So, having established in what circumstances conscription works. In what circumstances is it just? — Isaac

I think defending your country from an attacking other nation is just.

What threat? — _db

The threat of another state attacking your country. We have seen that such actions aren't confined only to history, but can and have happened in the present.

If the threat is independent terrorist groups etc. I would think the response could (and should) be handled by the police.

I think that conscription works if there is among the majority of citizens a collective understanding that universal military service is needed and that basically the threat comes from outside the state/society. Hence in Finland, Israel or even in Switzerland conscription works. The Swiss even had a referendum on having an armed forces or disbanding them, but the Swiss voted to continue having the militia army (even if now surrounded by EU states nearly all members of NATO).

Where conscription usually doesn't work is where the military is mainly for internal security. Trained reservists are then more of a liability and usually you see that in these countries the armed forces are divided for political purposes. For example in Russia and Saudi-Arabia both there is a large National Guard force to counterbalance the role of the army. In these countries a military coup is a genuine possibility.

(in 1993 Yeltsin had a constitutional crisis and ordered the Parliament to be fired on by tanks, hence there is this domestic political role for the army in Russia. Russia has tried to turn the armed forces into an all volunteer force, but hasn't been able to do this.)


(and btw, not every Finn likes universal conscription - which obviously is the case in a democracy.)

Nobody's fine with forced enlisment into the armed forces. — Agent Smith

I'm fine with conscription, and so is the majority of Finns also. Of course, there is the option of siviilipalvelus, a "civil service" where you basically go work in a hospital or fire brigade etc. for 11 months. Hence it's not forced enlistment to the military, even if by the Finnish constitution every Finn has to participate in national defense with the abilities they have. And if you are a male (and healthy, capable to serve) and opt not to serve either, you can spend your time (a bit over five months) in prison. A little bit less than one fifth get a medical discharge from the army.

Conscription, if it happens, implies the country's on the verge of defeat - — Agent Smith

Russia has 145 million people and Finland just over 5 million. And history has told us you can survive even from the verge of a catastrophic defeat and yet fight it on to a cease fire.

But one wonders, by doing these drills, are they not showing Taiwan and the US what could happen should an invasion ever take place? — Manuel

Well, if you would think to try to perform such a difficult military operation than a landing on an hostile island roughly over 150 kilometers away from your country, then practice obviously is needed. In the military you really don't try any complex operation without it being trained and trained over again. Otherwise you might face a catastrophic defeat because of the sheer inexperience of the forces performing combine arms maneuver battle.

China wants to show it has the capability of invading Taiwan, hence it will have to train annually.

Sanctions can have other effects than influencing decisions here and now. The most obvious effect of the present sanctions is in degrading Russia's war potential. That effect will be mostly delayed, but some of it is arguably felt even now. Russia has spent much of its high-precision munition stocks, and rebuilding will be challenging, partly due to sanctions. They are now reduced to lobbing dated anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles at ground structures, which is far from optimal. They also have a shortage of drones, NVGs, navigation, communication and other high-tech equipment - same problem here. — SophistiCat

This is true, but when there is a will, there will be a way. At least with time. Sanctions are a way to hinder the ability, but when you have the ability to make the needed components, even if inferior, then with time you will overcome the problems caused by sanctions and embargoes.

One of the best examples are the Iranian Grumman F-14 Tomcats, top-of-the-line fighters bought by the Shah of Iran just before the Islamic Revolution in the 1970's. After the revolution happened all supplies and parts to the fighters were stopped by the US. Yet not only did the Iranian F-14 fighters perform well in the Iran-Iraq war (with the only Tomcat aces being now Iranian pilots), but the aircraft are still after 40 years still flying.



When a country basically puts it entire army to attack a neighboring country, then obviously it's such a major "policy initiative" that simply the threat of sanctions will not change. Sanctions will be seen as a minor issue. Hence in fact sanctions and embargoes work when they are initiated by some action or policy that in importance is similar to international trade and/or international relations. Yet when one country commits to such an enormous task or feels that it's facing an existential risk, then sanctions are a side issue.

Putin has shown many times that he doesn't care about stock market prices, relations with the West and international trade relations etc. when he has initiated his wars.

The US should let China boast, and then it should blow over, come back to the status quo. This may be over soon, or the current party in Taiwan could be heavily sanctioned, and that could bring problems down the line. It wouldn't seem rational. The only logic I can think of would be to distract people from domestic problems and control people through the country being at a state-of-war. But on the other hand, they do have stringent Covid-limitations even now.

