Talk:Militarism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

WPMILHIST This article is within the scope of the Military history WikiProject. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks.
B This article has been rated as B-Class on the quality scale.
Related task forces...
 Military science task force

Can this be NPOV'd? (The POV is one I tend to agree with, but it is a point of view.)

Sure, by focusing a little more on history, and a little less on what happened in the last 15 minutes. The Romans were successfully militaristic for the better part of a thousand years,
Hoom. Hum. That's one measure of success, perhaps. We got a lot of culture from the Romans. Important political DNA. Worth noting. Hoom. Hmm. EntmootsOfTrolls
I am told that official Chinese government documents say flatly that the U.S. is pursuing exactly the Roman strategy: bread and circuses, absolute power for the Roman Emperor, a fawning Roman Senate consisting of patricians, and all the pomp and ceremony of elections for key posts - back to Augustus Caesar who retained all forms of the Roman Republic. EntmootsOfTrolls
Germans and Japanese in the late 19th century are interesting because we get to see how it ended.
Yes, it ended in extreme pacifism after crushing military defeat after only five or six generations. Worth noting. Hoom. Hum. EntmootsOfTrolls
My suggestion is to delete most of the US stuff, too immediate for anybody to be neutral about it, and revisit US militarism twenty years from now, see how it looks then. 1/2 :-) Stan 19:16 Mar 20, 2003 (UTC)
Assessment of the U.S. is too hasty by far, yes. But accusations must be put in context, or we lose our relevance. Agreed that modern militarism must be assessed differently from historical, with different mesaures applied. So a recent-history versus ancient-history may do best. We can't really measure "public support" for Roman Emperors so implying it's a general measure of all forms of militarism is weak, but we do in fact know a lot about public opinion from mid-19th-century to present.EntmootsOfTrolls
Another article on evidence of U.S. militarism could be started for the too-recent stuff, if it just doesn't fit well in the new article. Hm?EntmootsOfTrolls

I mention Romans, Germans, and Japanese, because in the case of the Romans, the militaristic strategy was extremely successful, not only bringing to an end the two centuries of instability that was part of Alexander's legacy to the Greek world, but going on to maintain peace for centuries more. It was so stunningly successful that it was looked upon nostalgically by Europeans until the beginning of the modern age. So at least that bit of historical evidence suggests that militarism can be a route to long-term stability and peace. The German and Japanese experience suggests that it can also go horribly wrong in a hurry. I don't think an encyclopedia article can do much more than define the concept and list examples that have been thoroughly studied and agreed upon by historians and political scientists. Stan 02:17 Mar 21, 2003 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Good article, but...

I think this entry too thinly veils the opinions of the author, and should be edited accordingly. Discussing modern issues is fine, in my opinion, if it can be done without any noticeable bias. As a side note, I enjoy hearing peoples opinions about subjects, and would love a link to/portion of each article which could involve some debate and opinion posting.

about the "Where does the word come from"

isn't that kind of obvious? if not, the whole 'equation' thing doesn't seem very professionally written..

[edit] Uniform Rewriting and Expansion Proposal

After comparison of the original and current forms of this article the overwhelming methods of establishing NPOV have been obfuscation of direct statements and removal of information rather than the clarification of concepts. I propose that we make a concerted effort to refine the varied aspects of militarism (historical and concurrent instances, economic causes and effects, political implications, etc.) regardless of any nationalist sensitivities and with global scope to ensure NPOV while providing greater substance for this article.

For example? Deryck C. 00:47, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Under new account. For example, this segment modified for clarity and NPOV:

Militarism tends to be defined in recent times as the direct opposition to peace. However, historically it carried a different meaning as reference to nations with a paramount military focus-particularly those that engaged in Imperialism; e.g. Empire of Japan, British Empire, Third Reich, New Roman Empire of Mussolini, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics under Stalin, Iraq under Saddam Hussein. This historic definition continues to be used in the present day to refer to both nations with modern militaries requiring substantially higher budgets to maintain than the average among nations (Israel, United States, Kuwait) and to developing nation-states devoting substantial portions of their GDPs to accumulate such forces (North Korea, Equatorial Guinea, Saudi Arabia). Source: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/mil_exp_dol_fig_cap# Militärwissenschaften 02:18, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Anymore help needed? I'm always here to help. Deryck C. 14:07, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

Certainly. A rewrite will require the removal of vast swaths of information from the current article (to eliminate redundancy, etc); as I understand it this requires often lengthy discussion to justify. A relation of rewrite/expansion of the article and objection/justification on this talk page between we who are currently active in editing this article can only improve it and might serve to offset troll reverts and vandalism. Certainly greater expansion to cover more occurrences of observed militarism in history are required (Danish, Swedish, English, French, perhaps reference to Prussia and northern confederation member states of pre-Germany, perhaps reference to pre-unification states in the area that became China, etc.). Perhaps a description of the contributory relation between many of these occurrences (Napoleon's occupation spurring onset of greater German nationalism, description of continental power concentrations, etc.), or at least a theoretical framework for identification of militarist deviance in a nation (Size, funding, development of forces in varied aspects) should be provided to unify such descriptions? What are your thoughts on the development and inclusion of this sort of information in a new form of the article? Militärwissenschaften 17:36, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

To be frank, I don't understand much about the definition and contents of "militarism" as stated here. My work on this article is to associate the Jap. militarism during WW2, which is usually known as the "narrow sense" of militarism, with the "wide militarism" here. Deryck C. 13:24, 29 August 2005 (UTC)

"the loosely allied Anglo-Saxon powers led by the United States and Australia" Since when is Western Anglo-Saxon nations led by... Australia? I can see it's important for their continent but it only has a population of 20 million and follows the United States more than leading any other nation on its own... The United States alone seems to hold the reins for us. (I'm not just saying that being biased towards American... I'm Canadian.)

