Just caught the end of Loncraine's Richard III and it got me thinking, what would modern war look if the Medieval feudal system was still in effect?
WI: Modern Feudal War
- Thread starter nick_crenshaw82
- Start date
Kaze
Banned
A lot of suffering and a lot of dead people - case in point Africa post decolonization.
A lot of people who do not deserve to be the feudal lord and those with the potential of being a good one will either end up dead, hated, or plan something like becoming a Shogun.
As for myself :
I would likely end up in all of the above - I would plan to become a Shogun for the greater good of all my subjects, end up hated where poems and histories would set me next to Cao-Cao and Nobunaga, and end up dead (probably assassinated by my underling). Unless I am very lucky - - then all Hail the New Shogun.
A lot of people who do not deserve to be the feudal lord and those with the potential of being a good one will either end up dead, hated, or plan something like becoming a Shogun.
As for myself :
I would likely end up in all of the above - I would plan to become a Shogun for the greater good of all my subjects, end up hated where poems and histories would set me next to Cao-Cao and Nobunaga, and end up dead (probably assassinated by my underling). Unless I am very lucky - - then all Hail the New Shogun.
Riain
Banned
It does lurk below the level of the state, or has done until very recently, like armed strikebreakers or companies with their own security. If the state gets weak enough then these forces will proliferate and become more active.
As for their activities, think about the border reivers and east India company armies, they would be used to steal shit on a grand scale.
As for their activities, think about the border reivers and east India company armies, they would be used to steal shit on a grand scale.
In the not so distant future, if the worst predictions come through, we might see some kind of neo-feudalism arise even in the west.
Purchase farmland enough to feed you and your hird, dig a moat around it, build some concrete walls around it before we forget how to make it (again), do stockpile guns and ammunition but also invest in crossbows and pikes.
Purchase farmland enough to feed you and your hird, dig a moat around it, build some concrete walls around it before we forget how to make it (again), do stockpile guns and ammunition but also invest in crossbows and pikes.
Multi-national corporations are already heading towards feudalism. They are powerful enough to buy or steal entire countries. Wage inequality makes the vast majority of the population struggle to earn a living wage while a tiny elite lives in luxury. Any outspoken peasant is found floating - face down - the next morning.
Since peasants don’t need to read or write, they are kept barefoot; pregnant and in the kitchen. Kind of like the volunteer “wives” for ISIS.
Since peasants don’t need to read or write, they are kept barefoot; pregnant and in the kitchen. Kind of like the volunteer “wives” for ISIS.
That's very very hard because you can't have a Feudal war without a Feudal system and you can't have a modern war without a modern arsenal that is going to make the system obsolete.
Production and maintenance of a modern arsenal are extremely expensive matters that require access to specific resources (Oil, coal, various metals and sometimes rare minerals.), the employment of specialized workers, the presence of a complex productive system that cannot be improvised and necessary infrastructures (Imagine having planes, but no airports or having a large navy, but no port big enough and with the necessary facilities to host and sustain it.).
All these require a lot of money, organization and access to a big "pool" of people to properly function. The Central Authority from which the feudal ones depend is just going to collect more taxes and gather more manpower and probably has access to larger amounts of resources than the feudal lords simply because of its size.
There're ways of dealing with this. You can have a state so huge with fiefs so big that they can easily find inside themselves everything needed. A massive and super- unlikely Reich stretching from the Atlantic to the Caucasus whose Central Authority is in crisis after an eventual nuking of Berlin would do the job with a Großführer in Vienna and a dozen of local Führers running their fiefs.
There's also the Afghanistan approach in which the necessary stuff that was listed above is not present and the arsenal can be imported from a foreign country that is able to produce it. The problem with it is that money become fundamental and unless the Central Authority is not able to collect taxes from the fiefs in peacetime it is not going to last.
Or the Dune approach... In a distant future in which space travels are common, but very expensive and long, the only way to make sure that planets far far away don't stop supplying you with their precious goods is to nominate special governors with a monopoly over the use of force. Concepts like honor and bloodline would become again extremely important: breaking the promise that your grandfather made about supplying Apple with 15 Bil T of Coltan every ten years would be a serious crime, enough to be stripped of the title of Vice-Greatgrandgovernor. Luckily, the local Amazon Greatgrandgovernorship needs the wheat and meat that your systems produce to supply their transgalactic couriers on the new route from Alpha Centauri and they are likely to deploy at least two fleets to help you. Your family would be remembered as a bunch of traitors, but at least you're going to hold your Vice-Greatgrandgovernorship for the next 20 generations.
