Poll: Would you join the army if there weren't guns?

[Asmundr]

Must be the Japanese in me but the idea of fighting with my body and a sword seems interesting.

Ha! Your not alone. I'm German and think the same way.

 

[Hisshiss]

Wouldn't that end up more brutal than it already is? I mean yeah guns kill, but atleast they usually do it quickly. Getting cut to pieces with a sword, beaten to death by a shield or a guys bare bands, or just plan bled dry by an arrow wound is a hell of alot worse than a tiny steel shell dropping you in an instant, and the removal of highly long range weaponry just means that you get to participate in those classic 500 on 500 charge duels you see in the movies, which would easily be the most terrifying fucking experience any human being had to ever have the misfortune of dying from. As hard as it is to believe with all the atrocities we still see today, war has gotten better. In the same way that getting hit by a car is better than getting slowly trampled to death by a horse. It's funny because the tech gap is about identical.

 

[Superior Mind]

No, but I'd be far more inclined to fight if the combat was based mostly om fighting skill rather than luck, like it is with guns.

Learn how to properly operate an assault rifle or light machine gun in a military scenario. Learn how to hit a target at 500m with a 1.5x scope or open sight and learn how to clear any stoppage in a LMG in ten seconds or less. Learn fire control orders and how to operate effectively in a section. Finally, learn how to assault in a section or platoon including how to reload on the run, find cover, maintain your weapon, keep up communication and keep up effective fire. Then come back to me and see if you can say that fighting with firearms is based on luck.

And that's just the bare outlines of basic weapon training.

Anyone can wave a bit of pointy metal around. Show up on a battlefield with a gun an no clue - well count how many times you've died in any first person shooter game. That's you. Except you don't get to respawn.

I seem to have slightly misworded what I meant. I'm sure it take alot of work to learn how to use a firearm, but I'd never consider a scatter weapon like an assault rifle to be based on aiming skill. Concerning your last paragraph, it's pretty evident that you know as much about swordplay as you seem to think I do about gunplay, (especially considering that rocking up with no idea in a battle of blades leaves you just as screwed as your example, albeit taking a bit more time), so we seem to have reached an impasse. I don't play FPSs either, I play good games, but I get what you mean.

Actually I used to fence competitively so I know quite a bit about swordplay as well. My point was that it is foolish to see the simple operating mechanism of a firearm, (which is essentially point-and-press-a-button,) and think "no skill". Fighting with an assault rifle isn't just a matter of basic firearm operation like putting bullets down range or even aiming correctly, it's about using your environment, moving, taking cover when and where you need to, considering where your enemy is aiming so when you get up to fire you're not greeted with a bullet to the face - not to mention communication and fire control orders and all that other junk that is a part of modern warfare. There is a lot of skill involved in all of this, not to mention phsyical fitness. Now in a battle with blades... while 'wave a bit of pointy metal around' may be a major understatement there is, how I see it at least, fewer factors to consider meaning a novice has a better chance of not being sliced in two right away.. I think we can agree though that both forms of warfare are based on skill more than luck.