In the early days of the (American) Republic, there was very nearly an amendment to the constitution that would've banned the formation of standing armies by the federal government in times of peace. I think it would've been quite to see how history would've unfolded had this been adopted. Truly a pity that the founders' suspicions of standing armies have completely fallen by the wayside, and indeed the pendulum has swung so far in the other direction that government soldiers are practically worshiped in the public arena. It is quite ironic to have soldiers praised for "protecting our freedom" over the loudspeakers at an airport while some TSA goon is squeezing my testicles (and another is ransacking my check-in baggage).

Tolstoy wants complete quiet when his testicles are being squeeze.

Or at least some romantic music and candles.

And to answer your question, without an ability to raise a standing army under the constitution (I think it is a bit generous to say there was "almost" this ammendment) You probably would have had a chaotic nineteenth century in eastern north America indeed.

actually kind of a fun thought experiment to play out. The way I see it, defense would be provided by the states. The situation would play itself out in a way where the south and west would have strong defensive militias with the north focusing on protecting shipping and merchants. Slave power would probably be augmented and westward expansion would also have occurred. And the sectional rivalries would have gotten viscous quick. I hardly think there was a chance that Americans would have lived in peace.

Chaotic? The standing army was mostly used to expand into Indian Territory in the early days of the Republic. Without it, the states would've been on their own to expand, which would've simply given the natives a fighting chance to resist the Great White Menace. Europe was too distracted with its own problems to go picking a fight with the US, certainly from 1789-1815. After that, one bloodied nose from backwoods militiamen like at New Orleans would've convinced the Europeans that there were easier picking elsewhere if they had been of a mind to expand in North America.

*Vicious, doubt they would have gotten thicker.

But what about today? I'd be in favour of Ireland joining a movement to disband their armies, but currently irish forces are busy out on UN peacekeeping missions... It seems like it will be a long time before these aren't needed. (and i'm sure the irish defence chiefs are happy to have a real army getting expierence, even when they know they could never win a conventional war to defend the country)

Didn't Liechtenstein's Army die in 1941, of old age. Not sure if he was ever replaced...

They disbanded it in the 18 somethings... Worked pretty well, too small to he worth invading apparently.

But look ay Costa Ricca

"The standing army was mostly used to expand into Indian Territory in the early days of the Republic"

The standing army was used to mop up messes caused by local militias and settlers who tried to expand themselves. With the absence of a national standing army you would likely have gotten stronger state militias that would have filled the void. Indian war was the results of white people going where they shouldn't have been, shaming other white people into defending them and then rinse and repeat

"After that, one bloodied nose from backwoods militiamen like at New Orleans would've convinced the Europeans that there were easier picking elsewhere if they had been of a mind to expand in North America. "

The exception to the rule. American Militia could not stand up to European armies unless they were camped in a fortified behind breastworks and the Europeans decided to charge through a swamp. And this didn't even work at Bladensburg. Even with a standing army European States treated the Americans with complete disrespect in the period you outlined. Without it it could have been worse.

That being said, if the Napoleonic wars turned out the way they did, Britain would likely have provided their protection to the US and the Western Hemisphere as they did throughout the 19th century.

We are assuming the only role of an army is to fight wars. It is unlikely even in world peace militaries would be completely obsolete. Internal conflicts and disaster relief are functions for which militaries come in handy

'Indian war was the results of white people going where they shouldn't have been, shaming other white people into defending them and then rinse and repeat'

Sounds like Israel today...

@Santa
Civil defense groups providing flood relief and other aid exist in ireland independantly of the armed forced. Meanwhile internal conflict (the terrorist war between the IRA and UVF) has been mostly reduced to police control, infact the war grew when British troops were sent in to do policing... Probably a bad idea to send soildiers trainrd to shooy people in to do a policing job.

"With the absence of a national standing army you would likely have gotten stronger state militias that would have filled the void."

Perhaps... but getting the militias of New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia all on the same page on Northwestern expansion would've been a lot more difficult and complicated than simply commanding the Federal Army to invade. Not to mention the cost of expansion would've been born more by those who wanted it, instead of those who had nothing to gain from it - which certainly would've slowed it down some.

"American Militia could not stand up to European armies unless they were camped in a fortified behind breastworks and the Europeans decided to charge through a swamp."

