Is Military Power the Only Source of Security in International Relations?
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- Category: Politics: Political Science
- Date Submitted: 04/04/2011 12:17 AM
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Is military power the only source of security in international relations?
According to B. McSweeney when we think about security we may come with two different images; the word ‘security’ evokes the picture of a solid object, it might be a lock or weapon for instance. In contrast, it might have different consequence, like make us think about vulnerability and even feel unsafe.
In international relations security is understood differently, many of us could probably imagine army, tanks and bombs when thought about state security.
Military power is definitely very important source of security in international relations but it is not the only one. Military power is a result of coherent security system, which includes military, economic, political, environmental and nowadays even virtual security. The relation between these sources of security is akin, and to understand how the whole system works it is necessary to understand each source individually.
Military power is definitely the most powerful source of power. It uses direct aggression and brutality; it is probably the simplest way to get rid of your enemies but probably not the smartest one, as it always requires victims of your own. From the emergence of human, until now military power is widely used, changed only the number of fighters, goals and the arsenal. There were times when horses were great advantage against your enemies. Horses helped to conquer half of the world for Alexander the Great, for Mongolians – to create the largest empire in the world, but people were improving. Once Napoleon said; “God is on the side of the big battalions” (Biddle,2004: 14) and then he was right, manpower was the main military power beside canons filled with the gunpowder, which was high tech at the time. Humans were fighting with swords and muskets and victims were calculated in thousands or hundreds of thousands, but not millions. But times have changed and weapons drastically changed. This was largely due to...
According to B. McSweeney when we think about security we may come with two different images; the word ‘security’ evokes the picture of a solid object, it might be a lock or weapon for instance. In contrast, it might have different consequence, like make us think about vulnerability and even feel unsafe.
In international relations security is understood differently, many of us could probably imagine army, tanks and bombs when thought about state security.
Military power is definitely very important source of security in international relations but it is not the only one. Military power is a result of coherent security system, which includes military, economic, political, environmental and nowadays even virtual security. The relation between these sources of security is akin, and to understand how the whole system works it is necessary to understand each source individually.
Military power is definitely the most powerful source of power. It uses direct aggression and brutality; it is probably the simplest way to get rid of your enemies but probably not the smartest one, as it always requires victims of your own. From the emergence of human, until now military power is widely used, changed only the number of fighters, goals and the arsenal. There were times when horses were great advantage against your enemies. Horses helped to conquer half of the world for Alexander the Great, for Mongolians – to create the largest empire in the world, but people were improving. Once Napoleon said; “God is on the side of the big battalions” (Biddle,2004: 14) and then he was right, manpower was the main military power beside canons filled with the gunpowder, which was high tech at the time. Humans were fighting with swords and muskets and victims were calculated in thousands or hundreds of thousands, but not millions. But times have changed and weapons drastically changed. This was largely due to...