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The most effective Army is an Army that is Motivated. In a mercenary army that is pay with minimal possibility of suffering injury. Once you have either, that army is gone (and most people will NOT enlist in an army fighting a cause they do NOT believe in if the possibility of injury is high).
A foreign mercenary Army will only work if the recruits fell they will suffer less injuries if they join the Military than if they stay out of the Military. Once you show that is NOT true, enlistments tend to drop like a rock (For example what is happening to the US Army do to Iraq). Even people in Central America (Where most immigrants are coming from) will not enlist do to high losses. Furthermore the immigrants who would enlist do not speak English which mean the US Army will have to change its fighting doctrine to the one used in the Middle East (i.e. Enlisted personnel have no say and rigidly controlled). To control the Enlisted ranks, independent thought by the NCO corp will have to be curtailed and with it the ability of the Army to do its job. The problem with that type of Army is it tends to break up when it runs across an army that is Motivated. The best armies give the maximum amount of authority as far down the chain of command as it can, with un underpaid unmotivated Army you can NOT do that, thus the Army loses flexibility.
When Rome conquered the World it took over 300 years. Rome refused to stay in any provence that fought a long term guerrilla war with Rome. Rome pulled out and then started to undermine the Resistance by giving the local rulers Roman Citizenship and giving even the peasants rights within the Empire. Thus the people who opposed Rome was denied leadership and that with the use of non-local troops to suppress the Natives kept Rome on top from the Time of the First Punic War till the near collapse in the Third Century AD. Afterward the Roman Empire ceased to be an Empire and started to refer to itself as the "Country of Rome" i.e "Romania". By this time almost everyone in the Empire thought of themselves as Romans and Romania was their Country. This Collapsed during the Fifth Century (only in the West) when Rome ran out of Money to pay the Troops and then started to use Barbarian mercenaries to maintain controlled. From 450 AD onward these Barbarians started to rule the Western portion of the Empire but people in the West still considered themselves Romans (and in many aspects would still call themselves Romans till the Crowning of Charlemagne as Emperor of the Germans in 800 AD (and one of the reasons the Roman Catholic Church stayed so powerful till the rise of the Nation State in the late 1700s was it was viewed as the continuance of the Roman Republic in the West and people wanted to be a member of this LARGER Multi-State organization more than they wanted to be Citizens of their own Country).
I go into the above for to look at the Roman Empire as an Empire you have to look at the period between the First Punic War till the near collapse of the Roman Empire in the mid 200s AD. Afterward it is NOT an Empire but a Country with three equal and balanced parts, The Latin West (About 40% of the Country), the Greek speaking area of the Balkans, Modern Greece and Turkey (About 30% of the Country) and the Proto-Arab speakers of Syria, Palestine and Egypt (another 30% of the Country). These three balanced each other from the mid-200s till the Lombard Invasion of 570 AD. The Latin West was weaken by the Abolishment of the Western Emperorship in 476 AD, but was still part of the Romania long after that event. Justinian's Wars to retake the West help bring divisions between the Latin West and the Greek East, but you had unity of thought till the Lombard's invaded Northern Italy in 570 and made everything North of Rome Non-Roman Territory and for all practical purposes separated the Latin West from the Rest of Romania. Without the Latin West to balance the Greek and Arab Speaking parts of Romania these two areas fought within the Empire for control of the Empire until the Arab Conquest of the early 620-650 which finally separated the Greek Speaking part of the Romania from the Arab Speaking part. The Eastern Roman Empire would still call itself the Roman Republic till 1453 (When the Turks took Constantinople) but after 650 it was a Greek Country and acted as a Greek Country NOT as an Empire.
Except for Rome, no Empire has survived more than 150 years (And you can see from above this may even be true for the Roman Empire). The First British Empire died At Yorktown in 1783. Britain did save parts of its Empire and expanded its control of India but this Second British Empire ended in 1947 with Indian Independence. The Mongol Empire lasted no more than 150 years before it broke up into the Mongol Hordes of the late Middle Ages. The Russian Empire, while called an Empire, was more the Country of Russia expanding Eastward till the mid 1800s when Russia expanded into the area now consisting of the Central Asia Republics between Iran and Modern Russia. Russia barely held onto them for 150 years (and lost Central Europe after only 45 years of occupation). The Manchu Empire of China did last from about 1600 to almost 1900, but unlike the Earlier Mongols who occupied parts of the empire with troops from other parts of the Empire, The Manchus keep all local forces local, in effect the Manchu Empire was less an Empire and more just China reaching to its outermost limits.
The reason for this limit is that an Empire expands till the costs to expand exceeds the benefit of expanding. One of the cost of an Empire is that the Army, if it is on the Frontier, can NOT be near the capital where the levers of power of the Empire is. At the same time if the Army is near the Capital, it can not defend the Frontiers. The politicians in charge of the Army wants it near them, and wants it near the Capital. Thus sooner or later the Army is to far away from either the levels of government OR the Frontier and the Empire starts to Collapse. This gets worse as the original generation dies out and the Second and third generations takes over. These cousins tend to fight among themselves for their part of the Empire as the Empire as a whole collapse around them.
Example of the later is the infighting among the Mongols Hordes as the Mongol Empire Fell, the infighting among the Russian leadership as Russia collapsed during WWI, and the infighting among the Arabs as their Empire Collapsed after 750 AD (and even the lost of Egypt around 640 AD by the Eastern Roman Empire do to the continuing infighting between the Egyptian elites and the Greek elites of the Roman Empire of that time period). You can add to this the Austria Empire that lasted from roughly 1690 (when Austria took Hungary from Turkey) to 1867 when Austria became the Austria-Hungary Empire (which collapse in 1918).
