If you don't want to pay taxes, don't earn above the tax threshold.
Now what am I supposed to do if I don't want to be conscripted. Change age? — Isaac
Then conscription is unnecessary. So why instigate it. — Isaac
And you don't understand my answer. Seems you never haven't served in the military or even thought about the issue...as likely there's no threat of war where you live. But war for a society isn't similar like paying taxes. It's not a question if the government provides some service or not. For you it seems that wars are likely fought by some other people in other countries far far away where you live. Your not involved in any way.You're just completely ignoring the issue. War is bad, being taken over by a foreign power is bad.
Two bad things. You can't have neither, you have to choose which.
The question at hand here is simply why does the government decide and force its decision on the people? — Isaac
I've said again and again: Governments don't decide if people are willing to fight for them or not. — ssu
Taxation is not an impositions at all, it's the government collecting its legal property. — Isaac
Taxation is not an impositions at all, it's the government collecting its legal property. — Isaac
Nope — Olivier5
I thought of a more costly non-choice imposition a government can make on free, innocent adults: bomb them, like the Russians are doing to the Ukrainians. — Olivier5
So bombing is justified? That sounds a little sociopathic to me. — Isaac
Motivation, the will to fight, is quite essential if a conscript/reservist army is effective or not. The classic view is that a professional/volunteer force is better trained and motivated than conscripts.So? What's that got to do with conscription? — Isaac
This thread wasn't started by you and from your comments it seems that you don't know much about the military or especially about conscription.If you haven't got anything to say on that topic, maybe just focus on other threads? — Isaac
This position is precisely what I was responding to: a government can obviously do far worse than conscription: it can bomb folks. — Olivier5
Motivation, the will to fight, is quite essential if a conscript/reservist army is effective or not — ssu
This thread wasn't started by you — ssu
when a country imposes conscription on its citizens, it begs the question, for whose interests is the country acting? Is the country mobilizing to save its citizens, or is it mobilizing to save the existing power structure? — _db
States choose conscription or a volunteer force based on how effective the choice would be. This is essential to understand before answering @_db's question. Because if you don't think just why some country has chosen conscription and not a volunteer professional force, then you'll likely be carried away to some irrelevant reasons.Where in that are you reading the question "what factors determine how effective a conscript army is?" — Isaac
Hence if Ukraine is facing one of the largest armed forces in the World, it is quite rational for it to rely on conscription (as it has done in peacetime). Especially now as it is obviously fighting for it's existence. — ssu
I think in the case of Corona pandemic, which didn't turn into the next Spanish flu or the Black Death by death count, such a debate about relative harms and the state overriding the decisions of its citizens is useful.The question is about why the state overrides the decision of its citizens about the relative harms. — Isaac
People do understand the threat if the cities they live in are bombed. — ssu
The idea that any state can force people to take up arms when they don't want to, simply will not happen. — ssu
Perhaps you should give a historical example where the state overrides the decision of its citizens about the relative harms to advance this discussion. — ssu
1. Where did I make the claim that a government cannot do worse things than conscripting people? — Isaac
I can't even think of a non-choice imposition a government makes on free, innocent adults at all, let alone one which carries such a high cost. — Isaac
2. How is being bombed worse then being shot/tortured? — Isaac
3. What has any of this got to do with the grounds on which s government conscripts (you know, the actual topic)? — Isaac
governments often resort conscription once another nation starts to attack and bomb them and their citizens. For example, that's what Ukraine did. — Olivier5
When Russia invaded Ukraine, Ukraine imposed a general mobilization of all male citizens between the ages of 18 and 60, and banned them from leaving the country. — _db
What's that got to do with the OP? — Isaac
So how could you possibly read that and think the thread was about whether and when a government might use conscription? — Isaac
Of all the evils of government, forcing individuals to kill and die is by far the worst. — Tzeentch
Training an army from civilians doesn't happen in an instant. In WW1 for the British Army it took one year to man a larger force into France after the war had started. Initially the so-called "Kitchener's Army" of half million men was intended to be ready in mid 1916, but it was used first in September 1915. Another example is just how long in WW2 it took to create the US wartime armed forces after Pearl Harbour as prior to the war the US army was smaller than the army of Belgium.Then conscription is unnecessary. People will voluntarily join the army if they understand the need. — Isaac
Manpower and actual combat capability are two different things, Isaac. Don't confuse the two. With conscription your manpower problems are solved. But morale, training and good equipment are needed to form military capability.So why did Ukraine instigate conscription. It can't force its citizens to fight, you say, so the only real fighters it's going to get are free volunteers. What's with all the laws then? A joke? — Isaac
Your strawmanning again, IsaacIf you're seriously going to advance the argument that every conscript actually wants to fight then we've nothing more to say. — Isaac
I think this is your main point. And when you can't (or won't) understand that conscription is basically a manpower issue, you'll just stick to this meaningless dichotomy of the state's agenda and the "people's" agenda.Conscription is about the aims of the state, not the population. — Isaac
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