| the2real4mafol said: with the amount of guns the US has, why do you need an actual army? Just do what the Swiss does and have a civilian army who are decently trained. This way, it would be far cheaper and help to quickly lower your debt |
Essentially because
A) THe US isn't surrounded by a ton of allied democricies.
B) The US wouldn't have NATO, the US mostly being NATO.
C) The US doesn't have an extensive network of tunnels and fallout shelters like Switzerland does. The Swiss fallout shelters make it so that they can essentially "Turtle" and avoid the effects of some of the more powerful modern weapons until A or B arrive.
D) We don't have the Swiss Alps. Most of the US would be terrible for civilian army defense which requires a lot of hiding places.
E) The US is essentially too spread out. Despite most of their army being civilian they do draft all of their citizens and force them in the army for a few years. Teaching a lot of them how to use modern weapons like fighter plances. We wouldn't have enough to succussfully cover all our borders this way.
F) A lot of our most valuable states are on the edges. Want are Technology? You only have to go as far as California.
Want oil? Texas is right there and can be accessed by sea. So essentially playing on D and E... an "enemy" Nation could just nibble at the edges.
Actually Switzerland is EXACTLY what some of the more influential of the founding fathers wanted us to be, which is why for example.... Thomas Jefferson thought it was not only a right to own a gun but a duty as a citizen. It'd be great if we could be like it, but the Swiss just have a lot of advantages at being the Swiss.