We'll see. — Manuel

China hasn't been such an actor as Russia, so I don't think they would do it. Of course, with out-of-the-blue surprise attack they would get strategic surprise. But they also can see what the response would be with sanctions etc. even if the US wouldn't respond militarily.

(Chinese marines have been basically formed to attack Taiwan. Still it would be a very risky move.)

But it's the US and China, I mean, any mistake here is a disaster. — Manuel

Yes.

And the Soviet Union and the US didn't go to war either. And the other didn't attack the other's ones ally. Yet there was the Cuban missile crisis and events like exercise Able Archer '83.

As I understand it, if China attempted to invade Taiwan, it would take a rather long time to conquer it, given how substantial Taiwan's military capabilities are. But China wouldn't like to bark without biting too much. Looks bad for them, even though it's what most of us would prefer, that nothing happens. — Manuel

Making a landing is the one of the most difficult military operations you can have. And for China exporting to the World is important.

Yet I think that it's a very American narrative to look at Chinese - Taiwan relations from the viewpoint of a possible war breaking out. Yes, it's a possibility, but then on the other hand Taiwan has for quite long enjoyed peace from Communist China, even if the relations have been sometimes better and sometimes worse. Basically Taiwan wants the status quo to remain. For China Taiwan is an embarrasment, like if after the US Civil War somehow Puerto Rico would be still in the hands of the Confederation and calling itself also the US.

The two China's were in war until 1979, yet the fighting basically ended after the 1950's with few incidents in the 1960's. In fact, China has since then gone to war with the Soviet Union (1969) and Vietnam (1979) after that.

Hence I think hopefully this is a nothing burger. As usually tensions are there. But both sides (+ the US) have to have their rhetoric about the issue.

Guys, have you noticed that there's a (regional) banking crisis in China?

First it was Evergrande, now it's protests outside some regional banks.

China's embattled property giant Evergrande has failed to deliver a preliminary debt restructuring plan it had promised by July 31, leading to further concerns about the future of the world's most indebted developer.

The real estate company's failure to meet its self-imposed deadline comes at a time when China's entire property sector is dealing with a growing mortgage boycott and slumping housing sales.

Bursting of a housing bubble can be a real disaster. Now this wouldn't be a big issue otherwise, but if the Chinese economy goes hell in a handbasket, then I would be really worried about Taiwan.

Why?

Because the old political trick is when your facing really ugly domestic problems, for example a severe economic problems, is to start a war and use (abuse) the Rally 'round the flag effect.

That is my only worry. Otherwise it's very far fetched that China would invade Taiwan. Talk about stupid risky actions. So I still think that the risk is quite low.

Yet surely China will "go ballistic" or at least make a show of "going ballistic" if a prominent American politician visits Taiwan. And of course the US itself has incentives to make the threat of China invading Taiwan a greater threat than it is.

A Discussion with you is quite pointless. You won't even engage in discussion, just respond that others' answers are 'irrelevant', you can't find an argument, others are reading the OP wrong or not answering it etc. When asked questions, you don't answer.

Luckily there are others here than you.

Yes, that's what I had in mind. Our electoral system and gerrymandering also makes many votes seem worthless. — Pie

Votes aren't worthless.

It's also in the interest of the two parties sharing power in the US to sustain the current polarization (or division) among the voters. Americans have taken to heart the idea that giving a vote to a third party will benefit the party they hate the most. This is the idea that both parties want to promote.

When there is the will, there is a way.

Maybe this long thread has covered the salient points raised in this video but I haven't read the last 150-200 posts, so someone tell me what this presentation gets wrong. — 180 Proof

Good question. I'll take a try.

When the documentary is saying "sanctions are working", first think what sanctions working would really mean?

Would Russia really stop the fighting and accept a peace favorable to Ukraine? I think not, yet "sanctions working" obviously would have to do that.

The last time sanctions did work was with South Africa: the country finally accepted to stop it's Apartheid-policies and give power to the black majority. Yet South Africa didn't view the West as an existential threat the way Iran, Venezuela and Cuba see the West and especially the US. North Korea basically is still at war with the US as there is only an armstice between the countries. Economic sanctions are just the new normal (or even the old normal) for them. South Africa was basically on the side of the US during the Cold War.

