re: #67 Dark_Falcon

Not unalloyed, but it allowed for a far more skilled army, which in turn has helped greatly reduce our casualties in war. Compared to conscripts, our current army is far more effective at its main job: Protecting the nation.

it’s curious how this process mirrors marius’ professionalization of the roman army

but a side effect was to divorce the army from the roman citizenry, and create an army “class”

and then after a while the army discovered that it could make and unmake emperors

of course, this sort of thing doesn’t happen today - except for pakistan, egypt…