From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@yahoo.com)
Date: Mon Mar 24 2003 - 07:07:57 MST
--- Amara Graps <amara@amara.com> wrote:
>
> According to this author's categorization, I would be one of those
> who say "there would be no state to conquer". I don't mind. I'm glad
> that this author has given a lot of thought to the concept, and I
> appreciate the many people who are thinking and looking into this
> idea. Preston analyzes Hoppe, and he does address the free rider
> problem. Whether that is satisfactory, is up to the readers.
Amara, while I wouldn't dream of second guessing you on astronomical
matters, I'd hope you'd defer to people who actually have military
experience in such matters as defense.
When one state conquers another, it may be fighting another state, but
it's goal is not to take over the government. Putting a puppet state in
place is simply an expedient toward the real goal: obtaining the
economic assets for one's sphere of influence or outright domestic
needs.
An anarchist territory faced with a governed state agressor is still
conquerable, it is just that there is no central authority to issue a
surrender from. The conqueror is only interested in obtaining the
economic productivity of the territory for its own sphere of influence
and to expand its own tax base. Since the overriding principle of
anarchy is self sovereignty, an invader is going to have to pacify the
entire territory, which may or may not be a difficult job, depending on
the attitudes of the residents of that territory.
If the residents are anti-gun pacifist anarchists, they will get rolled
over like bowling pins.
If the residents are pro-gun non-initiation-of-force anarchists, that
is another story entirely. Conquest will be difficult and messy, but is
still quite possible provided the conquering state does not feel bound
by any international standards of behavior (Geneva Conventions) or feel
vulnerable to media scrutiny (i.e. no free press). Conquest is also
dependent upon whether the anarchist partisans are able to obtain
materiel support and shelter from third parties.
The Soviet experience in Afghanistan is a good example of such a
conflict, yet it can be seen from the US experience there a decade
later that a certain degree of technical superiority, in both equipment
and training, can largely eliminate any advantage the local anarchists
may have once had, even when the conqueror is under both media scrutiny
and feels bound by international standards of behavior.
Training is a big component that is largely overlooked by anarchist
theorists in defense. Anarchists are generally very individualist. They
do what they feel like doing and don't do what they don't feel like
doing. They are not prone to subjecting themselves to military
discipline or to enjoying such experience when they do. Anarchists are
both strategically and tactically weak in that it takes lots of
consensus building to put together a plan of action, leaders
(facilitators) are elected, and any change in the plan will be met with
lots of opposition from individuals with their own opinions.
Todays modern military unit will find that 90% of its effectiveness is
entirely due to the cohesiveness that comes from long term and well
managed training of its members. These are members who have no problem
subsuming their egos to the dictates of the unelected commander who
achieves his position based on experience, training, and merit. They
must subsume their egos for extended periods of time and extended
amounts of training.
While much hoopla is made in the media today of the whiz-bang high tech
weaponry the US has, that weaponry is useless in the hands of those
improperly trained in its integration into unit tactics. Anarchists buy
into this, thinking "Gee, any anarchist economy is going to be
technologically more advanced (despite the examples of Afghanistan and
Somalia), so all we need are weapons of similar technological level."
This is an opinion based on ignorance.
Some anarchists have taken this to heart. We see in the modern
anti-globalization movement that groups like the Merry Pranksters have
established anarchist boot camps to train individuals to be the
anarchist equivalents of 'A-Team' members. An "A-Team", in Vietnam era
parlance, is a small unit of a handful of highly trained soldiers (3-5
members) who will penetrate an area, develop relationships with the
locals, and build a local firebase with local help and recruit and
train several platoons of local militia to man the firebase and patrol
the local region for enemy activity.
Such anarchist "A-Teams" are the heart of every anti-globalization
protest held to date. They are impressive in the numbers of individuals
they have been able to recruit, and in the vehemence that has been
built in local recruits. The propaganda they use and disseminate in
local schools and colleges is of paramount importance, but that is
another story.
Such events generally attract sufficient numbers that the many jobs the
A-Team has planned to make the protest effective can be filled just
from the fact that a large enough pool has a sufficiently diverse
degree of interests. The 'consensus meetings' that are put together are
generally shams. The A-Team members are the facilitators and they
always have several previously recruited individuals in the audience to
give the answers and ideas, approval and support they need to fulfill
the plan already agreed to.
While the anarchists use a lot of effective tactics, their plans are
generally very simplistic (move x many people from point a to point b)
or become so complex that the protest fails and is overwhelmed by
police. Many times the presence of other A-Teams with their own
organiztions causes conflict and confusion. While they usually have an
advantage in numbers and morale, protests usually fall apart because
protestors, like poorly trained militia or conscripts, crack in the
face of enemy opposition.
There is currently no known facilities for advanced unit training of
entire anarchist groups. These would be the anarchist equivalents of
the US Army's Fort Erwin facility in California.
Now, all the anarchist activities I've spoken of so far are entirely
non-martial in nature. For an anarchist group to build the same unit
cohesiveness that US Army units have, as actual military units
defending an anarchist ungoverned territory, the anarchists would need
a facility of roughly equivalent size and scope. At Fort Erwin,
multiple units can fight entire mock wars with all their actions under
the monitoring of training cadre. Battles can be fought over and over
again, with every tactic, from the unit to the individual soldier,
cross examined and improvements suggested. It is this sort of
experience and training that anarchist military units will need to
fight effectively against an advanced organized state military.
To date, I have met very few anarchists who are pro-gun. Those who are
tend to be the very most militant and hard-core types who are the heart
of the anarchist movement. They are Vietnam vets who served in A-Teams
and they see the current movement as simply a non-violent prelude to an
outright socialist revolution.
The primary problem I see with any anarchist society is that its
members will tend far more toward the bambi-lover non-violent types
than the type necessary to put together effective anarchist militia
units with sufficient training to mount effective defenses against
state agression.
=====
Mike Lorrey
"Live Free or Die, Death is not the Worst of Evils."
- Gen. John Stark
"Pacifists are Objectively Pro-Fascist." - George Orwell
"Treason doth never Prosper. What is the Reason?
For if it Prosper, none Dare call it Treason..." - Ovid
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