Yeah, Russians are now missing many things that earlier came from the West. They have now all kinds of problems and do feel the sanctions. Yet how will this work? Why would Putin submit when he sees the West as an existential threat to himself (and for Russia). As Russia is quite totalitarian and there are now far more political prisoners than in the end of the Soviet Union, it can endure these sanctions.

In fact just think what Ukraine is enduring now. More than every tenth Ukrainian is now a refugee. The GDP of Ukraine has fallen 45%. It basically cannot export it's produce. And it's losing a terrifying number of men daily and the death toll from this war (that started in 2014) will be very high. So wouldn't those kind of effects put Ukrainians into the negotiating table? No, because they see the war literally as an existential threat. And when people feel that they are facing an existential threat, ordinary issues like the standard of living doesn't matter.

However, Ukraine's ability to continue to defend is also highly uncertain. We simply don't know the relative force capabilities on each side at the moment. Damage to Russia's army only matters if there's not equal or greater damage to Ukraine's army.

Every example of damage against the Russians, or then various problems, generally is safe to assume is as bad or worse for the Ukrainians. — boethius

Ukraine is economically absolutely devastated. But then it's fighting for it's survival. Economic hardships don't matter so much, when your facing even greater danger (which Ukrainians can see from the actions of Russians in the occupied territories).

Yet apart from a Crimea-like victorious sudden invasion (which didn't go through), Russia has not the manpower to occupy totally a country as large as Ukraine. Basically what it could do is to gain the area of "Novorossiya", which it is largely holding apart from Odessa and the Western coastline of Ukraine. The inability of Ukraine to contain Russia forces in the Crimean Peninsula has been one of Ukraine's failures in this war.

The "Transnistrian war" was hardly a war: the scale and the forces involved were tiny compared to Donbas. There were, I think, a few old Soviet tanks that were rolled out at one point to intimidate the Moldovan forces - and that proved to be enough. There wasn't much will or ability to fight on the Moldovan side. — SophistiCat

Yes, but do note Transnistria is also tiny compared to the Donbas. Transnistria has a population of 347000 people, perhaps earlier half a million. The breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk have 3,7 million people in them (even if many have left the region).

And, as you noted, Lukashenko is sitting on bayonets as it is; dragging his people into Russia's war against their will is the last thing he wants. — SophistiCat

Totally agree with you and this looks quite evident now.

So far, Kremlin has been accommodating, but one wonders: how long will Putin tolerate this wily, self-willed and treacherous vassal? Will he at some point decide that it would be so much more convenient to have a loyal silovik in charge? Of course, taking over a personalistic, top-down security and patronage system from a man who has been at the helm even longer than Putin would not be easy and smooth. But does Putin realize this? His delusional ideas of how easily he would take over Ukraine do not instill confidence in his judgement. — SophistiCat

I think Putin and Russian's understand that toppling Lukashenko can make things even worse. The last thing Russia would want is to handle political turmoil or at worse, an insurgency in Belarus. That basically Russia can use the territory of Belarus without fears that Ukraine attacking it is enough for now.

If Europe goes through with its divestment from Russian energy, then Russia's game doesn't look so good in the medium term. Oil and gas are not like gold: moving them takes a lot of specialized infrastructure that simply does not exist today and won't come into existence any time soon. And Asia's appetite for Russian energy isn't bottomless either: they'll take what they can if the discount is big enough, but they have other supplies as well. — SophistiCat

Your correct to talk about the medium term: Germany can build LNG ports, steer away from Russian gas, but not before it has to endure next winter. Creating new infrastructure simply takes time and if peace-time development speed is used (with all NIMBYs complaining to courts about the construction) it will take several years.

A real possibility is that today's globalization will morph to a world with competing economic axis: the West and Russia-China opposing each other.

Besides, energy isn't everything, and the rest of Russian economy looks pretty dismal. It will survive, but it needs more than mere survival in order to continue to support long and bloody wars of aggression. — SophistiCat

Russia won't collapse, it will survive, but it won't collapse. Iran and it's sanctions is a good example of this.

Then conscription is unnecessary. People will voluntarily join the army if they understand the need. — Isaac

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.

And if the opponent can invade your country before that, then it's meaningless to try to create an army that will take a year to create. Hence one option is to have conscription to create a large reserve force.

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

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.

