The world is running out of soldiers
The world is running out of soldiers
Wars are getting more common and militaries are building up. There’s just one thing missing.
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Militaries are doing more with less these days, person-wise, though still with massively inflated budgets. These days you operate a large standing army when you're worried that your youth might get bored and tear your country up if you don't keep them busy rather than because you expect to use them in waves of mass infantry rushes.
They are doing more with less, but we're in the shadow of a looming fire in Ukraine. When countries are invaded, you can't do a lot with drones, governments will need bodies. At that point however, is when conscription would be its most effective (going off prior history -- obviously given recent developments, this is also being proven false).
I could very well be wrong, but in my eyes the war in Ukraine has shown that having a big standing army to swing around isn't the magic win button it used to be. Ukraine has been resisting far beyond anyone's realistic expectation despite being massively outnumbered, doing huge amounts of damage to even Russia's naval assets (in large part due to drone warfare). Russia thought they were just going to roll over the border and plant a flag in to Zelensky's head, yet they remain embroiled in a bitter war of attrition with a military that is a fraction of their size. For what they assumed was going to be a simple border dispute, they have had to convert their economy to a "total war" footing. The ramifications of them throwing scores of their young male population in to a meatgrinder are going to be felt for generations to come, even if/when they "win" and occupy Ukraine... and they know it, given their penchant for kidnapping children.
Humans are by far the most dangerous and capable "robots". They are just very unwilling to risk being damaged.
Errr... okay?