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points by xphos 1 day ago | 0 comments

I think you only come out with this type of thinking if you've never really spent much time with people who served in the armed forces. Wars are declared by politicans not soldiers. Soldiers are enlisted to serve (at least in the US and most western nations) at the behest of the democratic body that employs them.

I.e they shouldn't be blamed if politicans force them to fight battles they think are unjust. If they are ordered to they don't have a choice its fight or go to miltary prison per UCMJ. Other jobs (law enforcement) are not like that. Generally speaking its quite unfair to double blame soldiers forcing them to fight unjust wars and than punish them for being forced into stupid wars. They can choose to not be soldiers but not everyone will be in a position economically to ignore the possible benefits. Miltary service is a strong path to escape poverty especially in the US.

Law enforcement is entirely different they are immune to judgement errors they make even if they kill someone. They have little accountablity, and often abuse of the law is just overlooked or covered up because they are the ones who enforce it. They don't even have to know how to do their job or law, if they mess up its someone elses problem due to qualifed immunity. Hence the craziness with the ICE they can violate rights with impunity and much of that has to due with the fact their oversight body is apparently just the president who says don't care about any law breaking.

[–] genocidicbunny 1 day ago

> They can choose to not be soldiers but not everyone will be in a position economically to ignore the possible benefits. Miltary service is a strong path to escape poverty especially in the US.

Adding to this, if you're in the peacetime military and have a long contract, and congress or the executive orders the military to deploy somewhere, those soldiers won't even have much of a choice. As long as you're under contract, if the military says jump, most often all you can respond with is "how high?"

[–] Computer0 1 day ago

So we should ignore the atrocities of people who sold their soul for cash because they sold their soul?

[–] genocidicbunny 6 hours ago

In that same light, all of us programmers sold our souls for cash to make the Facebooks and Flocks and OpenAI's of the world. Don't throw stones when you live in a glass house.

[–] Computer0 6 hours ago

Yeah I think those people are morally objectionable. I can defend every second of my history.

[–] croon 20 hours ago

While I'm some degree of a pacifist, it's tough to argue against the concept of a defense army, in the face of human nature. Defense in the larger sense also has to mean (preventative) intervention, for example world war 2 might have ended very differently unless the US joined.

I also recognize that the US has perverted this concept countless times since with blatant imperialistic motives, it does however still not break the concept of a just responsive military force.

TL;DR: They're not selling their souls if they (mistakenly) trust elected officials to work for the will of the people and only deploy for just causes.

[–] couchand 17 hours ago

How can anyone look at hundreds of years of US imperialism with rose-colored glasses anymore? Who is really misguided into thinking the US army is defensive in nature? You have constructed a beautiful straw man.

Fortunately the Nuremberg principles rescue us here. Following orders is no excuse for abdicating a moral responsibility.

[–] croon 16 hours ago

> How can anyone look at hundreds of years of US imperialism with rose-colored glasses anymore?

I quite explicitly did the opposite of that.

> Who is really misguided into thinking the US army is defensive in nature?

Let me put it this way:

* Had Ukraine not had an army, it would not exist right now.

* Had Ukraine had a bigger army, it might not have been invaded at all.

* Had Ukraine had the biggest army in the world, it might or might not have abused it for nefarious reasons.

The argument I made is that the US (and any country) needs it for case 1 and 2 (can also be solved through defensive alliances, though Ukraine had assurances that were broken), but the US has gone the wrong way for case 3.

This however does not invalidate case 1 and 2.

> You have constructed a beautiful straw man.

I'm unsure how to respond to this other than state that it's ironic.

[–] xphos 13 hours ago

Honestly I couldn't say this better. I would just go one step further participating in the Miltary does not equal your doing atrocities as a natural conclusion. We want people of sound morals to be in the Miltary because they will make I hope moral decisions when it comes to the conduct of war.

I highly recommend reading On War by carl von clausewitz. He gives a pragmetic opinion on War and being read for it. Along with being ready for general conflict both non-violent and violent

[–] infamouscow 15 hours ago

The answer is you can't. They did not reason themselves into their position, and you can't reason them out of it. It's irrational to have rational discussion with the irrational.

This is why derision is a valid philosophical debate strategy if a person refuses to engage in rational discussion. To label GP as an R-word is a social signal and warning to others not to behave similarly. Derision also promotes healthy skepticism of new arguments you hear, lest risk falling into the same trap and have oneself become a laughingstock.

[–] ImPostingOnHN 14 hours ago

Please consider posting comments more in line with the YC posting guidelines, with fewer shallow dismissals and insults.

You're not going to have a good conversation like this, and you aren't going to be "winning" anything for your troubles, either.

[–] zinodaur 1 day ago

If you take their cookie for dropping their bombs - it seems like you’ve earned whatever blame comes your way for the people you kill. It never seems like much blame makes it back anyways

[–] Computer0 1 day ago

The military is for killing. I am fundamentally opposed to that. Anyone who signs up to be a soldier I have a moral qualm with.