With conscription you simply get far more men (in some countries women) to train in the military than by having military service voluntary. (I can speak of my own experience: I would have never thought to join the armed forces if it was voluntary. I simply thought it wasn't for me, I wasn't good in shape, I was a bit shy in my youth and didn't think I was the type for military service. Well, my prejudices about military service were proved false).

With conscription you have the potential for a large reservist army, but naturally then that reserve has to be trained an has to have equipment for it. Large countries opt not have a large reserve. Basically Ukraine has this problem now: it has a lot of potential reservists, but it lacks the equipment and training to form capable military formations from this source.

Russia is a case example where you do have conscription, but basically after the obligatory military service the reservists aren't actually used: there is no logistical system to mobilize them and they haven't been trained afterwards their conscript service. Hence Putin has a real manpower problem, even if there are many under 30-years males that have done their military service as potential reservists. And naturally he doesn't dare to draft reservist from Moscow or St. Petersburg, as this isn't a war, remember? Soviet Union had basically on paper a huge reserve, but mobilizing this reserve would have meant such a gigantic effort, something that to mobilize was basically more theoretical than realistic.

If you're seriously going to advance the argument that every conscript actually wants to fight then we've nothing more to say. — Isaac

Your strawmanning again, Isaac

Even in a volunteer force likely not every one will fight when the bullets start flying.

Conscription is about the aims of the state, not the population. — 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.

Yet answer this, if conscription is about the aims of the state, not the population, then just what aims of the state aren't for itself, but for the people?

The question is about why the state overrides the decision of its citizens about the relative harms. — Isaac

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.

When a foreign entity attacks a country and the people find themselves in a war, similar debate of relative harms isn't useful. People do understand the threat if the cities they live in are bombed.

As I said, if the state would override its citizens actual will, the army simply would surrender or even simply melt away. The idea that any state can force people to take up arms when they don't want to, simply will not happen. Sure, there can be (and usually are) some individuals, but do not underestimate the ability of people to do something collectively.

Perhaps you should give a historical example where the state overrides the decision of its citizens about the relative harms to advance this discussion.

What is the something that it tells? — boethius

Just from where the most participants are from (mainly from the Anglosphere). Which is quite natural as we use English.

Sure, many people don't care about any war, participated in discussing this one to jump on the social media virtue signalling band-waggon before hopping off. — boethius

Well, let's hope participating on a Philosophy forum isn't virtue signalling.

As for the current state of the war, counter offensive against Kershon does not seem to be working.

I would guess that the second last batch of weapons was predicated on the promise of holding out in Dombas, and now the latest batch of weapons is predicated on a promise of counter offensive in Kershon.

If this counter-offensive fails, "allies" will continue to wind-down their arms shipments to Ukraine, continue to deescalate with Russia, and forget about Ukraine. — boethius

This is a real possibility, I agree.

It seems that already Russia has signaled that it will take a break. And likely Ukraine doesn't have the ability to muster a large counterattack. There is the possibility that the war does what it did after 2014-2015: become a stalemate. Or at least for the time being until Russia simply can train new batches of conscripts and add up the needed materiel.

On the economic "sanctions"-front, I think that Russia has played it's cards very well. It simply is just such a large supplier of natural resources that the World cannot simply disregard it. The logical way for the West to counter this would be to try a push the price of oil and gas down by increasing production, but that would go against what has been set as goal to curb climate change. German energy policy of having relied to Russian energy with closing down nuclear plants and now having to open coal plants show how clueless the West actually is here.

Ukraine is still just one issue among others and Putin knows that.

Are you talking about your own comments? — boethius

Hopefully not. :roll:

But this thread is now going to be 300 pages and some have this fixation that the most important issue talked about should be the US tells something.

I don't see why people would be surprised that the subject of an ongoing war isn't in the framework of the usual academic decorum, hedged language, and polite patting on the back for everyone participating in an obscure, unimportant, and zero-stakes intellectual masterbation session. — boethius

Usually they are like that... as people really don't get heated up about various armed groups fighting in a civil war in a country that they have problem finding on a map.

Well, as I'm now writing an answer to you from just a bit over 9 kilometers from the border of one participant in this war, yeah, for me it's more important than let's say the war in Ethiopia. Which itself is also interesting (and important) as peace might finally be found there.

Where in that are you reading the question "what factors determine how effective a conscript army is?" — Isaac

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.

