From ptrourke@ziplink.net Sun Apr 4 06:58:42 1999 Received: from mxu2.u.washington.edu (mxu2.u.washington.edu [140.142.32.9]) by lists.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW99.02/8.9.3+UW99.01) with ESMTP id GAA47448 for ; Sun, 4 Apr 1999 06:58:42 -0700 Received: from ziplink.net (relay-0.ziplink.net [206.15.168.49]) by mxu2.u.washington.edu (8.9.3+UW99.02/8.9.3+UW99.01) with ESMTP id GAA30697 for ; Sun, 4 Apr 1999 06:58:41 -0700 Received: from patricktrourke (1Cust152.tnt2.danvers.ma.da.uu.net [153.35.113.152]) by ziplink.net (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id JAA10548 for ; Sun, 4 Apr 1999 09:58:39 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: <001a01be7ea3$2fe294e0$98712399@patricktrourke> From: "Patrick T. Rourke" To: "Classics List" Subject: Academia Kosovoque Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 09:57:34 -0400 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2014.211 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2014.211 >Students of the ancient world might be able to comment usefully on the >long-term results of the move from citizen army to mercenary army in Rome >at the end of the Second Century, B.C. and in the US in the early 1970's. >The short-term results were positive in both cases, but in the long run >we find that mercenary armies are no longer the citizens' "boys." They are >loyal to their commander in chief. This is EXACTLY why J. F. Gannon was right to call against this discussion. C'mon, Prof. Kopff, you know very well that the US troops have practically NO PERSONAL LOYALTY to their commander in chief - in point of fact a number of US soldiers over the years have faced severe discipline for failing to properly respect their commander in chief; the reason behind the discipline was not to protect Clinton personally, but to protect the concept of civilian control of the military (a concept the Romans lacked - they had no popularly-elected civilian commander in chief - and because the nature of the way in which generals were chosen by the Senate was heavily politicized [and the fact that there could be equal commanders in chief in the Roman army, with different spheres of action; and given the long Roman tradition of using one's appointments to increase one's power base], partisanship (factiones) infected the Roman military at all levels.). You know all of this, Prof. Kopff, far better than I do, I'm sure, but for inexplicable reasons you choose to ignore the distinctions of which you are quite aware in order that you may deploy a rhetorical device which you know to be false. Does Clinton vote for a bonus for US troops every time they complete one of his tasks? Does he bribe them for their votes? Does he have any political rivals who also have authority over armed forces? I see absolutely NO historical parallels between the adoption of a professional army in the late Republic and in that in the U.S. If the citizens of the US oppose the war, they should fault the fact that they elected Clinton, and have allowed the political process (and especially the economic system) in the US to evolve to the point that they have no significant control over the choice of candidates in U.S. presidential elections. >Serbs were our allies in World War II, just as Ariovistus was _amicus populi Romani_. Such factors become >subordinate to the political interests of the commander in chief. And the USSR was our ally during the Second World War. Did that matter to Truman, Eisenhower, MacArthur, LeMay, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, McNamara? What is the SUBSTANCE of this controversial (rather than provocative) comparison? >Of course, there are differences. The US Senate has no Cato. No, because when history does repeat itself, the third time it is farce: ergo The Cato Institute, none of whose prominent members strike me as more than caricature Catones. If you MUST discuss this topic, please refrain from specious and argumentative analogies to ancient conflicts and work from a perspective that acknowledges the full historical depth of such conflicts (as, for instance, D. Tompkins has done). The historiography of the classical world is LITTERED with such empty rhetorical comparisons, and there is no methodological distinction between justifying U.S. slavery on the basis of a comparison with Roman slavery on the one hand, and condemning unjust U.S. military actions by means of a comparison with the causes of unjust Roman military actions on the other (despite the clear and significant moral distinction between the two kinds of rationalization). The latter could have the unintended effect of justifying the former. Patrick Rourke, who opposes the action in Kosovo for the same reasons he opposed Indian military intervention in the conflict in Sri Lanka - because outside military interventions into internal ethnic conflicts have the effect of hardening the ethnic distrust that led to the conflict into permanent hatred, and a shared hatred on the part of the two sides for the intervener. Ask Rajiv Gandhi. That's NOT a specious or argumentative analogy. PTR ptrourke@ziplink.net http://www.ziplink.net/~ptrourke/ .