The effect of political ideology on the military

[FONT=Verdana]We hear every day about the effects of politics on the military, from equipment they request being denied, to the fact that all military equipment is bought from the lowest bidder at twice the price. But our goal in this debate is to talk about the effect of political ideology on the military, or in other word, the effect of capitalism and communism on the military.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]The most powerful of these effects, is the effect of political oversight of the military. The reason why we need political oversight of the military is to make sure that those who deal in war go to war for the right reason. In other words, why we go to war needs to be up held by the military that fights it.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]Because capitalism and communism are different ideology, they have different reasons for going to war, and therefore have different forms of political oversight. Let’s dive into the different reason for why capitalism and communism go to war. Capitalism and Communism are affected only by the economic systems. Under capitalism the system is based on make a dollar while spending none, while communism is about making two dollars by spending one. While these are minor differences, they have massively different outcomes. The reason for going to war, must match their economic systems. Because war is violent, the reason for going to war, need to use violence in them. Let’s look at a case where economic forces would need violence, in order to carry out a transaction. Let’s say that a man is killed. Now there are two reasons why he died, form economic transaction. One he died during a mugging, in which the point was not to kill him, but to take his possession, the fact he died, a only collateral damage, during a economic transaction. The second reason is that someone hired a hit man to kill the man. In the mugging case, nothing had to be given up to in order for him to be mugged, while in the hit man case someone had to give up something to pay for the hit. Because these two case match our to economic cases respectably, we can conclude the following.[/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]Capitalist go to war to steal, and Communist to kill. When it a nation state there reasons are the same, but there method are more complex. A Capitalist pay a mercenary volunteer army to steal what they are paid with interest. While a Communist, army is conscripted to kill an enemy, for a payment of national benefits. That can never be denied to them. [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]This of course this leads to the most well now in body meets of oversight in the military, the Commissar and the Chaplain. The book, “Soldiers, Commissars, and Chaplains: Civil-military Relations since Cromwell” can be used as a resource to understand the history of these to figure but not the reason why have them. Capitalist need Chaplains to makes sure that the army does not go on a killing spree, and strikes to the goal of stealing from the enemy. This is why you hear Chaplains “there has been enough killing today”. As killing would leave no one to steal from. Communist on the other had need Commissars to make sure that there army does not steal from those they kill, as they are not paid for stealing. The image of the bloodthirsty commissar painted from the right-wing, comes from the fact that the commissar forces the troops to kill the enemy, and kill those who steal from the enemy. In order word the problem the right-wing has with commissars, is that they don’t allow people to steal from one other. [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana]I’m more than happy to debate my findings with you. [/FONT]

That book is interesting. I read a lot of material on political commissars last night, and I think this book is one of them.

Allow me to repost my OP re. political oversight.

Bullets do nothing against armor, RPGs do nothing against jets thus you need a mechanized fighting force possibly with nuclear capabilities depending how the revolutionary war unfolds. I doubt workers militias can be trusted with tactical nukes, and even if the revolutionary army sees this as a line not to cross I doubt workers militias can be trusted with thermobaric warheads, and then there is a huge issue of workers militias working abroad.

I've stated before the need not to turn swords into plowshares by dismantling engineer and other non-commanding specialists (hence opposition to the slogan "abolition of the standing army"), but what hasn't been addressed is political and security supervision over military organization during the DOTP.

Security has been addressed somewhat here:

http://www.revleft.com/vb/security-f...182/index.html

The subject of political supervision is interesting, because how can one reconcile this with military unionization and elected or demarchically selected commanding officers subject to recall? The term "political commissar" is a stereotype for a very specific kind of political officer, as explained below, that was replaced by a potential reconciliation:

The other type was the political commissars (or "politruks"). This was a type of army officer, originally used to help keep Red Army units loyal during the Civil War, and then reestablished for ensuring the army's loyalty during the Stalin era (in the 1930s). The commissar's principal responsibility was effectively to act as a link between the party and the army, as well as boosting the morale of the men as a counselor and organizing ideological activities and basic political education courses for the troops. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politruk) The USSR permanently retained this type of commissar, and still had thousands of poltical commissars in the 1980s, although the commissar's initial authority to act as an "alternative commander" and give his own separate orders was eliminated in 1942; the political officers were formally renamed and no longer addressed as commissars (the new replacement term was "zampolit" -- an abbreviation standing for "deputy commander for political work"; the umbrella term "politruk" -- an abbreviation simply standing for "political leader" was also used before and after the 1942 changes).