The obvious answer every armed forces would give is that their interests are both the people and the existing power structures, irrelevant of the armed forces being made up of conscripts/reservists or a volunteer force. Since a volunteer army is made of countries own citizens also, the question is actually a bit confusing. (I guess the Vatican's Swiss Guard is the only force that is genuinely made up of foreigners and not it's own citizens. There might be other mini-states with similar issues.)

If the military's primary function is to "save the existing power structure", it likely means that it's focus is on the domestic threat towards the state. For many Third World countries this is the primary objective of the armed forces: they aren't worried about foreign countries or neighbors invading them. But they are worried about keeping things peaceful inside the country. Hence the size of the wartime military depends on the size of the domestic population itself. If the primary function of the military is to deter foreign threats, meaning that the armed forces can deter hostile nations from invading the country, then obviously those threats form the requirements for your army for it to create a credible deterrence.

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.

One way to check the health of a democracy would be to see whether the will of the people is manifest in the laws. Along these lines, we'd want to see if the laws favored the rich minority or a non-rich majority. — Pie

This is a good point.

Someone made this inquiry from the US and the results absolutely horrible. What the voters wanted didn't matter much if anything in the actual implemented policies!

So? What's that got to do with conscription? — 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.

Conscription is basically a manpower issue. Yet how motivated and well trained conscripts/reservists depends on a lot of things starting from geopolitics and the society itself.

If you haven't got anything to say on that topic, maybe just focus on other threads? — 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.

Then conscription is unnecessary. So why instigate it. — Isaac

Conscription is basically a manpower issue: if you have enough people to man a wartime army on a volunteer basis, then you can have voluntary service.

If you didn't have enough manpower otherwise to counter a foe in the 20th Century (Israel, Finland, Switzerland) then conscription and basically a reservist army is the answer. The war in Ukraine has now shown that manpower in the 21st Century is important: smart gizmos won't do the trick.

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

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.

I've said again and again: Governments don't decide if people are willing to fight for them or not. The state can put you into the army, it can give you an uniform and an assault rifle and try to teach you to fight. But once in the battlefield, no authority will make you fight. You can always raise your hands and hope that the enemy will accept your surrender. Or you can try to flee, put on civilian clothes and try to make it home or to go abroad and hope to get political asylum somewhere.

Hence it's not just the government's decision to choose war or to choose surrender. Even if the government surrenders, military resistance or an insurgency can develop however willing a new government is to serve the new masters.

It's not a fair comparison: life in Donbas was pretty miserable even before the invasion. — SophistiCat

Yes. Although there was the Transnistrian war in 1990-1992, which was rather similar (as the war in Donbas 2014-2022).

The bigger player here that is and hopefully will stay inactive is of course Belarus. There are Belarussian fighters fighting in the lines of Ukraine, questionable support for the current leadership (after the massive demonstrations put down with violence) and basically no reason for Belarus to attack it's southern neighbor. Hence it's likely that the current situation will prevail with Belarus giving Russian forces a ground to operate, but won't join themselves the fighting.

Even the Ukrainians have observed this:

(30th July, 2022) The situation has not undergone significant changes in the Volyn and Polissia directions. There have been no signs of the formation of offensive groups by the armed forces of the Russian Federation and the armed forces of the Republic of Belarus. The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said this in its morning report published on Facebook, Ukrinform reports.

Otherwise if Belarus would be involved the clusterfuck would start to resemble the Russia Civil War.

The question is why, in this specific case, the government does that weighing and then forces it's decision on its people.

It doesn't seem to behave that way in any other case. I can't think of a single thing people are otherwise forced to do with such a massive risk of harm, on the basis of the government's idea of the pros and cons. — Isaac

The simple fact is that there is in war a massive risk of harm and to be defeated in a war the whole society takes also a massive risk. And the people also understand this. You are making a separation with the government and the people here as if the threat would not be extremely dangerous for everybody in the society.

The simple fact is that especially in case of war "the government" isn't some different entity from the people making decisions to fight a war totally independently from the people. It's delusional to think any government or regime would contemplate war or to defend itself by military means if there is no support for this from it's people for this. If there's not the will to fight, whatever the government decides is irrelevant. The soldiers will either surrender or will shed their uniforms and run away and simply go home. In war not only the army of the opposing side becomes the enemy, also the people are under intense scrutiny from the attackers.

You’d think that would bring inflation down — but hasn’t. — Xtrix

Well, just look at how high the Fed had to raise the interest rates in the 80's for the inflation to ease off. Real interest rates were back then positive. Now positive real interest rates would be a disaster and that's the basic problem.