I think the lack of a trained standing army would've impressed upon American military leadership the futility of standing up to a European army in traditional European warfare. Less battles, more ambushes of supply convoys on roads in the back woods... the cost of invasion increases unrelentingly, and British, French, or Spanish generals go mad by their inability to win the war even though they've "never lost a battle" while their kings ask why they're spending so much money to send all these troops and supplies across a great big ocean for no benefit.

Europe would've tired of it quickly... and without a standing army, the US would've had no resources to invade Canada with in the first place.

I assume that the main role of an army is to prevent wars, not to stop them.

In other words, other countries are going to have armies, and eventually they will have leaders that will use them to conquer my country with no resistance if I don't have one. So, I should have an army.

Costa Rica and the like are smart enough to realize that in modern times, they can depend on the US and its massive army in case of hostile invasion, so why waste the money on their own army? You can bet that if, say, Nicaragua invaded we'd be sending soldiers down there within a week, just like when Iraq invaded Kuwait.

Ha, Costa Rica relies on the US guarentee of security?

Really can you support this claim?

Maybe Iceland relies on the US guarentee of security, but the US has done far more to destabilise south/latin America than it has to improve security.

What US intervention was there the last time oil-poor costa rica had a civil war? Or the time before that?? No US has never really guarenteed it's allies in South America unlike Kuwait, because Kuwait exporting oil, costa rica typically exports coffee and bananas...

The US have never stopped a war in South America, that i am aware of... In fact Nivaragua did recieve some CIA backed assistance if i'm not miataken

"Truly a pity that the founders' suspicions of standing armies have completely fallen by the wayside"

To be fair, in today's fast-paced warfare, if your army isn't standing, then you might as well have no army. As long as martial law isn't in effect and there isn't a soldier on every street corner (civilian leadership of the military prevents this), I think a standing army is a positive thing and not the danger that the Founders feared. Hell, the men at Pearl Harbor were in standing military units, and we still got caught with our pants down.

orathaic: I think your forgetting something: United Fruit Company. ;-)

To be honest, I think you're understating how often the U. S. has shamelessly intervened in Latin America. It has done a lot of damage; that's an understatement as well, ha ha. But U. S. diplomats have successfully negotiated so that international wars don't breaks out in Latin America; after all, it's only the United States that has any right to exploit its southern neighbours.

OK, so if you don't like the idea that CR depends on the US army, orathaic, you can say it this way: they depend on the "international community" to defend them.

What do you think would happen if another country were to invade Costa Rica? We'd all just sit and say "hm, too bad for them they didn't have an army."? Not a chance. Sanctions against the invading country (backed up by military force) at a minimum, and I'd say that the odds are pretty good there'd be UN or some sort of alliance putting boots on the ground inside a week if the invading army didn't back off.

That's what I mean when I say that Costa Rica is smart enough to let others foot the bill for their national defense. It's a genius plan; why reinvent the wheel, at great cost to your populace, when just 1000 km north there is an army that could crush yours anyway if it wanted to? Just make friends with that guy and you're good.

As for the USA never stopping a war in South America, has there even been an invasion of one country into another's territory since WWII? Border skirmishes, sure, and then the US was involved in my own country (Bolivia's) fight against a retarded Communist guerrilla when Che was around, but for the most part, there hasn't been a serious territorial invasion since the Chaco war back in the 30's.

The Monroe Doctrine may not be the latest thing across the pipe but I think you're kidding yourself if you think the US would sit on its hands if Costa Rica were invaded.

I saw the thread title and thought you were talking about England and either Italy or Turkey. Then I read the OP and thought you were talking about world variant. I'm a little disappointed this turned so serious so quickly.

I believe that the Monroe Doctrine is still very relevant. Latin America is still the United States' backyard and we will defend it from invading armies. I don't see America getting involved in an international, regional war in Latin America, but if someone else like China, India, or Russia randomly invaded a Latin American country(for whatever reason, I'm just speaking hypothetically) we would jump in pretty fast.

Wrong. America would be involved in almost any interstate war or civil war in Latin America. Can you imagine us doing nothing if Venezuela invaded Guyana? Or Nicaragua Costa Rica? Or Bolivia Chile? We've been at Plan Colombia for over a decade just to bust drug suppliers and a guerrilla force.