From Stalin's time and onward, the Red Army's political commissars were assigned to their own type of hierarchy (later in the war they were actually given corresponding military ranks, from lieutenant to general). The highest-ranking political commissars were responsible for the political education of entire armies and essentially had a rank equal to that of the Red Army generals -- thus men like Khrushchev and Bulganin ended up with the rank of general, although the operational decisions were made by career army officers like Zhukov, etc. As a matter of course, the highest-ranked of the army's commissars were the high-ranking Party members -- some even members of the Central Committee of the Communist Party.

At the same time, a lot of the lower-level political officers ('commisars') who went off to war in 1941 were guys in their 20s. Naturally, many of them were recent party members. (Even though experienced people with solid party backgrounds were naturally preferable for this type of work, but the only real requirement for the job was being a highly dedicated and loyal communist.)

For instance, the legendary WWII partisan Nikolay Kiselyov (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolay...evich_Kiselyov) was made a commissar straight out of college, and many of the junior-level commissars were just your regular rank-and-file Communists in good standing.

My great-grandfather, who'd worked as a Marxist political science instructor at a vocational school in eastern Poland / western Belarus for a bit, but hadn't been a Communist party official, volunteered for the Red Army in 1941 and was assigned as a political officer to a tank brigade.

It was a pretty dangerous job on the Eastern Front: Hitler gave the infamous Commissar Order (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commissar_Order), which stipulated that any commissar who fell into German captivity was to be shot on the spot. The casualties among them in battle were pretty high.

Although sometimes used in other contexts (e.g., an authoritative Soviet writer on drama or literature could be labelled a "cultural commissar" by anti-Communist western sources), the term "commissar" isn't applicable to other areas. There were no "commissars" in workplaces or offices or anywhere else outside the Cabinet positions and the army structure.

The zampolit as an institution should be re-examined further as a potential DOTP instrument in the future.

(From the US deficit debate thread in Worker Struggles)

I perceive the DOTP's military model to be a combination of soldier unionization and intra-military democratic rights (like recallability) with the old Armed Forces of the USSR (not the preceding "Workers and Peasants Red Army"), its zampolit apparatus, and its supporting defense industry.

Until there is revolutionary democracy from below in the army, the class nature remains the same.

Quit the tired sloganeering.

You say above that "Not every battle-order but all issues of strategy and tactics must be democratically discussed, yes. You can hardly imagine it? Think harder."

Well, I can think about democratic discussions on strategy, but not about tactics. Tactics require extensive knowledge of field manuals, thinking outside the limits of said field manuals, and related expertise taught in military schools.

Not even the grunts of ancient Athens discussed or voted upon this stuff.

Ditto with the grunts of the Paris Commune's more working-class and "patriotic" National Guard, the only possible "saviour" against the more petit-bourgeois (in particular more comprador) Communal Council and its ineptitude by means of some Breakthough Military Coup by the National Guard's Central Committee aiming to be the Committee of Public Safety.

Workers' militias were based on election and participative democracy, and the standing army prior to the German and Russian Revolutions had the officer corps basically displaced as authorities by congresses and elected committees of soldiers' delegates.

Again, what "officer corps"? Just the commanding officers, or the engineer and other non-commanding specialists, as well?

Ideally, the Russian Revolutions should have seen the retirement transfer of the czarist officer corps to instructor positions in military schools and such in order to train the next generation of military commanders, especially on how not to conduct wars (like the czarist regime did in WWI).

