Originally posted by Officer of Engineers
View Post
Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
Is Russia still a key world power?
Collapse
X
-
-
Originally posted by Cactus View PostIt depends on the time period. Between 1820-50, the British East India Company behaved more like a state than a company -- taking so many actions driven by political impulses than profit motive, that the company finally collapsed and had to be "bought out" by the British government in 1857.
We all love to talk about "corporate citizenship" and all, but no real company lets those activities affect its worker productivity and market growth. By embedding Christian missionaries into its factories, plantations and army units, and allowing them to convert people -- EIC subverted its line and unit cohesion, and tainted the brand image of its products (since the market associated Christians of being indiscriminate eaters of beef and pork - abhorrent to Hindus and Muslims).
Companies love keeping a small payroll, minimum salaries and prefer to pay for performance -- in this time period, the EIC army was doing exactly the opposite. Regular battalions started getting 20+ European (i.e. expensive) officers, while irregular units were performing very well with just 3-4 European officers; it became more like a government make-work program than a profit-driven enterprise. The EIC army also stopped paying out bata (field service bonus), and rationalized on a uniform pay system (that ossified bureaucracies love).
Good companies also know when to keep off micro-managing their smaller supply-chain partners, and here the EIC behaved more like an early modern nation-state trying to break its feudatories than a global conglomerate. It instituted the Doctrine of Lapse, whereby the management of the minor principalities lapsed to the EIC when the ruler died without a son.
All these actions combined to catalyze the Sepoy Mutiny / the First War of Indian Independence in 1857. The EIC went bankrupt, and British crown troops has to be rushed in to suppress the rebellion and old Vicky officially became the Empress. This whole period can be a MBA seminar on "How not to Run Your Business Empire into the Dust 101".
Comment
-
Originally posted by cataphract View PostNot simultaneously, no. Even as a single theatre of war, Russia's ability to take on and win a conventional war against China or Iran is questionable.Last edited by Officer of Engineers; 21 Feb 16,, 22:16.Chimo
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by Gun Grape View PostThe DeepWater Horizon oil spill ;>)
That showed the Gulf Of Mexico not to screw with American.No such thing as a good tax - Churchill
To make mistakes is human. To blame someone else for your mistake, is strategic.
Comment
-
Originally posted by Cactus View PostHow profitable was Ireland - Britain's first subject nation? I thought it mainly served to sustain the British feudalism. What about usurpation of common lands and evictions of people who depended on it, Highland clearances, etc that provided so many foot-soldiers, settlers, administrators and finally champions of the empire? Didn't they serve the immediate economic needs and security of the British political system? Why were most upper-field and flag ranks of the East India Company army even in late 1700s filled with men who held British Army commissions? Didn't that give the Horse Guards de facto command and control over the military progress of the "commercial" empire in Asia?
The British Empire being an "accidental empire" won by aggressive commercial activities is a convenient fiction; it was fueled as much by domestic political system and hunger for resources as any empire before or since. 19th C British historians and educators often wrote about the Roman Republic growing into Empire driven by the Patricians gobbling up smaller farmers' holdings, depressing wages with foreign slavery and the small farmers being forced to enlist as professional soldiers in hopes of getting a piece of conquered land in Spain or N. Africa or Dalmatia ... I wonder how much of it was code for what was actually happening in their own country.
Without getting into the meat of it. Suggest the focus on the 'British' aspect of it detracts heavily from the same thing happening under different auspices in todays world. It fundamentally misses the point to underwrite it as British problem unique to Britain, when the Duke of Wellington is deploying troops to put down their own workers protesting about the conditions comparable to what the EIC was inflicting on the Indians in their own country illustrates that divide (not just in friggin' Ireland). To imply that the British State always intended to Create the EIC for future takeover at that time is a theory bordering on conspiracy or rather is - the collapse of it wasn't manufactured by the government, only the greed of it's shareholders. It became too big to fail, with associated vested interest. It did go kaput more than once. Sound familiar? Of course they morph over time to equate to different meanings including domestic politics you talk of, take the Falklands for example.
Put simply and crudely for anyone who has formulated as part of their political leanings about how fundamentally evil *everything British* is, The EIC was set up for private Individuals to get rich. It was the same with the French, they both went the same way, and they both used their military as guarantor. It provided the drive. There was no shortage of bum people applying for Blackwater roles after mercenaries were strung from a bridge. The appalling situation in India was clearly created by company administration. It forced government takeover, the Government was hardly going to surrender it's interests, and basically the government gave about as little damn about its subjects, as it had of its own a few decades earlier. It's cold, it means a lack of an identifiable scape goat. Doesn't sit well with the left etc. I merely point you to stock exchange department stores selling brand name jeans for top dollar, made in Bangladesh factories, administered by Bangladeshies where they lock the people in and if it burns to the ground they all die... Yep, the local government still taxes the factories, their police still walk in the door... but they couldn't give a rats, fundamentally there isn't much difference at all.Ego Numquam
Comment
-
-
Originally posted by Versus View PostA small add on to my "expose". Every monotheistic religion is by default expansionist and intolerant to other cultures and religions. Buddhism is a polytheistic and that is why it has the biggest chance of survival in the coming years.
Russian GDP is less than Italian, bar nukes and threats and the willingness to invest and use their military in a limited manner Russia is most definitely not a 'superpower'; that's what the whole Gerasimov Doctrine on asymmetric war is about, punching above your real (and sustainable weight); appearing to be rather than being. If you are a 'superpower' you do not need threaten Denmark with nukes.Last edited by snapper; 24 Feb 16,, 17:39.
Comment
-
Originally posted by snapper View PostRome before Constantine.
Russian GDP is less than Italian, bar nukes and threats and the willingness to invest and use their military in a limited manner Russia is most definitely not a 'superpower'; that's what the whole Gerasimov Doctrine on asymmetric war is about, punching above your real (and sustainable weight); appearing to be rather than being. If you are a 'superpower' you do not need threaten Denmark with nukes.
Comment
-
Originally posted by Doktor View PostThey've threaten Israel, too
USA did that to China and UK to Argentina
The point?
The point is that human species is a mammal and it comes in two genders. At start, we all begin as girls and develop sex later on, which makes us unstable mentally. Than human males as any males have the tendency to mark the territory with, either nukes or with something yellow. Everything is very sexual in some bizarre way.
Comment
Comment