Having a private military for some reason reminds me of terrorist groups...

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Believing that McAfee is going to protect you from hackers and viruses is exactly like believing that republicans can actually protect you from terrorists.

When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die.

Theres always need for supply and more often then not specialized security. So these companies make money during times of peace as well..just more so during war.

Alot of the military function if you look closely is "privatized" not in and of itself but for instance by using private contractors to deliver food, fuel, ammo, whatever to US military bases or whatnot.
These can include everything from Haliburton to UPS.


Companies like Blackwater provide more security oriented type support. IE you have a Diplomat in Iraq who needs security while he does his thing.
Now you can use regular military to do this..or you can hire these people thus getting the security as well as not using these regular soldiers up for such activities.



Way to much willy nilly well get rid of this and don't do that..without thinking what not doing that means in reality.

If you don't like the level of Privatization now then your going to have to increase the size of the military...becasue the roles being filled now by these private companies HAVE to be filled.


http://www.blackwaterusa.com/







(The Nazi compariosn adn such and disgusting crap. The people doing that are smearing people who are often 10-20 year veterans of the United States Military who have risked their lives in more 'undisclosed' operations then some of the people badmouthing them have likely been alive...and to put salt in the woudn they did it FOR the peace of mind the people badmouthing them enjoy)

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"We make war that we may live in peace"
"...peace is the highest aspiration of the American People. We will negotiate for it, sacrifice for it, we will never surrender for it, now or ever."
"War critics can no longer credibly argue that we are losing in Iraq, so now they argue the war costs too much."
"Oderint dum metuant"
http://members.cox.net/neddy/bobhope_kerfuffles.wmv
http://youtube.com/watch?v=RnfflRNpwKA
http://youtube.com/watch?v=j-QYIP7o2-A

for example, a pilot is commercially available and can be contracted out.
however, the bomber behind him is inherently governmental and must be a federal employee.
see how simple this is

see: Federal Acquisition Regulation, Office of Federal Procurement Policy Letter 93-1
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/procur...-1_051894.html

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1.20.09 - the end of an error

"The people who cast the votes don't decide an election, the people who count the votes do." Joseph Stalin

Life is a sexually transmitted disease having a 100% fatality rate

Unless ofcourse the military is replaced with machines.

I personally live in a family that is now funded by privatized military so yes of course i want it, although it has its down sides The unity of the country is broken, capitalism again becomes a (*)(*)(*)(*)(*) ect. but if the privatized military becomes banned or w/e The military needs to have many less regulations, a military is not their to play footsies it's their to Intimidate, Capture, Rescue, and Kill. and thats how it should be nothing more

I'm not in the military, but I know a lot of folks in the military. One of the things they tell me is that a lot of their job doesn't get much press. One guy I know spent a lot of time in Iraq building basketball courts. Which actually seems to me like a pretty good use of time in the long term, but a somewhat surreal use of time in the short term.

It seems to me like the military does a lot of construction and engineering. Is this not so?

I don't have a problem with privatizing the non-combat functions of the military. For instance, military personnel run the mail delivery systems (i.e., post office). They serve food. They cook food.

There is no reason that these roles can't be played by cheaper civilians.

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I gave myself to Jesus, but now he never calls.

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There are only two things wrong with this great nation of ours, democrats and republicans!

Not necessarily in that order.

Preamble:

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

"provide for the common defense"

At this current time with the current technology and level of corporate responsibility and the level of the suppressing with the introduction of new technology would it be correct to have a privatized military?

Currently, there is a balance because of the existence of "militias",gun rights groups and state controlled military.

If any side becomes stronger it would create an imbalance into the society especially a society where some have not controlled their human emotions and impulses for power.

If there is any private control then it would have to be run by someone who respects the constitution and the natural rights of others.

Another part of the Constitution states:

Article 1 -
Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

Would a private military entity would have this function also:

To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;

Or would this private entity declare war on all threats or would it neglect parts of the union (nation-state) because of its own self-interest???

Privatizing the military may introduce a spiraling of how the Roman empire collapsed.

The powers of the state is through congress:

To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;

Looking through Article 1 we could sense that the state would have control of private enterprises as long as those enterprises are loyal to the state. Total independence of private armies would be impossible under the directive of the U.S. Constitution.

Then we go back to a further stipulation and we observe that the U.S. state/government is at times obligated to respect other nation's laws or another body of laws (non-U.S. Constitution):

To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;

It also says concerning "militias":

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

further to also explain the powers of the individual state within the union which also could express the limited powers of any "private" entity:

Section 10. No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility.

No state shall, without the consent of the Congress, lay any imposts or duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it's inspection laws: and the net produce of all duties and imposts, laid by any state on imports or exports, shall be for the use of the treasury of the United States; and all such laws shall be subject to the revision and control of the Congress.

No state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops, or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.

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My point being that any idea of a totally private enterprise independent of the confines of the directives of the U.S. Congress would be considered illegal.

Yes, an amendment is possible. Yet again, the current realities and the current human impulse for power would curtail any possibility of total privatization of the military.

"Article V -
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate. "

Again Private armies could decide not to be loyal to U.S. or neglect some states would be violating this stipulation:

Section 3. Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The existence of "militias" and the right to self-defense is noted in the 2nd Amendment:

Amendment II

2nd Amendment

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

Let us read parts of "COMMON SENSE" by Thomas Paine concerning the distinctions between human wants and government:

Of the Origin and Design of Government in General, with Concise Remarks on the English Constitution

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.

In order to gain a clear and just idea of the design and end of government, let us suppose a small number of persons settled in some sequestered part of the earth, unconnected with the rest; they will then represent the first peopling of any country, or of the world. In this state of natural liberty, society will be their first thought. A thousand motives will excite them thereto; the strength of one man is so unequal to his wants, and his mind so unfitted for perpetual solitude, that he is soon obliged to seek assistance and relief of another, who in his turn requires the same. Four or five united would be able to raise a tolerable dwelling in the midst of a wilderness, but one man might labour out the common period of life without accomplishing any thing; when he had felled his timber he could not remove it, nor erect it after it was removed; hunger in the mean time would urge him to quit his work, and every different want would call him a different way. Disease, nay even misfortune, would be death; for, though neither might be mortal, yet either would disable him from living, and reduce him to a state in which he might rather be said to perish than to die.

Thus necessity, like a gravitating power, would soon form our newly arrived emigrants into society, the reciprocal blessings of which would supersede, and render the obligations of law and government unnecessary while they remained perfectly just to each other; but as nothing but Heaven is impregnable to vice, it will unavoidably happen that in proportion as they surmount the first difficulties of emigration, which bound them together in a common cause, they will begin to relax in their duty and attachment to each other: and this remissness will point out the necessity of establishing some form of government to supply the defect of moral virtue.

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Point being that human nature demands the existence of both state and a form of "private" militia or armies to balance out each other according to the stipulation of the 2nd Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Yes, there are both positives and negatives to the privitization of the military. It depends on the moral strength of the individual who would either control the private military or being president of a state controlled military.