Armed Forces

''For the military meaning, see Armed force.'' ''Armed Forces'' was Elvis Costello's third album, his second with the Attractions, and the first to officially credit the Attractions on the cover. It featured a more pop-oriented sound, which Costello has attributed to his ABBA fandom. It was Record producer by Nick Lowe. The working title of ''Armed Forces'' was ''Emotional Fascism'', and throughout the album Costello's lyrics are noticably mired in Militarism and Nazism/fascism imagery ("Oliver's New Model Army is here to stay," "are you ready for the Final Solution," "two little Adolf Hitler," etc.). ==Track listing== #Accidents Will Happen #Senior Service #Oliver's Army #Big Boys #Green Shirt #Party Girl #Goon Squad #Busy Bodies #Sunday's Best #Moods for Moderns #Chemistry Class #Two Little Hitlers #(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding NOTE: "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding" was not on the original UK release of ''Armed Forces''. It was first issued as a B-side on the single "American Squirm" by Nick Lowe & His Sound. ==2002 Rhino Bonus Disc Tracks== #Tiny Steps #Busy Bodies ''(alternate version)'' #Talking in the Dark #Big Boys ''(alternate version)'' #Clean Money #Wednesday Week #My Funny Valentine #Accidents Will Happen ''(live)'' #Mystery Dance ''(live)'' #Goon Squad ''(live)'' #Party Girl ''(live)'' #Stranger in the House ''(live)'' #Alison ''(live)'' #Lipstick Vogue ''(live)'' #Watching the Detectives ''(live)'' #You Belong to Me ''(live)'' #Chemistry Class ''(live solo)'' ==Personnel== * Nick Lowe - producer * Roger Bechirian - engineer * Elvis Costello - guitar, vocals, songwriter * Steve Nieve - keyboards * Bruce Thomas - bass * Pete Thomas - drums 1979 albums Elvis Costello albums New Wave albums

Armed forces

The armed forces of a state are its military organization. They exist to further the foreign and domestic policies of their governing body. They may consist of both military and paramilitary forces. Armed force is the use of armed forces to achieve political objectives. The study of the use of Armed Forces is called military science. Broadly speaking, this involves considering offense and defense at three "levels": strategy, operational art, and tactics. All of these areas study the application of the use of force in order to achieve a desired objective. ==Organization== Armed forces may be organized as ''standing forces'' (or a regular army), which describes a professional army that is engaged in no other profession than preparing for and engaging in warfare. In contrast, there is the ''citizen army''. A citizen army (also known as a militia or reserve army) is only mobilised as needed. Its advantage lies in the fact that it is dramatically less expensive (in terms of wealth, manpower, and opportunity cost) for the organizing society to support. The disadvantage is that such a "citizen's army" is less well trained and organized. Historically, professional armies often triumph over much larger citizen armies when engaged in combat. A compromise between the two has a small cadre of professional NCOs (non-commissioned officers) and officers who act as a skeleton for a much larger force. When war comes, this skeleton is filled out with conscripts or reservists (former soldiers who volunteer for a small stipend to occasionally train with the cadre to keep their military skills intact), who form the wartime unit. This balances the pros and cons of each basic organization, and allows the formation of huge armies (in terms of millions of combatants), necessary in modern large scale warfare. Militaries in many larger countries are divided into an army, an air force, and a navy (if necessary). These divisions may be solely for the purposes of training and support, or may be completely independent branches responsible for conducting operations independently of other services. Most smaller countries have a single military that encompasses all armed forces employed by the country in question. The state of readiness of a military organisation may be indicated by its Defense Condition state (US) or BIKINI state (UK). ==Benefits and costs== The obvious benefit of any military is in providing protection from foreign armed forces, and from internal conflict. In recent decades standing armies have also been used as emergency civil support roles in post-disaster situations. On the other hand they may also harm a society by engaging in counter-productive (or merely unsuccessful) warfare, by domestic repression, or simply by supporting the idea that violence (or the threat thereof) is the way to get what one wants. Expenditure on science and technology to develop weapons and military systems sometimes produces side benefits, although some claim that greater benefits could come from targeting the money directly towards things that would improve life instead of ending it. Excessive expenditure on military forces can drain a society of needed manpower and material, significantly reducing civilian living standards. If continued over a significant period of time, this results in reduced civilian research and development, degrading the society's ability to improve its infrastructure. This lack of development in turn affects the military in a vicious cycle. See the Soviet Union for a typical modern example of this problem. Transarmament is a recent movement to replace armed forces with nonviolence training and infrastructure. ==Armed forces of the world== See :Category:Militaries. ==See also== * Militaria * Military academy * Military courtesy * Military fiat * Military history * Military incompetence * Junta * Military rule * Military science * Military tactics * Military technology and equipment * Military Aid to the Civil Power * Military Aid to the Civil Community * List of air forces * List of navies * List of armies * List of battles Military ==External links== *[http://www.janes.com/defence/ Janes Defence] *[http://www.HavenWorks.com/military Military News] *[http://www.militaryindexes.com/ Directory of Online Military Indexes & Records - USA] *[http://www.DefenseLINK.mil US Military News DefenseLINK.mil] *[http://www.bdcol.ee/ Baltic Defence College] simple:Military zh-cn:武装力量

