Mercenaries

[tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)]

At 9:40 PM 9/17/96, William Knowles wrote:
>On Tue, 17 Sep 1996, Michelle Thompson wrote:
>
>> Interesting information from a friend of mine-
>>
>> >An american can not serve for pay for a position in another military
>> >that could be filled by local populace.  I may have my jurisdiction
>> >wrong tho, this could be an international law not a US law.
>> >Basically, you can't go be a grunt or an assasin in another country,
>> >because they can find their own,

As to Michelle's point that Americans cannot serve for pay in other
militaries, there are all sorts of waivers and "look the other way"s
involved. For example, the retired American officer who became the top
military man in Estonia (or one of the Baltic States)--while still
retaining his U.S. citizenship.

>What about the French Foreign Legion? or the Volunteers for Israel,
>which isn't really a fighting force, but Americans can help keep
>the Israeli army at a ready state.

Israel is one of several states which the U.S. allows dual citizenship
with. For political reasons, because of America's extermination of the Jews
in WW II (Whoops, we were on the other side...so why do we have such a cozy
deal with Israel, but not with, say, France? Beats me. Politics.)

Brian Davis, our former Prosecutor, can tell us how likely it is that any
person would be charged and brought to trial for being a paid mercenary for
some small country in the Third World. The CIA is often behind such
mercenaries, so national security issues could make the issue murky.

But the real reason such prosecutions are rare is that the government
realizes how Orwellian it sounds to say:

"You are being prosecuted because you were a mercenary for Oceania in its
war with Eastasia. While Oceania was once our ally in our battle with
Eastasia, and we endorsed and financed your role as a mercenary, we became
allies with our great friend Eastasia and are now in a state of war with
the tyrants of Oceania."


>Explicit isn't a dirty word, Or is it?

AOL has declared "explicit" to be a Banned Word, along with "pissant,"
"craps," and "cock," and numerous other such ordinary words. (So much for
mentioning their pissant policies, a game of craps in Las Vegas, or a male
chicken.)

--Tim May

We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed.
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