Re: The Sovereign State and Its Competitors

Michael Lorrey (retroman@tpk.net)
Tue, 01 Apr 1997 17:21:23 -0500


Robin Hanson wrote:
>
> Michael Lorrey writes:
> >Seeing an invasion even a few hours away would enable Silicon Valley
> >businesses to dump their mainframes onto systems at remote locations,
> >and provided that their employees for the most part make it out with
> >their brains intact, can rebuild their company with only minimal
> >losses, possibly as little as a 30-50% loss in value. ...
> >High tech industries can operate defensively in a scorched earth
> >retreat strategy.
>
> Maybe I'm misunderstanding you two. What I hear is "We no longer need
> centralized military coordination because we can just run away when
> attacked." But this seems crazy to me. Even if a single firm loses
> 30-50% of their value in such a move, groups of firms could lose much
> more if they failed to coordinate to all move to the same place in
> such a way as to preserve their business relations (based in part on
> geographic proximity). Also, individuals would lose houses and
> personal possessions, communities would lose roads, shopping centers,
> etc. It seems to me we are far from the point where the losses from
> moving are less than the losses from defending via central military
> coordination.
>

WHile running away per se is not my own cup of tea, the first mandate of
maintaining a viable insurgency (i.e. successful guerrilla camapaign,
not necessarily being centrally controlled) is establishing sources and
routes of supply and relief outside the zone of conflict. In any such
conflict, while con-combatants in the current sense are much like serfs
tied to the land in the feudal sense, in a high tech battle, anyone with
a brain is a combatant. The rules of war dictate eliminating the enemy's
ability to sustain combat, and barring that, denying victory in denying
the victor the spoils. I.E: If you can't win, make sure the other guy
pays dearly for the victory.

WHile the prospect of losing house and home is not fun, a sorched earth
strategy allows for at least denying the invader the profit of use of
the assets you lose. Boobytrapping anything and everything are mandated.

-- 
TANSTAAFL!!!
			Michael Lorrey
------------------------------------------------------------
mailto:retroman@tpk.net		Inventor of the Lorrey Drive
Agent Lorrey@ThePentagon.com
Silo_1013@ThePentagon.com	http://www.tpk.net/~retroman/

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