[–] justinhj 1 day ago

Don't you feel grateful you likely have peace and security because of these people?

[–] vrganj 1 day ago

In the case of the US, this view is pure propaganda.

Peace from who? Mexico? Canada? Which country is going to invade you?

All the American military does is bomb Middle Eastern countries and leave a huge mess. I do not believe US security is helped by bombing weddings and schools. I would even argue that it worsens it, by creating a bunch of people that lost their loved ones to those acts and that then turn to terrorism as a means of revenge.

[–] justinhj 16 hours ago

"we don't need military because we live surrounded by peaceful neighbours" yes and the world was once nonstop warfare among tribes. it's child like to think peace just arose magically and does not need to be protected

[–] vrganj 15 hours ago

You know what protects peace? Cooperation.

The countries of Western Europe used to be at a state of continuous war for literal centuries, horrible atrocities inflicted on one another.

They all had their fancy armies, and they were all tempted to use them. Gotta get your money's worth, y'know?

Then they founded the world's most successful peace project, the European Union.

No wars between members since.

This adolescent behavior of threatening gestures is counterproductive and only leads to more conflict.

More mature societies have figured that out already.

[–] rdiddly 14 hours ago

Why stop there? Include Russia in the EU. Surely they'll be impressed by your maturity and cooperation and be inspired to maturely cooperate. Then you can rely on them to protect you from the US, instead of the opposite situation that you've enjoyed for 80 years.

[–] vrganj 14 hours ago

I agree. The most painful mistake of European foreign policy in the last decades was not swooping up Russia in the 90s.

Again, the idea of "military protection" is overly primitive and simplistic. If we had integrated them in our system, we could've given them rule of law as we have done with many an applicant state (think other post-Soviet countries!) and nurtured peace through fostering mutual dependence.

We failed to spread the values of enlightenment and now we are paying the price.

The whole protection racket thing that's now exploding in our face would've been unnecessary and could've been avoided.

Violence is the language of the weak.

We've seen time and time again how ineffective it is, most recently when y'all tore up the deal the EU negotiated with Iran and instead went back to more primitive ways, with predictable results. Before that, in Afghanistan, where after countless dead the same group is in power again. When even is the last time your approach worked? WW2? Might be time to move with the times.

[–] justinhj 6 hours ago

Amazing insight. If only you could go back in time and tell those early tribes that cooperation is all you need we could have saved millenia of warfare.

[–] vrganj 15 minutes ago

The whole point is that we have moved on from the early tribe stage and have figured out better ways, ways that actually work and protect peace.

Well, some of us at least.

It is telling you have not been able to engage with the point at all and choose to bury your head in ancient history instead of confronting the present day.

[–] rdiddly 23 hours ago

It's propaganda, but also true. If the US or any other country had no military, ANY country could invade it. This is why they all tend to have militaries. Also it doesn't have to be Canada and Mexico, this is not a Risk board. The army men have big army boats, toot toot goes the horn on the big army boat! And they have big army planes too, zoom zoom go the army planes!

[–] tremon 16 hours ago

> If the US or any other country had no military, ANY country could invade it

Please explain what would happen if the US had no military and Andorra decided to invade?

[–] rdiddly 15 hours ago

Then Andorra would not meet any military resistance. If you're saying Andorra can't do anything because their military is small or non-existent, you're just proving the point that armies that exist are the ones that do things. But is Andorra defenseless? No, it's protected by all the military force of the EU, and, ironically, allies like the US.

[–] vrganj 23 hours ago

You think somebody is going to storm the beaches of Miami? C'mon, don't be ridiculous.

Nobody's gonna invade the US, what a preposterous idea. This is precisely the fear based propaganda I'm talking about.

[–] croon 19 hours ago

It's a preposterous idea with the size of the military forces of US currently. It would not be preposterous with 0 military force.

And to be clear, the US has abused the army for half a century for unjust causes, and I'm not defending that, but the concept of an army can be moral in the context of rivalling aggressive nations.

[–] regretsresin 16 hours ago

You are defending that. Because the US military does those awful things and has done forever.

There is no US military that's a defensive force. It is a war crimes machine.

You might think you are defending the idea of a peaceful defense force in the US but that's never existed and probably will never exist. So we all read your posts as if they were talking about the US military that exists.

[–] rdiddly 15 hours ago

Nobody invades because they know they'll meet an army. Same reason nobody invades France.

[–] vrganj 13 hours ago

Why does nobody invade Ireland?

[–] infamouscow 14 hours ago

Some people are evil, e.g., Hitler. All the moral grandstanding in the world isn't going to help if you're invaded and they slaughter you and everyone with your morality out of existence.

I'm not being condescending or rude or otherwise out of line here saying your position is genuinely stupid.

[–] kelipso 17 hours ago

You are saying that killing people is justified if you want to make money. What kind of disgusting argument is this?