I've stated before the need not to turn swords into plowshares by dismantling engineer and other non-commanding specialists (hence opposition to the slogan "abolition of the standing army"), but what hasn't been addressed is political and security supervision over military organization during the DOTP.

"Abolition of the Standing army" comes form action movies where the hero wipes out the "enemy" and everone lives happy ever after in peace. This ideal world does not need a standing army as there is no enemy to fight.

With out going into the legal and moral question of wiping out a group that you label the "enemy" there is the real practical question of eeven can it be done.

Marx himself point out that not all revolutionaries are communist. Some are from the systems before capitalism, most noted today, Slave Society and Feudalism. The reason why we still have these groups around is because Feudalist , failed to wipe out slavers, and capitalist failed to wipe out Feudalist.

And the reason for why they failed is simple. It is not practical to wipe out an enitre group of people, only replace them. Theres many reason why it is not practical; They could have skills you need, or your own moral or legal system many no allow you to have act of genocide.

But for what ever reason the old qroup that you just replaced will still be around, producing the need for a army to produce against a counter-revolution.

(From the US deficit debate thread in Worker Struggles)

Quit the tired sloganeering.

You say above that "Not every battle-order but all issues of strategy and tactics must be democratically discussed, yes. You can hardly imagine it? Think harder."

Well, I can think about democratic discussions on strategy, but not about tactics. Tactics require extensive knowledge of field manuals, thinking outside the limits of said field manuals, and related expertise taught in military schools.

Not even the grunts of ancient Athens discussed or voted upon this stuff.

Ditto with the grunts of the Paris Commune's more working-class and "patriotic" National Guard, the only possible "saviour" against the more petit-bourgeois (in particular more comprador) Communal Council and its ineptitude by means of some Breakthough Military Coup by the National Guard's Central Committee aiming to be the Committee of Public Safety.

Again, what "officer corps"? Just the commanding officers, or the engineer and other non-commanding specialists, as well?

Ideally, the Russian Revolutions should have seen the retirement transfer of the czarist officer corps to instructor positions in military schools and such in order to train the next generation of military commanders, especially on how not to conduct wars (like the czarist regime did in WWI).

Debate point like the ones from Red dave, can be some up in the ideal of a "warship with no crew". Where the people aborad, have not military training or leadership. In the mind of Red Dave ["Officer corp", this ship doesn't even have a crew to command]. Most of these people think that they will never be attack as they are some how the only ship in the world, and if they are wrong, they can just debate how to react, with no knowledge in the field.

On some levels I would like to just watch these people debate "if the are under attack", while being fire at. Many of us would laugh at them as they debat ewhich gun should they use to fire back with provided that someone had the military knowledge to do maintenance on the weapon themselfs.

Red Dave has relied too much on cheap sloganeering for his political bread and butter.

Red Dave has relied too much on cheap sloganeering for his political bread and butter.

The problem is that he is not the only one. It seems that most of Revleft is made of people just like him. Who are nothing more then childern in adult body.

But this is moving off topico.

My next post will be about the some of the ideals I have for a new goverment and army.

Red Dave has relied too much on cheap sloganeering for his political bread and butter.

Red Dave has been banned for over half a year now, but I just have to chip in here.

It still annoys me just thinking about that guy. He was a moralizing liberal, and absolutely everything he said was revolutionary sloganeering. Moral outrage, advancing sectional interests, religious reverence for Trotsky, and insane levels of sloganeering.. these were his standards. From taking a look at the left communist forum over at the other website, that has not changed at all.

I still chuckle when I think of this line he made.

I doubt that I have ever read a more foolish or pretentious post.

Your precious Kautsky's memory lies buried in Flanders Fields while the memory of the Wobblies inspires to this day

The Wobblies are irrelevant romantics. Who exactly are they inspiring? Certainly not the workers as a class, that's for damn sure.

In a way, I have to feel bad for him. He's in his 60's or something, and he's lived his entire life as a pseudo-revolutionary liberal without realizing it.

