[vkou]

If politics is all about warfare, and warfare is all about individual willingness to self-sacrifice, why has the history of warfare largely consisted of drafting peasants at sword-and-gunpoint, usually for the benefit of settling a pissing contest one despot has with another?

[namaria]

Were American GI peasants pressed into service? Were SS stormtroopers? Were the 300 of Thermopylae? Were the french cavalry massacred at Anjou or the long-bowmen who dealt them defeat? Were the jihad armies that swept away the oldest empires known to Earth, or the Cossacks, or the Keshik? You seem to be projecting a caricature of history based on some idealized medieval European society over all of History.

[MrBuddyCasino]

I think this is a common delusion of contemporary people. They think that the mass mobilization of the modern nation state that started with Napoleon was how it has always been, ignoring that there used to be a high prestige warrior class which was above the peasant class. They can’t imagine a world where people choose to be warriors.

[namaria]

Average knowledge of History is sadly quite low, as intended by elites keen to keep our imagination very tame in terms of political possibilities. I try to fight it in the home front of my mind and I try to help anyone who seeks to learn more.

[MrBuddyCasino]

Is that your gut feeling about how it was, or is it backed up by historical research? Because I find this scenario not at all likely.

[vkou]

What do you find not at all likely? That conflicts are mostly fought for the benefit of the rulers? That being in the infantry really, really, really sucks, and when we do a show of hands, almost nobody wants to serve in it, and incredibly involved systems of violence and/or coercion/brainwashing/straight up dishonesty are necessary to make muster?

[namaria]

So politics is not about manipulating people into wars to benefit the rulers but it is? You're all over the place.