The Fed can do nothing about oil and gas supplies. Nothing. And it’s this that’s driving inflation so high. — Xtrix

You are right. And that's why actually the Russian linking their ruble to commodities (that you have to use rubles to buy their resources) made the ruble so strong.

Yet high oil prices are like an applied handbrake to the economy. The recession is the cure for it... assuming a recession is tolerated in an election year. Copper prices are a classic indicator for future economic activity and copper prices took a dip.

The Fed will continue lowering rates until we hit recession. — Xtrix

Uh, I think you meant raising. Technically we are in a recession. Two quarters of negative growth just happened.

The U.S. economy shrank in the last three months by 0.9%.

This is the second consecutive quarter where the economy has contracted. In the first quarter, GDP, or gross domestic product, decreased at an annual rate of 1.6%. While two consecutive quarters of negative growth is often considered a recession, it's not an official definition.

The last bit is typically added now to near every story about this. :smirk:

So let's see how solid inflation-fighter the Fed will be.

We don't take kindly to people inquirin' 'bout climate change 'round these places. — Tzeentch

:smile:

The administrator will quickly take you out into the woods and before you know it...BANNED!!!

(Or something like that, eh?)

. Of course, there are logical similarities with Russell's Paradox and the Cretan Liar. — alan1000

Why in my view is correct.

This is why mathematics isn't just one enormous tautology.

Well, I've tried to give examples of that (to fight or to surrender) when it comes to war, but you respond that it's irrelevant. So that's why I'm a bit confused what your point is.

That’s not why we have inflation. We have inflation because of the supply chain. — Xtrix

So how long are you going to believe the official "supply chain" argument? — ssu

Well, it has been seven months from this exchange. All only a supply chain problem, still?



Of course there are many reasons for the inflation, the effects of the pandemic, the war and both previous fiscal and monetary policy. But as the US is now in recession, it's interesting to see what the Fed will actually do from here onwards.



Let's see how much inflation reduction that bill is going to create.

It can go to that. In the end common sense should prevail.

But the other option, that the trade unions are non-existent (or illegal) can lead to very ugly situations.

A lot of times it can feel like "workplace democracy", which especially the Swedish like with their (företagsdemokrati): A nice thought to empower and integrate everyone to the decision process, yet is hypocritical in the end as some obviously carry the risks and reap the rewards more than others. After all, the CEO and the summer intern aren't equal stakeholders in any organization.

How is any of that related to the discussion. — Isaac

It's very related, because war can cause such immense destruction and death, it is something you cannot easily relate to peace actions of the state. You should understand that.

Are you claiming that more people want to be shot than want to be ruled by Russia? — Isaac

I have no idea what you are talking about here.

I'm still waiting on those examples your argument requires of government action which impose a risk of death for a non-unanimous gain. — Isaac

I don't understand what you point here is.

Or is it just why would countries and their people defend themselves with military force and opt for war rather than surrender?

Love in theory and hate in practice?

Isn't that a bit hypocritical?

Let's look at what that meant for example for Estonia: — ssu

It's irrelevant. No one is claiming that being invaded is good. — Isaac

Apart from you, who just above asked "How many would be happy to be ruled by Russia?" and answer yourself "it's a notable portion".

Well, the Sudetenland Germans were enthusiastic about the German annexation too. But the Czechs and the Slovaks weren't for some reason.

When it comes to Ukraine, I think we have seen just where some people are happy with being ruled by Russia and just in what parts of Ukraine they aren't. Yet this isn't a topic for this thread.

So with a clear and definite harm on one side, and an ambiguous, uncertain harm on the other, by what precedent does the government consider forcing people to take a very high risk of torture and death to avoid such an uncertain outcome. — Isaac

Why do you assume that not fighting a war the other option is "an ambiguous, uncertain harm on the other"? What are your examples for this idea?

OK. The Baltic states decided not to fight the Soviet Union and ended up annexed. Let's look at what that meant for example for Estonia:

War (WW2) and occupation deaths listed in the current reports total at 81,000. These include deaths in Soviet deportations in 1941, Soviet executions, German deportations, and victims of the Holocaust in Estonia.