Armed forces

==Phrasing of "military"== I'm not sure about US usage, and I know Wikipedia isn't a dictionary, but I always thought "military" was an adjective not a noun. The page seems to describe "army" or "military organisation". User:Mswake 02:22 Jul 30, 2002 (PDT) Hmmmm, I'm not certain either. If someone want's to move it, so be it. The ending isn't very good right now. When I'm more motivated, I'll come back and flesh it out. Anyone want to give it a crack? User:Bobdobbs1723 20:56 Sep 16, 2002 (UTC) English makes verbs out of nouns and nouns out of adjectives all the time. It's quite common to speak of the armed forces as "the military", but I suppose "armed forces" probably is better. --User:Lee Daniel Crocker Yes, military ''is'' a noun. For example, "The military engineered a ''coup d'état''." --User:Lowellian 20:58, Mar 23, 2004 (UTC) ---- A few things. Armed force is the use of force when one is armed, strictly speaking. I find the association a bit strained. I think army, or military organization may be better, but I can live with this. But do redirects (as from Military) stay forever? I think this is important, because all the links at the bottom (i.e. Military Science, Military History, Military tactics, Military technology and equipment and Military academy, Military incompetence, military fiat) all have military in them, after all..... :"Armed force" is a noun as well as a verb; "The armed forces of the :United Kingdom". Synonym of "Armed service". :Yes, I believe redirects stay until manually removed - User:Khendon 14:11 Sep 26, 2002 (UTC) :: I don't think that came out right. I meant to say that it is premissible to say "He used armed force against his wife's lover." without having anything to do with armed forces. It just doesn't sound quite like the correct word, especially if someone was doing a search of the Wikipedia to find information.User:Bobdobbs1723 14:43 Sep 26, 2002 (UTC) I think the edit to remove what some may consider to be United States bias may be a bit premature. I used an example - (A citizen army (also known as a militia, or National Guard in United States)) because I know the name of the national guard without looking it up. Is it the Home Guard in Britain? What about Germany, Bundesweir (?)? :I'm sorry, that was an honest mistake. I cut it out intending to put it :in a list of a few examples a little further down, but then forgot. The :British equivalent is the Territorial Army, but it isn't :primarily a skeleton force in the way you describe. (Nor is its main role :home defense, by the way - it is organised to provide support to the :Regular Army. Conventional home defense is officially considered so :remote a possibility that it's not worth preparing for. I mention :this just for interest :-) - User:Khendon 14:11 Sep 26, 2002 (UTC) :: No problem. The current National Guard system isn't quite a skeleton as well. It is currently formed of long term veterans (many from the Gulf war), who are can be better than their enlisted counterparts (due to having been in a real war). But the basic idea remains to provide a balance between thrift and usefulness. And like the British, we don't expect it to defend the country from invasion either! User:Bobdobbs1723 14:43 Sep 26, 2002 (UTC) The point of specifing the existence of these guard organizations (much more well trained and organized than what a militia implies), is that their formation (I think it was first by the Swiss, but I have to check) was the tool used by national governments in the mid to late 1900's to form mass armies for combat in WWI. Without the balance between economic and military needs that national guard organizations provide, WWI could not of been fought on the scale it was, or provide practice for truly huge WWII formations. User:Bobdobbs1723 13:52 Sep 26, 2002 (UTC) : Khendon almost got it right, but notice that his example didn't agree with his assertion: ''"Armed force" is a noun as well as a verb; "The armed forces of the United Kingdom".'' : * ''Armed force'', a mass noun, means violence employing weaponry. : * An ''armed force'' is any group of people acting together, with weapons. : * The ''armed forces'' (or the ''Armed Forces'') is a country's