By this do you mean that it ‘democracies’ the government can simply pass along all costs of the war to the citizens, forcing them through taxes to pay for them?
If so, how would a monarchy go about waging a war?
I probably shouldn’t pass myself off as a military historian, philosopher of war, or strategist. And I hope I haven’t.
But every so often I’ll read a book or essay on military history or some related subject. It’s a small interest of mine.
So, maybe I’m merely parroting the view of one or more authors I’ve read in the past, without the knowledge base to critically critique or challenge it.
But my understanding is that in democracies the whole nation can be mobilized for war. Not just citizens taxed but factories and materials all mobilized for the war effort. What I believe is termed “Total War” if I remember correctly. Think of the United States during WWII with the women in the factories while the men went off to fight. Even Hollywood was mobilized for a part in the war.
Monarchies could only collect so much money. Most monarchs would not want to deplete their treasuries and often they hired mercenary forces. People under the crown were
subjects and not
citizens. So, the wars were less those of the peoples and more those of the crown. Add to this the mercenary armies often lived off the ground. Raiding farms and homes for food. This is different than citizens entering national, professional military forces that receive rations. The basic result is that a lot of wars under monarchs turned into waiting games to see which army would back down first. Usually the battles didn’t result in massive casualties. Mind you… this was not always the case. The Protestants and Catholics slaughtered each other and left villages pillaged and burning in what was it… the Thirty Years War? But those were more akin to what we would call war crimes today.
Supposedly, the U.S. Civil War shocked Europeans of the time period because supposedly battles and wars up until then were never so savage and bloody. But around that same period Brazil with two other neighboring nations united to wage war on another neighboring country. That single country experienced basically - if not worse - what the U.S. or U.S. South did during the U.S. Civil War. That’s less talked about though.
So… I might add this: given the Crusaders were not a professional military force and given the rules of battle were much different during that time period (it was common to slaughter town that did not immediately surrender peacefully but resisted - enslaving or ransoming captives from battle was common too and one way people helped finance their wars) the massacre at Jerusalem is a little more understanding (however wrong and evil) than the
intentional fire bombings of Tokyo and half of Japan not to mention the two nuclear bombs dropped on two Japanese cities (basically, children and non-combatants were targeted).
From what I have read professional military forces throughout the 20th Century had increasingly targeted civilian, non-combatant populations.
