Keeping the Soldiers sweet

Perhaps at the bottom of the talk about a military covenant lies one really hard fact. Politicians power these days is very restricted. There are almost no real laws they can pass that will do anything. The result is that they endlessly tinker and re-tinker with those pointless powers which remain to them. Be that as it may. What is certainly the case is that what is led pecualiarly in the power of politicans is WAR. it is all they can really do, and know that they are powerful. They therefore become addicted to it. 

Soldiers are of course right in the front line of this addiction. More than that, they are also right in the front line of the politicians ego. One needs to keep the military sweet to do anything these days. It is no wonder that at this momement  the shop stewards of the military (its senior brass), start to talk about a covenant (first we had ever heard of it - but it sounds better than work to rule), and thereby as any 1970's union boss would understand, start to flex new found political muscle.

For more of the same so to

here