Quote:
Originally Posted by Askold
People seem to assume that military officers make perfect warlord material but there is an obvious problem there. They hold authority due to their rank in the military. Any authority they have is basically because of that rank, if the military collapses how many soldiers will continue blindly following them if they decide to become warlords? Certainly some might want to stick together simply because it offers better chances of survival but they might just as well decide to leave and try to get back to their families or perhaps find other units are not being led by a "warlord."
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Not just
any officer is going to become a warlord by virtue of their rank. The crap ones would be more likely to be fragged in a SHTF scenario. But, as the Romans have taught us, loyalty to a successful and/or charismatic officer can often trump loyalty to a more abstract concept such as "the state" or "the people". In Rome's case, this phenomenon led to the end of the Republic and largely contributed to the end of the Empire.