"Freedom Legions" a neocon idea to increase the size of the army.

[The Crazy Canadian]

http://www.latimes.com/la-oe-boot24feb24,0,4052293.column?coll=la-home-utilities

COMMENTARY
Uncle Sam Wants Tu
The military could ease its manpower shortage by letting foreigners join up.
Max Boot

February 24, 2005

It is hard to pick up a newspaper these days without reading about Army and Marine Corps recruiting and retention woes. Nonstop deployments and the danger faced by troops in Iraq are making it hard for both services to fill their ranks. The same goes for the National Guard and Reserves. (The Navy and Air Force, which are much less in harm's way, have no such difficulty.)

snip...

The simplest thing to do would be to sign up foreigners for the regular U.S. military, but it would also make sense to create a unit whose enlisted ranks would be composed entirely of non-Americans, led by U.S. officers and NCOs.

Call it the Freedom Legion. As its name implies, this unit would be modeled on the French Foreign Legion, except, again, U.S. citizenship would be part of the "pay." And rather than fighting for U.S. security writ small — the way the Foreign Legion fights for the glory of France — it would have as its mission defending and advancing freedom across the world. It would be, in effect, a multinational force under U.S. command — but one that wouldn't require the permission of France, Germany or the United Nations to deploy.

[mediaman007]

1. Really!

Like our military would turn over our technology to groups of people that may not turn out to be unreliable. Did they consider sabotage?

A better solution would be to have the "true believers" suit up! They might become a little more realistic about the world they are creating.

[phantom power]

15. But we make blunders like that all the time...

We sold our weaponry to both Afghanistan and Hussein, just to name two recent high-profile examples. Heck, we do this so often the CIA had to invent a word for it: "Blowback" :-)

[David K.]

2. Feeling a draft from the right?

I sure am.....

[_TJ_]

19. Maybe they'll make it legal to draft foreigners

Should I be worried ;)

[madrchsod]

3. ah..the romans buying off the huns and germans

didn`t take long to put the empire of the united states in the shit can...

[scarletlib]

17. exactly what I thought when I read this.

Romans recruited the foreigners to serve in their legions and protect their borders. The foreigners then learned the Roman way of fighting and their weaknesses and turned around and used their knowledge against the Romans.

Seems to me the neocons need to study their history a bit more.

[Lisa]

20. no kidding ...

Some of the most disasterous Roman defeats were caused by their auxiliaries turning on them (e.g. the loss of 3 legions in Germany in AD 9, and the Civilis rebellion 60 years later). And as you point out, they didn't learn from this -- they kept recruiting foreign warriors, and a couple of centuries later, many of the legions were made up of local tribespeople who wouldn't take orders from Rome.

And we've certainly seen a lot of examples of US military assistance (like Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden) coming back to haunt us, years later.

[kineneb]

23. Battle of Teotoburg Forest

It put an end to Rome's attempts at expansion (or so my German-language text says). History channel had a great series on the Barbarians (I was rooting for my German ancestors), which covered that era rather well.

[Larkspur]

4. Didn't outsourcing the military jobs lead to the downfall of the Roman

Empire?

[HawkerHurricane]

5. The Northland Division

or you can read about the original...
http://groups.msn.com/WWIIHistoryandReenacting/11thssnordland.msnw

[sarcasmo]

6. Outsourcing the Military, the day will be near when we don't even fight

our own battles. To quote Forest Gump. Stupid is as Stupid does.

[RainDog]

13. another plus for the reactionary right

if they train foreign troops, if the reactionary right wants to put down dissent in the U.S., they'll have less problems with foreign troops.

when China slaughtered dissidents in Tianneman Square, they brought in troops from the provinces, who would have no connection to the students.

outsourcing the military is a way to create a private army for corporations, too, to go in to places that hold no real threat to America, but who will not bend over for big biz.

I believe that democracy in America has been thoroughly corrupted. Who knows what the outcome will be, but we are in dark times.

[fedsron2us]

7. A sure sign that the final collapse is near

[dameocrat]

8. Well Boot is an honest imperialist

He doesn't belong in America. He belongs to Britain in the Victorian Era.

Having said that, one needs the french foriegn legion to fight imperialists wars. Unfortunately for Boot, women had lots more babies when the French foriegn legion was successful so they were willing to sacrifice them in endless wars. They don't anymore. Also since the poor don't have any opportunities for advancement in repuklakin land, American citizenship isn't much of as gift.

[BadGimp]

9. Max Boot:..it figures

This guy is not connected to the grid.

[Eloriel]

10. But he is connected to the NeoCons n/t

[greymattermom]

11. my idea is

A "support our troops" tax check off. Let them put their money where their mouth is so to speak.

[ixion]

12. it's what we did (sort of) in during the civil war

civil war... isn't that an oxymoron?

In this case, I really don't think it's a good idea to include foreigners in our ugly little war crimes debacle.

[Bridget Burke]

14. Not exactly. In the North, the draft could be avoided....

By paying someone else to take your place. Many who joined this way were immigrants. But they'd already made their move to the US. And those who survived stayed on to become Americans.

Many in the service now are not US citizens--often because their families emigrated when they were children.

But setting up a separate service of non-citizens--who will remain non-citizens--is a dreadful idea.

[bluestateguy]

16. Good idea. Sign up David Frum and Natan Sharansky.

I'm rather fed up with all the fucking foreigners' influence within this Administration.

[blindpig]

18. but where can you find some Visigoths when you need them?

Edward Gibbons is laughing in his grave. The greedy, ignorant fucks...................................

[Bridget Burke]

21. I doubt many of the Republicans have much of a classical education.

Although Cheney did give me a chill during the Florida "recount." Something about "crossing the Rubicon."

[kineneb]

24. Where are the Praetorian Guard?

Didn't they dispatch several Emperors they didn't like?
(I still remember the big blond guys, that looked like some relatives of mine, playing the Guard in "I, Claudius".)

-sorry, fingers can't spell tonight

[blindpig]

26. can you say CIA? n/t

22. Foreigners can already join the U.S. military

There are many people not from the U.S. in the U.S. military including people who don't have citizenship. Bush just posthumously granted citizenship to a mexican who was serving in the U.S. army in Iraq.

According to this article there are over 8,000 mexican citizens serving in the U.S. army.

http://www.el-universal.com.mx/pls/impreso/noticia.html?id_nota=9656&tabla=miami

[Dark]

25. Why would anybody risk their neck to get U.S. citizenship when

Bush already offered all illegal-immigrants amnesty?