As to the other extreme, i.e. can not longer hold the frontiers of the Empire, you have the lost of India to the British after World War II (Britain was no longer strong enough to keep India in the British Empire), The lost of the US to Britain in 1783 do to British Weakness, and more modern example is the collapse of the Soviet Empire in the last 1980s do to Weakness of Moscow. Even the lost the Western Roman Empire can be seen as this type of collapse of an Empire (through as stated about Rome is complicated by the fact at its collapse the vast majority of its Citizens viewed themselves as "Romans" as opposed to a nationality of the part of the Empire they were living in). The Austria Empire collapse in 1918 seems to follow this pattern, after dealing with the political collapse that lead to the Austria-Hungary Empire of 1867-1918.
I go into the above for Empire do try Foreign Mercenaries as they are collapsing but these do NOT last long for the reason for the Collapse is the lost of control of the Empire. Once lost the ability to PAY the mercenaries disappears, mercenaries disappear. In the late Western Roman Empire, the Western Empire tried to use Foreign Mercenaries, but when they ran out of money the mercenaries wanted land and when the Empire refused to give them land, the Barbarians just abolished the Empire and the Empire could not do anything about it for it had no money. The same will happen to the US, any attempt to use Foreign Mercenaries will be short lived. Such Mercenaries have NO interest in the long term health of the US they will want paid and get their Citizenship AND SUFFER NO INJURIES. Once the injuries start the Mercenaries will STOP enlisting and you can NOT draft foreigners. If the Government tries to Draft Citizens the government will have to motivate them. The only Motivation will be an improved future which the present economy can NOT provide. Thus the army will NOT be a universal Military Service Army that is Motivated to protect the US, but a Dragooned Draftee Army whose only Motivation is NOT to get injured. Those are lousy troops.
Remember the assumption in this Thread is a Military Dictatorship to keep the present leadership in charge. Sooner or later the fact that the Median Income (the point where 1/2 of the population earns less than and 1/2 earns more) has FALLEN since 2001 has to be addressed. The only solution will be to increase taxes on those people who can afford to pay the Taxes (i.e. the Rich) but the Rich do NOT want to pay the Taxes, but what the Government to protect them. These taxes will pay the Salaries of the Troops needed to keep the elites in power. This will mean additional revenue to the working class. The problem for the GOP is they do NOT want to raise the taxes on the people who can pay the taxes but raise the money elsewhere. Such taxes will just make the problem of the working class worse which will lead to the need for more troops which means more taxes. Unless someone decides to tax the rich, the system is doomed. In many ways the fall of the Roman Empire in the West followed this basic Outline, the Rich refused to pay Taxes to pay the troops, with no troops Rome opt to use German with the promise of land, the Germans took the land and then realized they had all the real power for they controlled the arms and slowly replaced the old Roman Elites with themselves AND paid off the peasants by giving them land. The Roman Peasants liked being given land and thus supported the Germans over their own Roman elites when Justinian tried to retake the Western Empire in the early 500s. Justinian bankrupted his Eastern Empire to retake Tunisian and Italy and so weaken his country that by 640 the Eastern Empire not only lost Italy and North Africa but also Syria and Egypt. The Eastern Empire just ran out of money and had to drop the old Roman Mercenary Army and replaced it with an Army raised within the Empire upon the promise they will get land at the end of their enlistment (which required taking land away from the old Roman Elites). The Eastern Empire could only do this in Greece for unlike both Egypt and the Western Empire Greece was still small farmers. The rest of the old Roman Empire was large estates owned by the Roman Elites who did not want their land taxed nor their peasants drafted into the army. This was another reason the Eastern Empire survived the Fall of both the Western Empire and Egypt.
In many ways how the Roman Empire Fell shows the problem facing the US. The Roman Empire Survived in the only part of the Empire that did not have most of its wealth controlled by a small elite. The Empire could raise taxes and troops in the area where the Roman Elite had the least controlled. In areas where the Old Roman Elite still controlled the land, reform was impossible and things went from bad to worse. It is only with the adoption of proper feudalism (and the Concept that you owned DUTIES to people below you) in the 900s that Western Europe was able to start to Expand. The old Roman elites were told by the Holy Roman Emperors (and than the Kings of France and England) that if you did NOT protect their peasants from the raiding Viking and Magyars, the Emperor would replace them with someone who could. The Old Roman Elites could not and their were replaced (and some times by the people doing the Raiding such as the Normans in Normandy, England and Southern Italy). While true land ownership was NOT returned to the Peasants under Feudalism, the Peasants were given under Feudalism rights to the land. The "Owners" of the land became the barons and Counts of the time period. They had certain rights from the peasants (i.e. not only part of the peasant's crop but military duties from the peasants) but this was given in exchange that the Baron or Count would fight off anyone invading the area of his control. Areas of Europe that adopted Feudalism quickly saw the end of raids by the Northmen, Magyars and their Neighbors. The Barons and Counts knew if they did not stop such raids, they would be replaced by someone that could. The Barons and Counts to be able to do their job needed the support of the peasants, so they gave the peasants rights, rights and power most of them had not had since pre-Roman Times. Today the modern equivalent would be to increase taxes on the Rich while reducing the taxes on the poor AND demanding that the Rich recognize the rights of the working class in the product of their work. This is what the US needs to do to solve its present problem, but instead it wants to protect the wealthy who has the most influence over the Government. Like the Roman Empire sooner or later this reform will occur, but like the Roman empire it may take 500 years to do so.
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