Kautsky's contributions are forgotten, but they exist today at almost every level of the Marxist movement. The main problem is that they aren't there enough, and key principles of Marxism have been stealthily and unconsciously replaced with Bakuninism.

Interesting original subject which I will have to get back to at some point.

Yes, he really is a retired old man who was personal buddies with Hal Draper.

That actually goes some ways in explaining his views. he basically turned anti-stalinism into a moralistic ideology. I think it's key to avoid those kind of positions, as they can lead to bizarre scenarios such as supporting the Mujahideen(in the case of Hoxha's moralistic "anti-imperialism").

Quote:
Originally Posted by RED DAVE
Until there is revolutionary democracy from below in the army, the class nature remains the same.

LOL, this guy is funny. In "free elections" of the soldier council kind, the Opportunists get the positions of power. No no, military is a strict top-down business, the CC should select a general commander, the commander select officers and worker/soldiers given the illusion of participatory consideration. It's the army, it has the duty to be the disciplined defendant of the revolutionary party. I recommend reading the volumes of "The Falcons of the Kremlin - 1917 to 1984" and stop any illusions you have that we can make our organisation of violence more libertarian.

Yeah no kidding.. I'm glad Red Dave is gone. As DNZ pointed out, all he did was make ridiculous slogans devoid of any real political content.

His insistence on "revolutionary democracy from below" as a precondition of a proletarian military is really just rehashed anarchism with its insistence on abolition of hierarchy. I heard that Red Dave is dead now, but I don't know whether it's true. I'd be curious to hear more about this idea of how defense should be organized under a genuine proletarian dictatorship though. Some of the ideas above were interesting.

Yeah no kidding.. I'm glad Red Dave is gone. As DNZ pointed out, all he did was make ridiculous slogans devoid of any real political content.

His insistence on "revolutionary democracy from below" as a precondition of a proletarian military is really just rehashed anarchism with its insistence on abolition of hierarchy. I heard that Red Dave is dead now, but I don't know whether it's true. I'd be curious to hear more about this idea of how defense should be organized under a genuine proletarian dictatorship though. Some of the ideas above were interesting.

You know Lenin was trying to build a genuine army of the people, but it failed because of the war situation. I think this is a very attractive concept of the majority of the population being members of the army, it would certainly give the revolution and the workers' state a whole lot of legitimacy.

Youth groups for 16 year olds and on should include training with weapons, military tactics, democratic workers' army culture be built. But only the communist youth groups and members of the youth group should be allowed to eventually take part in the people's army (given that communist youth group membership in East Germany was 70% and still 80% in Cuba, this could rightfully be called a genuine "people's army").
Army leader ranks for such a people's army should be determined by an Executive Board on which half are voted on by the party central committee leadership and the other half democratic representatives of the people's army members themselves.

But this is very much an ideal for the future to build on and not for the actual defense of the revolution as history has taught us.

Yeah no kidding.. I'm glad Red Dave is gone. As DNZ pointed out, all he did was make ridiculous slogans devoid of any real political content.

His insistence on "revolutionary democracy from below" as a precondition of a proletarian military is really just rehashed anarchism with its insistence on abolition of hierarchy. I heard that Red Dave is dead now, but I don't know whether it's true. I'd be curious to hear more about this idea of how defense should be organized under a genuine proletarian dictatorship though. Some of the ideas above were interesting.

I think you're confusing him with RedStar2000, a different poster and former theory expert and admin of this board. He and I never engaged polemically.

No, I'm not. I had heard that Red Dave died this summer.. seriously. RedStar has been dead for quite a while longer if I remember correctly. Red Dave was just an ultra-left Trotskyist while RedStar considered himself to be an "Anarcho-Marxist".

RedStar got bad with his stereotypes, but he could occasionally post things of intellectual content. Red Dave on the other hand, stuck exclusively to moralizing and sloganeering.

Yeah, if the former were still alive I could show him new perspectives. RIP to the latter if he's dead, though.