Unfortunately I think at this point the discussion can only go towards a back and forth on what is good and bad about the military, which can’t be very profitable, and this kind of debate has gone on for so long already that it’s embedded into popular culture. It’s also very heavily culture-warish.
Clearly, the military is adapted for one task, which requires an extraordinary amount of dependability and low likelihood of failure. There’s also an extraordinary cost for that low likelihood of failure, which encompasses the things you pointed out. I don’t think any society has survived very long being converted into 100% military culture, nor has it survived getting rid of it completely.
Clearly, the military is adapted for one task, which requires an extraordinary amount of dependability and low likelihood of failure.
Maybe a low likelihood of certain kind of errors for which it optimizes, but not in general. An above average rate of sexual assault is a sign of failure.
The NSA lost their cyber-weapons (maybe to Russian spies) and now you have civilian targets like hospitals getting attacked because they didn’t do their OPSec properly.
Unfortunately I think at this point the discussion can only go towards a back and forth on what is good and bad about the military, which can’t be very profitable, and this kind of debate has gone on for so long already that it’s embedded into popular culture. It’s also very heavily culture-warish.
Clearly, the military is adapted for one task, which requires an extraordinary amount of dependability and low likelihood of failure. There’s also an extraordinary cost for that low likelihood of failure, which encompasses the things you pointed out. I don’t think any society has survived very long being converted into 100% military culture, nor has it survived getting rid of it completely.
Maybe a low likelihood of certain kind of errors for which it optimizes, but not in general. An above average rate of sexual assault is a sign of failure.
Losing track of money in the middle of a war that might go to anyone is also a failure (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/feb/08/usa.iraq1).
The NSA lost their cyber-weapons (maybe to Russian spies) and now you have civilian targets like hospitals getting attacked because they didn’t do their OPSec properly.
The US military accidentally bombs hospitals.