Also, re: defense-in-depth for the Pacific: the recommended analyses are Shattered Sword and Fire in the Sky. Basically, Japan's ocean-defense strategy relied on overlapping island outposts with airfields to hold the enemy, long enough for the Kido Butai and the main surface force to scream in and obliterate the enemy. Two problems developed. One, the US built up the Fast Carrier Task Force so that by the end of 1943 it was capable of standing off an island fortress and attriting Japanese airpower into uselessness, a capability the Japanese never could have developed (even the mighty Kido Butai was a raiding force; it couldn't slug it out with an islanded enemy without ground-based air support). And two, Kido Butai got its face pushed in at Midway, meaning that the island bastions were no longer nodes in an integrated defense system, but isolated strongholds that could be blasted, invaded, or bypassed at will.
edited 12th Sep '14 6:57:57 PM by SabresEdge
Charlie Stross's cheerful, optimistic predictions for 2017, part one of three.I am not sure how big the difference is. From what I can recall it wasn't really a big difference and appropriate application can likely make up for the difference in power or there is so little difference it really doesn't matter outside of specific circumstances. As for hard to detect that is likely true. It has the reputation in general for being harder to detect due to the different chemical composition.
Who watches the watchmen?Hey guys, with the focus on more "brown water" capability, it looks like the Navy is getting back into the patrol boat game
, with the first of the new Mk. VI patrol boats arriving.
^^ And the sad thing is that except for endurance those are probably more capable than the LCS.
In regards to soldiers as hostages, probably unsurprisingly Duffelblog contributes to the discussion.
Unfortunately, even in jest that article has more than a bit of truth to it.
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I find DuffelBlog hilarious and I'm not even American or in uniform: Army War College welcomes foreign exchange class of future brutal dictators.
What reasons could there be for a Private Military Company's leadership that is mainly in the PMC business for profit above all else (including morality, thus claiming to be Above Good and Evil) to consider Psycho for Hire and/or Sociopathic Soldier as preferable traits in the contractors that they employ?
edited 13th Sep '14 7:53:02 AM by MarqFJA
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.Intimidation of the enemies, basically. Maybe the bosses of that PMC did hear of the (alleged; I am not sure if it's true but that is not important here) military strategy of the Mongols to commit war crimes (by contemporary standards) to scare their enemies into submission.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanAnd this is why mercenaries have no rights as Po Ws and such...
'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'Jones: That is an exaggeration and a gross one at that. Even most mercenaries are seldom so outwardly brutal or deranged. I don't personally like that they fight for money but they are still people. Also last I checked many of the enemies the US has gone against frankly didn't give a shit about POW rights to begin with regardless of where they POW was from.
Who watches the watchmen?PS:
- When I said "Psycho for Hire" and "Sociopathic Soldier", I was including the Rape, Pillage, and Burn sorts. In fact, try to take into account as many of the common variants listed in each trope's article as possible.
- Would replacing "preferable" with "tolerable" result in different answers?
edited 13th Sep '14 8:52:34 AM by MarqFJA
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.Which makes them open for recruitment by the more unscrupulous PMCs that either don't care for their psychopathy or actively seek it for one reason or the other, right?
edited 13th Sep '14 9:06:00 AM by MarqFJA
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.Marq: Not necessarily. Even the PMC's prefer folks who are reasonably stable. Erratic violent individuals like that tend to be bad for your bottom line and draw the attention of authorities.
You are more likely to find that kind of mentally unhinged sort in an institutionalized sort of org. Some of the SS/Gestapo fit that more then a PMC. Same for Pol Pot's Death Squads, or other similar groups. Even then the Heer of Nazi Germany were the least likely to be the drooling psychopaths.
That is to say troops can't degenerate into that with enough exposure to brutality and harshness but the vast majority won't outright evil bastards like that.
Who watches the watchmen?Just to clarify: When I said "the more unscrupulous PMCs", I wasn't comparing them to regular militaries; I was comparing them to more scrupulous PMCs. Maybe I should've said "the more unscrupulous among PMCs"...
That said, AFAIK, psychopathy/sociopathy does not necessarily entail that the afflicted person would be a total nutjob who will disobey orders on a whim just to indulge his sadistic side.
Would an environment where Corporate Warfare is not that uncommon be conducive to a considerably increased proportion of "Rape, Pillage, and Burn"-willing psychopaths/sociopaths on the average don't-care-about-psychopathy-if-you-will-do-your-job-well PMC's payroll?
edited 13th Sep '14 9:18:33 AM by MarqFJA
Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
rollin' on dubs
Blackwater and other PMC's were looking for anyone with military experience and in the early stages of OIF and OEF turned a blind eye to troops with lots of UCMJ actions and other problems. Steroid and other drugs were rampant among PMC's and again they turned a blind eye as long as the contract was paid out.
They were caught and they were forced to clean up their act. Unlike a government, a PMC has few rights when one of their employees breaks the law. The only thing shielding them would be their employeer (too desperate to toss them out) or they run back to a nation like the US (who can bail them out politically).
Even then, Blackwater is "no more' and is a shadow or it's former self.
A False Flag Operation is a terrible idea in this age of social media and even poor farmers having cell phones with cameras. A Psycho for Hire is a bad idea, they chicken out when the work gets tough and go crazy from boredom. Plus they will just go for the bigger paycheck.
edited 13th Sep '14 9:22:58 AM by TairaMai
I tried to walk like an Egyptian and now I need to see a Cairo practor....

In other words, Sherman with thicker armor and bigger gun.
Hello, Easy Eight, nice to see you too.
Charlie Stross's cheerful, optimistic predictions for 2017, part one of three.