In 1939 Estonia had a population of 1,1 million hence that means that 7% of the population died. Nearly all Estonian officers and the political and economic elite were purged immediately by the Soviets. Over 100 000 were forced either to the Red Army or to the German army and bitter battles were fought in Estonia during WW2. Over the course of the war, Estonia lost a fifth of its population as compared to its pre-war population. Several Estonia’s traditional ethnic minorities, Germans, Swedes and Jews, had left the country or were exterminated.

If you think this is normal behaviour for governments, you shouldn't have any trouble coming up with a similar action. Something where the harm is near certain injury, torture and death, the benefits are not even agreed upon, and the government gives no choice. — Isaac

War isn't normal.

Certain injury, torture or death is also very possible when the government chooses to surrender when faced the threat of war. Where do you get this idea that countries that invade others are somehow very benign and friendly to the people they conquer? Hasn't been so in history, isn't so in the present.

You have very strange ideas about war and just in what conditions nations choose to defend themselves with military force.

Yeah, and no one appears to be keen on reigniting it. Russia has its hands full with its present war, which it doesn't know how to end without losing face. It doesn't have a common border with Moldova. For an invasion it would need to establish a land corridor through southern Ukraine, which now appears to be a remote possibility. — SophistiCat

For the time being, yes.

But this unfortunately is likely to be a long war. Even if I hope I'm wrong here.

Transnistria is the least interested in upsetting the status quo. All these years they've been left alone, enjoying generous subsidies from Russia in the form of virtually free gas and a share of the Trans-Balkan pipeline. On the other side Transnistrians can travel freely to mainland Moldova (and from there visa-free to the EU), since most Transnistrians have Moldovan passports. While in theory, people there are staunchly pro-Russian, having been fed a steady diet of Russian TV, they like things to stay just as they are. — SophistiCat

Ask yourself, @SophistiCat, does Russia or anybody really listen to the Transnistrians when deciding on these matters?

In fact before February 24th for a long time things in the Donbas were rather similar to what you stated above from Transnistria: people could move back and forth to Ukraine and Ukraine even paid pensions to people in the Donbas People's Republics. I'm sure the people that actually supported Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics back in 2014 aren't so enthusiastic about how things are going now.

Let's take your assumption for granted. Israel would have ended up under the Palestinian thumb had it lost. — Isaac

Actually under Egyptian and Syrian rule. In 1948 the Arab countries didn't give a damn about the Palestinians, they were trying to conquer as much of the former British Mandate as possible. But onward...

That's not the question the OP is asking. The question the OP is asking is why does a state feel compelled to decide in opposition to those citizens, which state of affairs is preferable - war, or Palestinian rule. — Isaac

I'm not sure I get your point here. The state always tries to do what is the best for and understandably there always will be some who oppose it's policies.

Rarely but sometimes states have decided voluntarily to join another one. For example East Germany and West Germany uniting. Or North Yemen and South Yemen uniting (which later didn't go so well).

The oddity the OP is picking up on is that in the case of war, the decision (of literally life and death magnitude) is not only removed from any democratic process, but removed from personal choice too. — Isaac

This is the utter fallacy of people living in countries which go to war without any repercussions or effects on the country's own people AND have a paid volunteer army.

The fallacy is that it makes a big difference in war that if you have conscription or not. Well, in wars the city you live can be targeted by the enemy where you live, and you can die even if you would be totally against the war or any policies your state implements. Once war means that you are going to fight it on your own background, the question of mandatory or volunteer service is a simple manpower issue.

Yet if your country just fights "colonial wars" in other continents without any threat posed to your civilian population, you have no need for conscription. Or that conscription in the end will backfire, just as it did for the regime of Portugal in 1974.

The question is why the government forcibly imposes its conclusion on that weighing exercise when it doesn't do so in many other far less impactful decisions. — Isaac

We live in representative democracies. In these, the decision to go to war is usually done by the Parliament or a similar institution. These institutions already decide what we can do and can't do on a daily basis. Hence you can argue that the government forcibly imposes it's agenda on to you at a daily basis. In things that it considers dangerous for the collective, these regulations can be far more drastic than otherwise. Just think about the limitations you were forced to live under the pandemic. And wars typically are the most dangerous things for the collective.

So what's the problem?

Socialism is a commonsense way for the wee folk to deal with the oligarchs ? (OK, maybe I just mean I'd the US to be more like Denmark.) — Pie

Socialism basically means that means of production is owned by the state or the collective.

There being oligarchs means that a small group not only has wealth, which has been acquired through illegal means, but also has power over others. In a functioning democracy there can be rich individuals, but that doesn't mean they would control the legislative and political branch of the government.

