Wealth Begets Not War Frustration Does.

In response to a Stratfor Opinion Piece on the increased sophistication of SE Asian Military Forces which asserted that Capitalism begets military expansionism as shown by the new higher tech expansion of SE Asian and Chinese weaponry.
 

Soviet Film "Battleship Potemkin after a 1905 Black Sea Mutiny

 

"I  see a new mythology under beta test here, to the end First Principle what wealth begets military might which is manifested by "high end" materiel.   This Retro-Red point of view hung up with a world view of the rise of the evil capitalist bourgeoisie is necessarily militaristic is a fairy tale to frighten College Freshmen. 

Collage of Anti-War demonstrators waving Viet Cong flag

 

 

The reverse is true, in an age of declining resources, the biggest and baddest gun gets to goodies, like low tech food, gas, ammo, housing, and girls. To  that end, poor nations are kept poor. Any attempt to un-poor them is a clear and present threat to the hoarding gunsel faction.

 

 

To break this cycle of poverty begetting guns which begets poverty, one injects fancy guns to the gunsel faction.   The important thing to note, is that guns are status symbols and the bigger the gun the better.  This upgrade in gunnery works to faciltate fatness of the starved with guns that don't work on the street.  And too expensive to be used by the rabble.

 

The "downsizing" of large primitive forces into smaller more effective and better armed with the sexy and flashy bringing fear to the neighbors, raises the social status based on high tech standoffs.  Spit and Shine Soldiers don't like to get their boots dirty, and eventually become neutered.

 

See this:

After the Ad, the PLA

(Music by Hans Zimmer)

The Law of Inverse Attribution Reflex (L'IAR) applied to this vibrant dedication to the martial might of the Peoples Republic is bragging about their weakest virtue, the PLA.  Their strongest virtue is balancing enterprise with political stability.  The role of the PLA has been put the shadow of the growth of Communist Capitalism.

 

Gordon