Prince Henry Plays War

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6385169.stm

So the Prince is going to war. For me, this raises an interesting and perplexing question on the nature of democracy, or at least, the Diet Democracy we have here in this wonderful nation. Say what you want about monarchies, because it's probably true. But a monarchical, aristocratic-based government will always have a heads up on a democratic republic in one arena: war. Countless monarchs and their highest ranking subjects have gone to war. In fact, for most of its history in civilized culture (Eastern and Western both), war was fought by the upper class because it was too expensive for the lower and (when it was created) middle class. The public memory seems to have forgotten that one used to have to pay for all of his equipment in the army. The government didn't provide you with anything - and this makes sense because before the mid-1800s, governments really didn't give away anything. Anyway, this was quite pricey, as one can imagine, and as such, only the rich went to war. In the middle ages, this was absolutely embodied in the aristocratic warrior classes found in Europe and Japan (knights/samurai). Think of all the war heroes from before the 20th century in these places, and I bet not one of them was a commoner, save for maybe Joan of Arc. But she had the whole divine assistance thing going on. This isn't to say that commonfolk only just recently had a place in war, no...the archery units and musketry and such have been comprised of middle and lower class people since their inception, but the truth is the rich have only just recently had a much smaller role in war...since, oh, the spread of democracy after the American Revolution. Before then, the government declared war, and the government itself went to war. There is a long tradition of warrior kings and princes and dukes, from times that we consider to be less civilized than our own. These people made war, then went and fought it. And that is where modern democracy has always failed. Now the government declares war and watches while the middle class down to the most desperate of the lowest class goes off to fight it. That betrays the very meaning of equality. These people didn't ask to go to war, they don't actually make the vote to declare it - why should they fight it ? It would be different if those enlisted in the military were able to vote on whether or not war was declared upon a country, but then, 9 times out of 10 I'm sure we wouldn't fight wars. And where's the profit in that?

Now, here's one that will really bake your brownies later - was such a so-called "defect" in our system of government intentional? Ideally, the people run the country and so it would make sense that the people would go to war. But in a system that is so far removed from its original conception, so inundated with lobbyists and political machines and pork barrel legislature and partisanism, in short, a hardly ideal system, who is really running the country? Certainly not those who fight the wars. That is why I commend Prince Henry and his resolution to fight, because even though I do not agree with war, I do agree with equality and democracy, and what he is doing is far more democratic than anything I've seen on this side of the Atlantic.

{I may edit this a little more but for right now I just had to get this out of my system}