Hence in Denmark the richest people do have an important say in public matters, but they don't control the politics as to be oligarchs or have gotten their wealth through corruption. (At least I've not heard about Danes speaking of Danish oligarchs.)

A far better example of what? Blair was a much a neoliberal as anyone. — Xtrix

But that's the point!

Modern Social Democracy is part of modern capitalism. It's objectives are to curb the excesses of capitalism (as they see it), yet not to demolish capitalism. Even if they don't say that openly. They understand capitalism works and as democrats, they understand that they have to upkeep democracy, which means that there will be people with other ideas also.

In Sweden the Social Democratic party has been in power for I guess well over hundred years now. And what is Sweden? It's capitalist, with IKEA and Volvo cars. The result is a rather wealthy population and not so many billionaires, less income inequality than in the US and a large welfare state.

This is the part to understand from trade unions: they fit happily to the capitalist system and the economy can be very free market even with them. Trade unions, if they get powerful in the US, won't change the system. Sorry. They aren't going to be an engine of change. Even Marx admitted this possibility (unfortunately I don't remember just where the quote came) that the proletariat might not fight for the revolution, but simply demand higher wages. And along with safety issues and other work related stuff, higher wages are the objectives of trade unions.

And this is why in the US both the right-wing (which wants to demonize the left) and the left-wing (which wants to demonize capitalism) don't actually talk so much about the European style social democracy. The left-wing of the Democratic party goes to the length of even talking about themselves as 'Democratic Socialists', not social democrats. As if there would be a difference.

But 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

Simple answer: Those countries where armed forces are there to protect the existing power structures don't have conscription, usually. The last thing they would want is for their people to be trained to use arms and fight in a disciplined manner. Remember that the largest threat to existing power structures comes from the society itself.

Countries that face an existential risk usually do have conscription (and a reservist army). The question you asked is then quite easy to answer. Think about Israel. If Israel in the Six-day war or in the Yom Kippur war would have lost, been utterly defeated by the Arab armies, you really think it would just have been "a change in existing power structures"?

I'm pretty sure that if now it was the Palestinians that have endured their Nakba and have become second rate citizens in their homeland, or in Gaza inmates of a huge concentration camp, the same or worse fate would have happened to the Israelis, if the Jewish state lost a war.

When confronted with environmental problems, the green movement latched onto some pre-existing religious myths that seems vaguely applicable. — ChatteringMonkey

With the debate about nuclear, this is true.

But I have to say that many greens have been respectable enough to change their minds about nuclear energy and have not latched on the popular myths.

I think it's a problem for all political parties: when your base intensely believes in some myth which isn't true, they won't start to correct their supporters, even if they know it's not true.

We are seeing now quite clearly that the mantra "we just have to turn to renewable energy sources" isn't the short term answer that we can pick.

However, without the radical element the labor movement dies -- we see that in the United States as labor bureaucrats pushed out the radical elements in response to anti-communist propaganda. — Moliere

Well, looking at my country, or Sweden, I really don't find a "radical element" in our (or the Swedish) labor movement. After all, the Nordic model is called Social corporatism, which is institutionalized and basically part of the political structure in these countries.

Far away from radicalism.

According to some, unionization itself is just one step away from communism. The problem isn't whether unions are socialist, it's why socialism has gotten so demonized that it's assumed unions are "bad" by association. — Xtrix

If unionization is one step away from communism, then that 98% of Finnish active officers belong to a trade union makes me smile. After all, it's just an army that has since it's inception fought and prepared to fight Bolshevism, the Soviet Union and Soviet infiltration until the end of the Cold War and basically has been the only institution where Finlandization didn't happen at all. You really will not find in Finnish officer ranks an officer with political ideas like Hugo Chavez.

But generally I think the basic problem is that many Americans don't understand Social Democracy, or basically don't see it. Socialism is too many times simply related to communism (or earlier Marxism-Leninism) and now the examples given are Venezuela and Cuba.

Far better example would be the United Kingdom and it's Labour party and politicians like Tony Blair or Gordon Brown (not just Jeremy Corbyn). Looking at the UK, just for example, shows how actually successful social democracy has been. Corporatism and Social Corporatism might seem just one wheel in the capitalist system. In the end economies are a complex thing and there are many unique aspects in the US economy that differ a lot from other countries.