American policy regarding mercenaries strikes me as either exceptionally naive or deeply cynical. Our policy either presumes that hired mercenaries will evince a certain degree of loyalty to us or we don’t care because it’s all about money and power and nothing else. There is no reason to presume American mercenaries will be loyal to anybody but their paymaster, and their paymaster is only theoretically the American taxpayer; it could well be disloyal public officials plotting against their own country’s interest, as the television series Legends has been pointing out. Moreover, the increased use of mercenaries suggests a nation in decline, because the use of mercenaries has usually foreshadowed the decline of great powers, such as Rome and the Arab empires. We use mercenaries for corrupt purposes or because the public is nwilling to support war policies, or both. But we do not use them to spare the public casualties.
Posted on: Tue, 14 Oct 2014 01:19:16 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015