The one thing to think about is that our founders had no clue about the future and weaponry when it comes to the right to bear arms and they had no clue as to how foreign affairs could affect our own economy. 18th century America was isolationist by the mere fact that crossing oceans took upwards of two months and was much more frought with peril than today's one week and relative safety with modern navigation, radar, and radio weather monitoring or one day by air.

So now the United States national interests are threatened by wars half a globe away. Then if it wasn't Canada or Mexico, it wasn't a threat unless it came to our shores. Now with foreign oil dependence and countries like China and Japan owning a significant part of our debt and providing us with technology (Japan) and inexpensive goods (China), any conflict has the potential to affect our national interests.

@ Invictus

I really don't think so. Any declaration of war or exercise of war powers would be political suicide unless it was in response to a direct attack on American soil.

I disagree, Draug. We got involved in European wars pretty much from the word go...the War of 1812 was a European war that we got ourselves accidentally involved in and the whole point of colonialism was to move things from colonies months of travel away to the homeland. Heck, you could say that European wars had a very important effect on the US Revolution since the French helped the US out there.

"Any declaration of war or exercise of war powers would be political suicide unless it was in response to a direct attack on American soil."

Nonsense. Where have you been for the last seventy years?

I mean really, what are you thinking? We bombed Libya because Gaddafi was maybe going to massacre people in Benghazi, we would certainly bomb Guatemala if it tried to annex Belize.

@SD - Europe, yes. But the rest of the world? And really 1812 was because it was affecting our ability to conduct trade with France and our ships were being attacked by British-paid privateers (pirates paid by a government to loot and pillage). It wasn't really until WWI that we looked to wars overseas where we hadn't been attacked in some way and even during WWII, it took Japan attacking PEarl Harbor to finally push us into actual military action and not just an equipment and support role.

So Canada could easily disband their army, maybe keep a few anti-bear guns around in case of invasion from the north...

Meanwhile Mexico has it's own internal conflict to resolve... mostly a drug war which has everything to do with US economics and the ability to demand drugs while officially banning them... With a bit of common sense, and a repeal of the international narcotics trading ban they'd be ready to push for far less military...

In Europe, well as i've said, Ireland could do without one, but we're currently using it for the only thing we're able to... that is try to decrease the number of conflicted regions in the world so they are a little bit less likely to spread... (that's the official line on our peace-keeping policy) Sweden and Norway might be fine, except the NATO involvement would be an issue...

i don't see why Luxemborg, Belguim, Holland and Denmark bother spending money on defence... if they neighbours (either France of Germany) decides to invade they're going to end up with the exact same thing that happened in the last two European wars... and still their armies are mostly invovled in Afghanistan or actual peacekeeping...

Does mongolia need an army? They also seem to do a lot of peacekeeping, but if either China or Russia invaded how long would they last? (unless they managed to pull off something like the winter war as finland did against russia...)

What about australia? They just need some boats to keep trade routes open...

Oh, sorry, am i distracted you from the US-centric world view? Deepest apologies...

1. If you cannot oppose the enemy annexing your country in any way, other countries are hard pressed to believe you are actually anything but a collaborator. Furthermore, when no part of your population consists of trained soldiers, your means of sabotaging the occupation is limited to primitive domestic terrorism or emigrants getting the training elsewhere.
2. You cannot treat the smaller countries separately. Nazis could get their steamroll started because they picked the targets one by one. If the French and Brits didn't bail on Czechoslovaks, the latter could hold the position until the former pushed from the West. Similarly, Poland wouldn't fall as quickly if the countries you mentioned didn't pretend nothing was happening (and if they weren't forced to fight a two-front war). Even when split exactly in half, your presence in each theater will be weaker than 50% of your total strength. A simplified example would be: try to use 2 units against Austria and 2 against Russia and see how well you will fare.
3. On a related note, while the modern armies can be deployed pretty fast, if you cannot hold your ground at all, the enemy will simply occupy you before the help arrives. The fight will then take place on your soil which means substantial damage to your assets, be it collateral or pre-planned by the retreating forces (think the oil wells in Kuwait).

'primitive domestic terrorism' - yeah, like in Iraq and Afghanistan, that's a terrible plan! Ok, they may have crossed porous borders, and fine it's pretty hard to seal the border of either those rural desert/mountain countries (unlike an Island like ireland...)

Substantial damage to your assest sure, and the kind of assymetric warfare we've seen in the past decade will also do fine against the best trained armies in the world.