national military organization. : I'm going to move this article to armed forces, if possible, or post it on Requested moves if not. ''—User:Mzajac User talk:Mzajac 2005-04-16 03:33 Z'' ==Division into army, navy, air force== "Most militaries are divided into an army, a navy, and an air force." This is incorrect, but I see where User:Roadrunner is trying to go. No landlocked countries have a navy, and most coastal countries don't either. A few customs patrol boats don't really constitute a Navy in the sense of this article. :"No landlocked countries have a navy" Basically this is correct, but Bolivia, which is a landlocked country, maintains a nominal navy, mainly because it used to have a coastline and lost it to Chile. So they keap a boat or two in that large lake (I forget how to spell it) and call it their navy. ::Zaire also has a navy see http://www.1upinfo.com/country-guide-study/zaire/zaire191.html User:Mintguy The same goes with the army / air force distinction. The larger militaries have separate forces, but most militaries (police armies, actually) are just the guys with guns in the country, no matter what those guns are attached to, people or aircraft. And with the advent of Goldwater-Nichols (United States armed forces), the United States (the largest military in terms of force projection, and lethality, but not troops) may have separate services, but are commanded as a combined arms force. So 'divided' is in terms of training and support, not doctrine or command - which I would argue is much more important as a distinction. This also applies to NATO, as was shown in the combined arms doctrine employed in the first use of the basics of AirLand battle in the Second Gulf War in 1991 against Iraq. So most militaries (in terms of number of troops) have separate services. But most militaries have (in terms of number of countries) a single army that may or may not operate aircraft. Finally most militaries (in terms of force projection) have a single military with specialists in air, naval, ground, and space systems. User:Bobdobbs1723 02:50 Sep 30, 2002 (UTC) ==Capitalization== I can see changing United States armed forces to United States Armed Forces, but why change armed force to Armed Force? It's generic, not one particular force. -- User:Zoe ==The list by country== The section "Armed forces around the world" should probably be split out into an article like List of politics by country articles, probably List of militaries by country articles, and made to include links to all the available countries. --User:Shallot 19:42, 15 Feb 2004 (UTC) : Thanks for fixing that, User:Beland! --User:Joy 17:36, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC) ==Benefits and costs== Is it wrong to say that it would be better to spend money towards improving lives instead of ending them? User:Bensaccount 00:25, 27 Feb 2004 (UTC) : I wouldn't say that it's "wrong," but it does express a particular point of view that a lot of people would consider an oversimplification. I do happen to agree with you that the world's money (which is really a metaphor for the use of the world's human skill & energy) would be much better spent elsewhere, but the purpose of armed forces is more complicated than just "ending lives," as you imply, although at the bottom line, that is what they do. Nominally, the main purpose of a country's maintaining an armed force is for defense against other countries which have them, and that puts the entire world in a great catch-22 since no one has yet managed to convince everyone simultaneously to forswear violence, even though it is now somewhat possible with spy satellites and other means (arguably, the United Nations' weapons inspections) to be sure of compliance. That probably won't happen anytime soon largely due to smaller nations' fear of economic subjugation by larger nations, where if they find themselves in a cycle of what amounts to slave labor to developed countries, they could, in theory, fight for greater equality. Unless, of course, the biggest nation of them all outdoes itself by keeping up an army ridiculously more advanced than anyone else's so that it can stay in control. Back and forth. And that's a biased oversimplification