Baiji

Good article in the Washington Post by Ann Tyson. She captures both the concept of guerrilla entrepreneurs combining with criminal networks:

Insurgents have used Baiji as a base for staging attacks on Mosul and Baghdad while skimming funds from the oil trade, U.S. officers said. Together with criminal networks, they began profiting by cutting pipelines and trucking oil products to be sold on the black market. "No one makes money when oil flows. They make money when it's disrupted," said Lt. Col. Mike Getchell, an operations officer with the 101st in Tikrit. In Baiji, the black market for gasoline bustles, with vendors often reappearing within days or hours of being detained by U.S. troops. "They're all over the place," Houston, 20, of Cincinnati, said on a recent patrol through town.

and the essence of Creveld's moral degradation (strong forces fighting weak ones will become weak themselves):

"I felt so angry and violated," said Goudy, of Clarksville, Tenn. "We all wanted to go out and tear up the city, kick down the doors, shoot the civilians, blow up the mosque." Goudy and others were convinced Iraqis living nearby knew about the bomb but did nothing to warn them.

Comments

[Federalist X]

the moral degradation theory is particularly interesting to me. the spartans faced off with xerxes at horrible odds. they then sent even more of their troops home before leonidas took his last stand. a fight which is perhaps one of the most famous battles of all. creveld i gather would propose a different course of action for xerxes. rather than use the traitor's information to ensnare leonidas. he would have used it to step around him, leaving only a rear guard to protect against the spartans?

the climax of moral degradation here though was not xerxes decision to finish the spartans off at the pass. in other words, engaging the weaker foe wasn't the telos of the persian army's degradation. it was after the battle when xerxes decided to cut off the head of leonidas and mount it on a pole instead of giving the body the proper burial honors which the persian force was accustomed to doing. of course much of that could have been a literary device constructed by herodotus, though even if so it would only make the point still more interesting.

carl page is a professor down at st. john's college in annapolis md. he has a wonderful little essay on the actions xerxes took here. i can't find a copy online but if you are able to i would recommend reading it. it is clear and succinct and deals heavily with the moral degradation dilemma.