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[druid91]

Ok, I have been wondering this for a while now.... Why aren't penal legions (or whatever military group term you feel is correct, I'm no expert and I like legion so I'm sticking with it.) in use in modern militaries?

I mean IIUC militaries could always use more people... and there are tons of people in prison for life. Why not find some mechanism of keeping them controlled and put them in front of non penal legion soldiers?

I mean on the one hand you have the normal system, where you pay good people to go out and kill, take care of all his food and shelter...

on the other hand you can conscript murderers, serial killers, rapists, and their ilk to go out and do the same job for no pay, and not have to bother with money on humane executions.

They couldn't be our only military of course but I see no reason why not to supplement the military with them. If nothing else it'd help reduce the outrage at home when a soldier dies, it isn't as sad when the man who died stabbed someone to death in the street before being sent out.

[mainiac]

Because modern militaries run on discipline and overwhelming fire support.

[Vector]

Serial killer => stabs fellow soldiers => gets loose => rapes his way through the countryside of whatever foreign country you're in => enormous political disaster

Worst case scenario.

Wars are fought more with politics now than they are with guns.  You need your soldiers to be sane.

[Fishbreath]

some mechanism of keeping them controlled

This is the hard part. Too, an important part of military strength is small-unit cohesion and morale. If the guy behind you is an axe-murdering psycho, even if he's promised to be on his best behavior, I don't think you're going to be paying as much attention to less immediate threats as you could.

[Willfor]

Arming violent criminals with war-grade weapons, and then shoving them out into a wartime environment where police-action and anti-insurgency is generally more common than straight-up warring?

Not on my dime, bucko.

[Puzzlemaker]

Actually, for some small-level crimes they do give the option to join the military.  For things like, oh, lets say rape, you don't want those kinds of people being in the military.  It leads to bad things.

[Sensei]

Like Vector said... for the populations of whatever countries we're in to not hate us, our soldiers have to be boy scouts, basically. I wouldn't trust penal soldiers to follow protocol and terms of engagement well.

Edit: TRIPLE NINJA'D

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Furthermore, you have to consider the possibility that some of these people will be wrongfully convicted innocents. We have to restrain the severity of punishment to ensure that people who get unlucky and fall through the cracks don't get screwed over. For example, being shot to death because you were forced to join the millitary under a penal legion.

[druid91]

Serial killer => stabs fellow soldiers => gets loose => rapes his way through the countryside of whatever foreign country you're in => enormous political disaster

Worst case scenario.

Wars are fought more with politics now than they are with guns.  You need your soldiers to be sane.

Or controlled.

some mechanism of keeping them controlled

This is the hard part. Too, an important part of military strength is small-unit cohesion and morale. If the guy behind you is an axe-murdering psycho, even if he's promised to be on his best behavior, I don't think you're going to be paying as much attention to less immediate threats as you could.

Surround them with normal guys, and the promise that they act up they get shot.

Like Vector said... for the populations of whatever countries we're in to not hate us, our soldiers have to be boy scouts, basically. I wouldn't trust penal soldiers to follow protocol and terms of engagement well.

Edit: TRIPLE NINJA'D

Which is why for every penal legion guy you have two normal guys, the penal legion guy acts up he gets shot.

Furthermore, you have to consider the possibility that some of these people will be wrongfully convicted innocents. We have to restrain the severity of punishment to ensure that people who get unlucky and fall through the cracks don't get screwed over. For example, being shot to death because you were forced to join the millitary under a penal legion.

so because one person might fall through the cracks, we give all prisoners a cushy life of free food and shelter to do nothing?

[Megaman]

There is no need to spend so much time enlisting penal forces and wasting time keeping them in line, there's no 'real' war right now.

[mainiac]

Or controlled.

Because modern militaries run on discipline and overwhelming fire support.

Surround them with normal guys, and the promise that they act up they get shot.

Because modern militaries run on discipline and overwhelming fire support.

Which is why for every penal legion guy you have two normal guys, the penal legion guy acts up he gets shot.

Because modern militaries run on discipline and overwhelming fire support.

Putting a bunch of felons on a battlefield would be a massive liability, not an asset.  Soldiers are supposed to be observing and reacting to their environment at all times, not playing prison warden.

Plus try explaining to the family of the first soldier who gets stabbed by a prisoner.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Serial killer => stabs fellow soldiers => gets loose => rapes his way through the countryside of whatever foreign country you're in => enormous political disaster

Worst case scenario.

Wars are fought more with politics now than they are with guns.  You need your soldiers to be sane.

Or controlled.

No, sanity is pretty high up there.

some mechanism of keeping them controlled

This is the hard part. Too, an important part of military strength is small-unit cohesion and morale. If the guy behind you is an axe-murdering psycho, even if he's promised to be on his best behavior, I don't think you're going to be paying as much attention to less immediate threats as you could.

Surround them with normal guys, and the promise that they act up they get shot.

These are people who have already proven that they are willing to do whatever it is they did despite the potentially high consequences. You really think a squad of normal soilders will deter them? Plus, I can't imagine soilders would want to work with convicted felons.

Furthermore, you have to consider the possibility that some of these people will be wrongfully convicted innocents. We have to restrain the severity of punishment to ensure that people who get unlucky and fall through the cracks don't get screwed over. For example, being shot to death because you were forced to join the millitary under a penal legion.

so because one person might fall through the cracks, we give all prisoners a cushy life of free food and shelter to do nothing?

Despite what you might think, being locked up for years and years in a building full of psychopaths isn't fun, free food nonwithstanding. Now, just take the USA. It has a population of 314,000,000. One person won't end up wrongfully convicted, thousands will. What are you going to say to the people who's relatives were killed in wars they were forced to join because the jury/judge/police/anyone else involved fucked up a court case?


And as Megaman said, it would be more trouble than it would ever be worth.

[Cthulhu]

There is no mechanism of controlling dangerous criminals that's effective, humane, and guaranteed enough to justify using it for penal military service.

It's a horrible idea.  At best we would look bad for drugging up/mind-controlling/whatever a bunch of our own citizens and using them as cannon fodder (The real Penal Legion route), and at worst we have a political disaster when a bunch of criminals start doing what criminals do to the unsuspecting populace of the country we're fighting in.

[PsyberianHusky]

Why have them fight, they could be unloading planes?

[Burnt Pies]

You'll still get that one who gets out and goes on a murdering/raping/vandalism spree, and by god the media will have a field day. What, say, in a firefight, stops him from putting a bullet through the head of his warder(s) for the day, and legging it? There's very little a suppressed squad could do to stop him, and you've just released your most dangerous criminals into the country you're 'liberating' or 'protecting'. They're gonna love you for that.