Production and maintenance of a modern arsenal are extremely expensive matters that require access to specific resources (Oil, coal, various metals and sometimes rare minerals.), the employment of specialized workers, the presence of a complex productive system that cannot be improvised and necessary infrastructures (Imagine having planes, but no airports or having a large navy, but no port big enough and with the necessary facilities to host and sustain it.).
All these require a lot of money, organization and access to a big "pool" of people to properly function. The Central Authority from which the feudal ones depend is just going to collect more taxes and gather more manpower and probably has access to larger amounts of resources than the feudal lords simply because of its size.
There're ways of dealing with this. You can have a state so huge with fiefs so big that they can easily find inside themselves everything needed. A massive and super- unlikely Reich stretching from the Atlantic to the Caucasus whose Central Authority is in crisis after an eventual nuking of Berlin would do the job with a Großführer in Vienna and a dozen of local Führers running their fiefs.
There's also the Afghanistan approach in which the necessary stuff that was listed above is not present and the arsenal can be imported from a foreign country that is able to produce it. The problem with it is that money become fundamental and unless the Central Authority is not able to collect taxes from the fiefs in peacetime it is not going to last.
Or the Dune approach... In a distant future in which space travels are common, but very expensive and long, the only way to make sure that planets far far away don't stop supplying you with their precious goods is to nominate special governors with a monopoly over the use of force. Concepts like honor and bloodline would become again extremely important: breaking the promise that your grandfather made about supplying Apple with 15 Bil T of Coltan every ten years would be a serious crime, enough to be stripped of the title of Vice-Greatgrandgovernor. Luckily, the local Amazon Greatgrandgovernorship needs the wheat and meat that your systems produce to supply their transgalactic couriers on the new route from Alpha Centauri and they are likely to deploy at least two fleets to help you. Your family would be remembered as a bunch of traitors, but at least you're going to hold your Vice-Greatgrandgovernorship for the next 20 generations.
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Riain
Banned
Not every power holder in the feudal system had the full gamut of modern war gear even at the height of the fuedal era. Projecting this forward the king, great lords, rich cities might have tanks and combat aircraft, indeed these might deliberately focus on these things at the expense of infantry. At the bottom of the scale the sorts of people who held a tower house equivalent might only have a hmg or mortar and free yeomen/women are kitted out infantry.
The big difference would be that any number of people could legitimately resort to armed violence. One tower house equivalent holder might attack another, or be attacked by a nearby city or higher lords for any manner of reasons. In addition accidents of birth, marriage and death would mean constant fluctuations of power and military potential .
marathag
Banned
But that's not really Feudalism, though. EIC did pretty much their own thing during the Revolution&Napoleonic Wars, and I would not call the UK government a weak state during that time, even with GIII being crazy some of the time, and then the Regency.
The problem is even large nation states now have issues with producing modern fighter jets (look at the multinational projects needed by even G7 powers) and once you have them (and the rest of modern heavy weapons) anybody else simply gets destroyed if they challenge you openly and the large state cares about winning sufficiently. The large states also want peace to pay for the expensive weapons as small scale fighting between tower houses will be far to disruptive to most trade and industry.
Riain
Banned
Indian state were weak, thus the EIC could get away with its activities.
And yes, it isn't feudalism, but it is a non state actor using coercive violence for it's own (not the state's) benefit. Similar happens in feudalism, for different reasons.
marathag
Banned
But in a Feudal syste, the EIC would have had to make a portion of their Military under the direct control of the British Sovereign, not the Indian Statlets under their control.
Could we see a situation where a powerful corporation or institution in one state openly and physically supporting an invasion and regime change by another state?
RamscoopRaider
Donor
Because it can afford higher end weapons if not the absolute top end? It doesn't matter if the state can't afford 7th gen gee wizz super jets, it can afford 5th/4.5+++ gen which are good enough while smaller organizations have to make due with Super Tucanos
Or the state has to get bigger to afford those, or become part of a superstate to afford those or get absorbed by a bigger state which can afford those, or get under the protection of such a state which can afford those
Riain
Banned
I don't disagree with any of that of course, after all it was the cost of cannon and the Trace Italienne (?) anti-cannon fortifications that forced the non king nobles out of the independant fighting business. However where the state is weak someone tends to step into the vacuum and avoid direct competition with the state until the power balance is even..