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đŸȘ” The Threshold

Hostile zones are surveilled and exploited but never occupied or settled

Properties2
tagsja-picks, contrarian_or_surprising, corroborated, xref, category/factual-claims
aliases@chamayou_theory_2013, loc. 136, @emlen_animal_2014, loc. 201

3 min read

Hostile zones are surveilled and exploited but never occupied or settled

Evidence

Clausewitz’s dictum becomes substantially obsolete with the spread of industrialised weaponry; and where the borders between nations have mostly been fixed and nation-states cover virtually the whole of earth’s surface, territorial aggrandisement loses the meaning it once had. Finally, growing interdependence on a global level increases the range of situations in which similar interests are shared by all states. To envisage a world without war is clearly Utopian, but is by no means wholly lacking in realism. — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 392 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

The hostile zone, for its part, remains a space that is left derelict but which, as a potentially threatening area, definitely needs to be kept under surveillance. It may even be exploited for its resources, but it is not, strictly speaking, to be occupied. One intervenes there and patrols it, but there is no suggestion of going to live there—except to carve out new secured zones, bases, or platforms in accordance with a general topographical schema and for reasons of security. — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 136 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Imagine a food resource spread out uniformly across a landscape—grass, if you’re a grazer, extending as far as the eye can see. As a male, where would you stand guard? Even if it were absolutely necessary for females to visit places with grass to feed, and even if they were willing to mate with you if you happened to be there when they fed, where would that location be? For food resources broadly distributed in space, there is no obvious location that is better than any other. It would be impossible for a male to anticipate where females were likely to visit since they could find their food anywhere. A male could still invest in the production of weapons, and he could use his weapons to deflect rivals from a patch of turf. But why should he bother to guard one particular area if all of the surrounding areas are just as good? And why should he pay the price of producing a weapon and fighting, if other males without weapons or territories do just as well as he does? In the parlance of economists, such behavior would not be cost-effective. — Emlen, Douglas J, Animal Weapons_ The Evolution of Battle, 201 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

  • corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim
  • XREF: connects to: The hostile zone is patrolled and surveilled but never occupied by living bodies — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 136; Uniformly distributed resources make territorial weapons uneconomical — Emlen, Douglas J, Animal Weapons_ The Evolution of Battle, 201; Industrialized weaponry and fixed borders make territorial conquest obsolete — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 392

Broader Connections

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