Can't verify your argument. Deryck C. - the very original one

Deryck C. - the esperanza-enriched one 07:20, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Post Deleted. --Shenshuai 21:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Civilian control of the military

Just a small note to editors who might be interested in this topic, I've expanded civilian control of the military a fair bit lately and am looking to send it to peer review soon; if anyone has any insights to its improvement before I take that next step, your comments are invited on the talk page. Thanks. — MC MasterChef :: Leave a tip — 00:31, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Militarization

Hi, I removed the re-direct, and created an article for militarization. It's my first wikipedia article, based on reading I've done this semester. Since it is so closely related to this topic I though it would be appropriate to post here and see if anyone had any input on the article or redirect-removal. Thanks. gallen01 17:25, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

You did an extremely great job. I don't know much about militarization myself, so you may consider reading other articles to see how and what you can do to make your great article an even better one. Deryck C. 07:54, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Militarism in Israel

Maybe an addition about Militarism in Israel? There is a section in the hebrew wikipedia i am willing to translate. --UVnet 09:16, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Do it. Deryck C. 09:47, 16 February 2006 (UTC)
Done. --UVnet 09:48, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
In the same vein, one could say something about 'warhawks' and 'chickenhawks' in the USA, and the focus around the candidates' military service in the 2004 campaigns. John Kerry military service controversy, George W. Bush military service controversy. Joffeloff 17:13, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Militarism in nosensical literature.

For any who has read the popular Bob Hamburger book, RUP, I believe he is expousing (espousing?) a character trait of certain militarist groups when he goes into the point of talking of the 'ninja clans' he tried to join when he was young. He mentions that they were hard to find and tended to be secretive and highly selective of their memebers. Now tell me this, whoever happens to be ready to answer right now: Is this a sign of fascist pro-militarist groups, or is it a sign of socialist pro-militarist groups, or is it just grassroots legalism (if there even is such a thing?)? I'd like to know. Thanks! --Shenshuai 21:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC) 1624 HRS ZONE EST 2124 HRS ZULU

I guess since they have no political affiliation mentioned, and to not use the term 'fascist' freely, we can just call them grassroots legalism. Whattaya say, EntmootsOfTrolls? --Oakland University 21:36, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Much too POV

I have a problem with this sentence: The concept of profiteering is central to militarization, as it denotes the private collusion between military and business to profit excessively from a state of war, in violation of the public good. It is totally POV, it talks about "militarization" which is not precisely the same as militarism, and it is actually about the military-industrial complex which is a different issue entirely. It is a slanted leftist comment; a militarist would argue that military buildup is designed for security, not profit, and is not necessarily "in violation of the public good". I have taken the sentence out. Walton monarchist89 09:45, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] German militarism - stylistic

I'm not impressed by the first-person style of this section - viz. and yet Germany was the only one that we can say had a militaristic government. or Let us take a glance at the development of this sort of government. It's also getting a bit POV in places: We should perhaps consider as a third result the fact that the possession of such a splendid and efficient military machine tended to make its possessors arrogant and unyielding in their intercourse with other nations. The whole thing reads more like an assignment or an academic essay than an encyclopedia entry. I will wait 7 days, then if no one objects I will rewrite the section, taking some of this out. Walton monarchist89 09:52, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

I have now rewritten it. Walton monarchist89 12:31, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discipline or security?

I disagree security is the highest aim of a Militaristic society. My perception is it is discipline. Discipline enables the society work in orderly manner like a clockwork - with no dissidence, no negotiations, no playing solo. The German phrase Ordnung muss sein! (There must be order!) summarizes this view well. All militaries in the world are based on discipline - not on security - and the erosion of the discipline within the forces and within the society, is seen as sign of societal collapse.

Valid point, but surely security is also central to a militarist society; after all, the purpose of a military force is to protect and defend the security of a nation and its people. Anyway, I don't see how this can be worked into the article. By the way, please sign your contributions. Walton monarchist89 09:43, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WPMILHIST Assessment

A very nice start, though perhaps it could be expanded a bit more in the general areas - how is militarism defined, how is it related to other ideologies, when/where was the term coined, etc. I applaud your careful and beautifully worded treatment of the question of Israeli militarism, and of course your inclusion of the discussion of German, Japanese, and other countries. Like "feudalism", "fascism" and countless other terms, "militarism" means something slightly different in each case it is applied to, and I think you've done a fine job of representing that. LordAmeth 09:51, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../m/i/l/Talk%7EMilitarism_77a5.html"