Manganland Armed Forces: An account
OOC: I am designing my armed forces and I thought I would ask for some assistance in the form of advice and links. I am not new to nationstates however I have no experience of designing my armed forces.
I will continually update this first post as ideas and information come to me.
I hand it to you.
The Evil Overlord
20-10-2003, 20:50
First, you really ought to determine what sort of military you will require. Landlocked countries, for example, rarely require large naval units.
Furthermore, you will need to determine your tech level. What sort of technology are you using? Magic, Elves, and swords? Planet-disintegrating beam weapons, energy shields, and FTL ships? Victorian-era breechloading rifles, steam ships, and cannon? WWII-era military? Modern technology? The choices are almost endless.
Once you've made these choices, you need to decide whether or not to build your own equipment or buy it from others. Building your own stuff takes a lot of time and energy on your part (especially if you're fond of pictures), but you can be reasonably sure that no one else has exactly the same stuff you do, you won't be buying "export" versions of the top-of-the-line foreign stuff that isn't quite as good as the real thing, and you get to custom-design your military to meet your needs. You'll need to post details of the R&D, construction, and deployment of the new equipment as it happens (some people use 1RL day = 1NS year, others use 1RL day = 1NS month).
OTOH, buying stuff is pretty easy. Go to any of several dozen different storefronts and pick and choose what you like. Beware of the cost. A lot of people figure that, since the money isn't really there, you can spend whatever you like. I recommend any of several decent GDP calculators to give yourselfa rough idea of how much money you really have to spend. You may also wish to list your currency with the Quippothian Currency Exchange (it's on a sticky) to get the relative value of your money.
Remember that few countries have much more than 2% of their population in the military (at best- most of them are less than 1%). There is no way a country with 6 million people can survive with half a million people in the military. Read a few of the stickies at the top of the first page on this forum.
Something else to remember: even a purely defensive military (like the Swiss, for example) still needs support units. Trucks, transport planes and helicopters, medical units, maintenance units, supply centers, etc. Except in the most dire of circumstances, most of your military will never fire a shot in anger. Organize accordingly. This applies even if your primary military unit is a 1000-crewman starship.