

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Going back to your first point, you can't have it both ways. You're saying that the current US military is decentralized, so that it doesn't matter if some "big chicken" commander gets picked off. Now you're saying it *is* centralized, which gives it some "integration" advantage. Yet private firms manage to work together all the time, increasing efficiency along the way.

I don't think companies are "wasteful" now, certainly not when compared with baroque bureaucracies like the US military.

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Why would "AC territories" use "current state borders as guides"? Guides for *what*, exactly?

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Notice my "miraculously" comment, I'm just using the states so that we'll have a frame of reference. In reality, pick any borders you like.

As an aside, I can't understand why people don't think that ACland will have borders (not that you said this, thus it's just an aside). How can it not. My town is full of wild, crazy, gamblin', coke snortin' people and a few miles over is a town founded by Catholics, certainly there will be borders. Different ideologies combined with the human nature to belong create these sorts of groups.

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These "borders" are known as property lines.

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What you describe is basically the situation circa 1776. They certainly banded together.

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Under one flag, yes. They were a country. A country based more on confederation then federal power, but a country still.

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Wrong. There wasn't "one flag". The Betsy Ross flag wasn't complete until 1777. The colonies were, in effect, 13 seperate governments. It was more of an alliance like NATO than a nation. That model continued at least until the Constitution was ratified, and wasn't totally eradicated until the civil war.

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Look at any denomination of people. Hell look at this board. Sides stick together, I may not agree with Joggers methods, but more often then not I'll give him a little "fudge room" in his arguments because, in general, he's on my side. Are you or anyone else any different. The more divided we get the more that sense of belonging kicks up. So it's not a stretch to think that at some point (in ACland) if there's an attack, people may not want to help my "crack free, gamble 'til you drop-ville" because we're "evil", paying no mind to the big picture.

By no means a certainty either way, but I think human nature (what we know of it) should play a large role in our discussions. Also, I reject the notion that Morneuyx put forward that we can't know human nature, I think certainly behavioral science isn't a fraud and there's valuable knowledge there.

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So far in this post, you've basically said you don't see any *advantages* to less regulation on more competition in this particular aspect of the economy. Do you see any *disadvantages*??

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Yes, but I'll divide it into two parts so that it will be more useful for you.

Real life- The military wastes on a massive scale, and because our system has basically given the free reign to spend whatever they want, I don't see this waste stopping.

Ideologically- Yes, but far less. Any armed force, from a man with a gun to the US military, is prone to the corruption of power. The market will not change this, nor will voting. I do think it's possible to at least attempt to keep it in check (limits on size, use), but as I've said before, we cannot fight our nature.

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Huh? I'm asking if you see any disadvantages to "less regulation and more competition". Not disadvantages to more centralization.