IF you have no-one to come to your rescue then it really doesn't matter how long you hold out. And most modern wars are not fought by people who expect an international force to come and save the day... Lots of African wars assume the UN will continue to be ineffective...

I don't know what happened to oil wells in Kuwait.

You were talking about European countries. Perhaps you have a vague idea of what Europe looks like, but if Germany invaded the Netherlands, there would be no Western mujahideens pouring in from Belgium (also, since when was the population of Iraq and Afghanistan devoid of military training, which was my condition?), nor would Germany have any trouble maintaining presence in a country which it borders with and which isn't half a globe away and sporting a completely different culture nor would there be any significant asymmetric warfare since the Dutch don't have a kalashnikov in every family nor do they possess an inhospitable landscape suitable to resistance apart from the urban warfare, Grozny-style (which means quite a bloodshed). Furthermore, I would like to see a European country without army with no allies - e.g. the Baltic states lacking air force are paying for aerial defense from other countries. If you had no army, you would still need to pay for defense, either by cash or by less tangible means, which is incidentally how the smallest members of NATO enjoy the stay in NATO or how Andorra and Liechtenstein can feel safe. Of course, you can try leeching on others, primarily hoping for American goodwill for instance but that is not the smartest nor safest solution.

Essentially, you are daydreaming about armyless Europe (and other regions but I don't comment on those) while your examples only work in distant, underdeveloped regions. Even then, by mentioning Africa, you are pretty much shooting yourself in the leg. Those countries have armies and that's why those wars are not decisively ended and the underdog can fight on. Did Ethiopia managed to reannex Eritrea? That question is rhetorical, despite the enormous manpower difference.

The fleeing Iraqis set those wells on fire and some of them burned for as much as 10 months.

The U.S. founders compromised, deciding on a standing army but giving the power to declare war to congress. Sadly (imo), congress has abdicated that power. Also, the original idea was that a small core of professional soldiers would be augmented by the state militias who would provide the greater part of the manpower in emergency. That pattern held through the civil war and even the Spanish/American war, but fell by the wayside after the Philippeno/Amercian war in which it was discovered that non-prefessionals did not perform well in free-fire zones, concentration camps, etc. Interestingly, the Philippeno war was our first major undeclared war, with more combat casualties than any preceding American war besides the Civil War. And to end this rant, I'm majorly in favor of going back to calling the Civil War the "War of the Rebellion".

The Filipino-American War (spell check, anyone? Ph or F with the preceding tense?) was also instrumental in getting the M1911 designed and introduced, as well as the last real combat use of the M1873 Colt Single Action Army.

The Army's new S&W revolvers in .38 caliber weren't stopping charging Filipino tribesmen, so the Army briefly reverted to the old SAA in .45 while the M1911 was being developed.

I'm sorry for that little hijacking, but firearms history fascinates me.

Hijack away, the history fascinates me too.
Didn't the Filipinos have a kind of body armor fashioned out of vines? Or did my brain just make that up? Or I read it in a fantasy novel?

I don't know about that, but they were doped up on pain-blocking drugs that made it obvious that .45 is the ideal pistol caliber.

@ Invictus

We were attacked by terrorists operating out of Afghanistan, and despite strong signs of the Taliban and al-Qaeda crumbling, only about 30% of Americans support continuing the war.

The only people who would support another foreign war is neoconservatives. Liberals, libertarians, and populist conservatives would demonize the president immediately. I simply don't see a scenario in which a minor war in Latin America results in American intervention.

@No armyless Europe.

What about Canada? It could survive without an army.

Most European nations get very little use from their armies, Germany and Japan have manged without serious military investment since the second world war (because they weren't really allowed by the powers that be) but how much did that improve their economies and social spending?

How does education fair when defence spending dropped to nearly zero?

The European defence budgets are ever evaporating but definitely not into the education budget.So instead of using the cash freed by Americans keeping their defence budget intact to do something constructive, we just squander it. We are not only free riders but stupid free riders.

i think the point of a 'free rider' is that they're taking the easy option, and thus not stupid but smart... regardless of what else they do with the saving...

Still the US is leeching off the rest of the world by not investing in education and then letting PHD graduates come to become citizens for no investment cost...

@Ora - Japan no serious military investment? I mean, yeah they haven't gone all-out but they have a quarter of a million troops and an aircraft carrier. They didn't spend like the US, USSR, or PRC, but they have still invested in their military quite a bit.