too, albeit longer. hmm. Anyway, I feel that your statement expresses unneeded bias because it reduces what is probably the world's most complicated, ages-old problem to a simple economic binary choice: spend money improving lives or ending them. It hides the forest with trees. User:Aratuk 13:08, 27 Feb 2004 (UTC) ::This is a very comprehensive view. It should definately go in the article. (right now there is no proverbial forest and no proverbial trees.)User:Bensaccount 02:01, 28 Feb 2004 (UTC) == =List of Vic/Defeats= == I would like to find a list of noteable Military victories/defeats, things that helped reshape military thought, or were the catalyst of a war's outcome. Lessons learned, etc. However, the first ones I know of are Brienne (Notable Defeat, WW2), Pickett's Charge (Noteable Defeat, US CivWar), Custer's Last Stand (which place to put it?) Perhaps I should just change it to notable battles. Or something that reflects ''learning through battles''. I think a special place should be made for those that demonstrated a latter epiphany. Assistance please... --User:Duemellon 19:37, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC) =="Armed forces are the military forces of a nation-state."== So that mean the Army of the UK is not a Armed Force? For the UK is not a nation-state, tis a multi-nation state (the four nations), and quite a number of countries today are not 'nation-states'. Could change it to: "Armed forces are the military forces of a state." or something. User:Kurek :The Comintern, al-Qaeda and a host of other organizations are not states or nation states either, yet they constitute armed forces, advocate, and use armed force.User:Nobs01 17:57, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC) ==Rank== i've asked on the appropriate pages but never got an answer. I have a question on rank on homework. the geneva convention outlines commissioned officers, non-commissioned officers and "men". compared to the united states army ranks, which ones fall into the three categories? i've got listed that both privates (E-1 % E-2) and private first class are "men". the corporal and sargeant ranks are NCOs and the officer ranks are commissioned officers. is this correct? also, is it universal for paygrades to automatically fit into one of the three categories? == Requested move to Armed forces == * An armed force is any group of people acting together, with weapons. But this article is about the armed forces (or the Armed Forces), a country's national military organization. ::''Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one sentence explanation and sign your vote with ~~~~ * Support this is my request. ''—User:Mzajac User talk:Mzajac 2005-04-17 00:19 Z'' * Support --User:Philip Baird Shearer 18:02, 20 Apr 2005 (UTC) * Support. User:Violetriga User_talk:violetriga 15:55, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC) * Support Comintern's stated objected was ""by all available means, including armed force, for the overthrow of the international bourgeoisie and for the creation of an international Soviet republic as a transition stage to the complete abolition of the State." User:Nobs01 17:30, 13 Jun 2005 (UTC) User:Violetriga User_talk:violetriga 15:55, 22 Apr 2005 (UTC)

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Words begining with Armed_forces:

Armed_Forces
Armed_forces
Armed_forces
Armed_Forces_(album)
Armed_forces_(delete)
Armed_Forces_(Fiji)
Armed_Forces_(Special_Powers)_Act,_1958
Armed_Forces_(UK)
Armed_Forces_Day
Armed_Forces_Day
Armed_Forces_Expeditionary_Medal
Armed_Forces_in_Hawaii
Armed_Forces_Medical_College,_Pune
Armed_Forces_Medical_College,_Pune
Armed_Forces_of_Malta
Armed_Forces_of_National_Liberation
Armed_forces_of_poland
Armed_Forces_of_PRC
Armed_Forces_of_the_Philippines
Armed_Forces_of_the_Philippines
Armed_Forces_of_the_United_Kingdom
Armed_forces_of_the_United_States
Armed_Forces_Police
Armed_Forces_Radio
Armed_Forces_Radio_and_Television_Service
Armed_Forces_Radio_Network
Armed_Forces_Radio_Service
Armed_Forces_Reserve_Medal
Armed_Forces_Revolutionary_Council
Armed_Forces_Security_Agency
Armed_Forces_Service_Medal
Armed_Forces_Special_Powers_Act
Armed_Forces_Vocational_Aptitude_Battery