The Republican president has previously referred to fallen American service personnel as “suckers” and “losers.” He has never served in the military, having in fact dodged the Vietnam War draft on five occasions. The last of those owed to a bone spur diagnosis. It’s a condition that usually affects elderly individuals. He was 22 at the time.
Trump has similarly threatened to invade U.S. allies Panama, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, and Greenland, which is an autonomous territory of Denmark, a fellow NATO member.
The MAGA president’s growing, campaign-promise-busting appetite for military engagement also comes amid his bitter disappointment at being passed over for last year’s Nobel Peace Prize, despite a concerted public and private push by his allies. It was previously awarded to his Democratic predecessor, President Barack Obama.
In a letter regarding that snub, Trump wrote to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre in January that “considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 Wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace.”
The Norwegian government is not affiliated with the Nobel Committee, which decides independently to whom it will grant its awards. Trump’s claim to have stopped eight wars remains highly disputed.
While I agree with the sentiment, you don’t have to go much more than 100 years back before it was common that the upper class led armies more or less from the front. For long stretches of history, leading from the front and in general being in the army has been one of the ways the upper class has held on to its power.
Cool that’s not how it works now
The point is that history has shown us that people will wage war for profit even if it means putting themselves and their children at risk by being directly involved in hostilities.
The whole “we wouldn’t have wars if rich people and their kids had to fight in them” idea just doesn’t hold up to historical precedent. People with power are likely to start wars regardless, because they see it as a means of increasing their power.
This hadn’t been true for a long time.
I honestly don’t see what you mean? It’s true that people in power have waged war on each other more or less throughout all of known history, no?
Whether or not said people had to actually take part in hostilities doesn’t seem to have much impact on whether they choose to wage war. Or do you have a counter example (a society that has changed whether it waged a bunch of wars based on whether its leaders had to fight in them)?
I think you’re trying to counter something I didn’t say, lol. I never said “we wouldn’t have wars if rich people and their kids had to fight in them”.
I said “Cool that’s not how it works now” because it’s a century later than the war paradigm you described and that’s not how it works anymore.
In that case, sorry I guess? Since I myself pointed out that that’s how it worked over 100 years ago I thought it was pretty obvious I was aware it didn’t work that way anymore, so I interpreted your comment as refuting my primary point (the one stated explicitly above). If that’s not what you meant to do then I don’t think we really have any disagreement.
Good point. I did not look too far back indeed. It would be interesting to know at what point that shift happened. Was it because of a weapons upgrade, or the increased complexity of the state, or … ?
To be fair it probably came from the fact that armies that protected strategic leaders at the expense of common soldiers were, over time, more effective. Military doctrine has a tendency to shift towards whatever works best, because the armies that don’t adopt it lose wars and don’t get to keep fighting.
Strategic leaders seem more a thing of the past, few would suspect Trump of being strategic, so I think I’m misunderstanding the point here. If Trump were taken out by an enemy from afar, it would not impact the US strategy, right?
Having let this entire discussion sink in a bit, it might also have to do with the decreasing influence of religion on leaders. Where in earlier times honour before God was an incentive for a king to fight among soldiers, such considerations may have vanished since the Enlightenment. But I’m not a historian, just pulling this out of my behind, :)
With respect to strategic leaders I was more referring to officers than political leaders. Historically, the path from military power to political power was also shorter: A common way to get political power was to first establish yourself as a high ranking officer.
This whole pipeline of “protecting officers, because it makes militarily sense” via “high ranking officers often end up with political power” to todays situation seems a rather natural development to me.
ahhh thanks for the clarification, indeed that seems totally plausible!
I’m making a guess but probably about the point somebody in a perch half a mile away could snipe said leader who was obviously showing rank and “leading from the front” haha.
Would an archer be able to do that? A spearman? Happened in 300 but I doubt that was accurate ;)