Rethinking the fall of Rome's republic

MIT news ^ | November 9, 2011 | Peter Dizikes

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>>Goes to show that privatizing the military is a bad idea. You really don't want your generals having their armies loyal to them above the state.

Through the US Civil War, officers were appointed by politicians and elected by the enlisted men in their discrete units. Promotions were done locally at the unit level through the First World War. It is only since the Second World War that promotions and appointments have been done through the top officers of a service or through Congress. The Navy's system is the envy of the others, with officer promotion selection boards ruled only through official personnel records reviewed by disinterested officers who do not know the people up for promotion. The Air Force, on the other hand, has had the most trouble with outside influence marring promotion results.

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>>Population movement led to the personal client army of the late republic, which has long been recognized as a key to understanding its fall."

Recently, the History Channel examined the history of the Roman soldier. He went from a high-trained, massively-equipped Roman professional at the time of Caesar to a provincial joke of a mercinary with straw armor and no training at the time of the fall 400 years later. Coincidentally, this is what Obama is trying to do to our military.