How would an “Anarchist Nation” react if a foreign neigbouring nation (non-Anarchist) was building up an army with every intention to start a killing spree? WW2 Germany is such an example.
Why would the foreigners do that? Any motivation is valid: greed, xenophobia, or whatever plague you can imagine statist nations have.
Would the Anarchist be justified in a pre-emptive coup, or should they wait for the Blitzkrieg?
There have been plenty of topics on the exact same thing.
What difference does it make if they are justified or not?
Well, technically speaking, you have a right to fight every and any government because of how it deprives its subjects of basic natural rights. Now, whether or not private defense agencies, militaries, etc. would launch a preemptive strike is questionable. However, aggressive nations usually tend to do other things which violate the property rights of foreign citizens (i.e. nationalization of natural resources). This could be an obvious reason for a PDA to somehow retaliate.
In the long run, however, I don’t think it matters. A modern anarchist society would be much better equiped at defending itself than any government-run counterpart. My reasoning? Have you ever heard of the critique that full rights to bear arms would include everyone having their own grenades, rocket launchers, machine guns, etc.?
Perhaps in an anarchist society people will be more likely to want to train themselves under military and martial arts disciplines.
Replace the two communities with two individuals, the question answers itself.
Owning a gun is never criminal. Using a gun to coerce is.
Wrong.
You have the right to prevent any government from harassing you. You do not have the right to prevent others from choosing a government for themselves.
But how effective would they be at defending themselves? I don’t really understand how a defense could be mounted in this situation without a free-rider problem, although it’s probably been answered).
(It seems that what the state is best at is defending itself from other states!)
Theres the nub.
States look competent only when compared to other states.
It has been answered, in fact, and sufficiently IMO. [The Anarchist Society vs. the Military State: The Insignificance of the Free Rider](http://media.mises.org/mp3/Vuk.mp3)
Of course it seems that way - its purpose is to preserve and expand its own power.
But surely one who is being oppressed has the right to delegate the duty of preventing the state from harassing them to another?
Certainly. But who currently would consent to have their government overthrown by outsiders? Are you suggesting you would greeted as a liberator?
As long as the people can bear arms, they cant be conquered. We would be able to have advanced weaponry to fight strong states through our free markets, and im sure local groups would band together for their mutual benefit.
If you’re absolutely sure that the bad neighboring totalitarian state is going to attack you and you know that preemptive strike would have more chances of taking out the enemy and killing less of your own people than that’s probably what would be done. After all, PDAs would be more motivated to keep their customers alive than any government.
They can all be killed however provided the conqueror is brutal enough. Civilians suffer far too much in a guerrila war. If possible repelling the invaders with a conventional war is preferable.
I have a different technicality question. How would these multiple competing private defense agencies establish a unity of command?
Um, I’m gonna go ahead and say that’s the exact opposite of the truth. The reason guerrilla campaigns work is because they inflict attritional damage against the occupiers while minimizing the risk of harm to the guerrilla force.
Basically, “who will coordinate the manufacture, distribution, and sale of [product]”?
The answer is, there is no good answer to that question. If unity of command is conducive to repelling the invaders, one will form naturally through market processes. But my question would be, why should we assume that a unity of command would be advantageous? Different strategies would be needed in every geographical, demographic, or any other sort of situation. Central planning doesn’t work to any good purpose, in any situation. Even the American military has learned this, giving each officer in the field almost total tactical discretion.
The only purpose of the military hierarchy is to maintain the link between the armed forces and the political powers, without the latter of which there would be no possibility of broad strategic blunders, no bureaucratic impediments, and most importantly, nobody to surrender on the behalf of everyone else.
The total lack of centralized military power in ancient Ireland, for example, is why it took the English five hundred years to conquer it, for those reasons.
Yes mate you are quite correct. But I meant the people not directly involved in the resistance. Guerilla armies are powerless to protect the civilians if the occupier should resort to reprisals, internment, deportations or genocide against the general population of the occupied territory.
In nearly every guerrila war the civilians suffer far more killed than the occupying army. I can only think of the Troubles in Northern Ireland as an example to contrary.
I don`t know, looking back some massive combined armed offensives were stunning successes. Operation Bagration comes to mind.
I do agree state armies are far too buerocratised and spend more time and resources on regimentation, parades, drill and instilling discipline than they actualy do training for combat. I am not speaking up for them. I`m just thinking…