The Prince - Book Report/Review Example

Thesis These principles can be applied to military conflict in Iraq and can help to explain the main problems and strategies followed by the US government and military men. Machiavelli goes on to specify that armies are basically of two types: hired mercenaries and citizen militias. This principle is followed by the US government who uses both types of soldiers. Machiavelli underlines that in Italy the mercenary system was almost universally employed, but Machiavelli proceeds in chapter 12 to launch an all-out attack on it.

'For many years' the Italians have been 'controlled by mercenary armies' and the results have been appalling: the entire peninsula 'has been overrun by Charles, plundered by Louis, ravaged by Ferdinand and treated with contempt by the Swiss' (Machiavelli 47). The core of the US army is native citizens motivated by ideas of freedom and global peace, heroism and global security (Parallels: "Machiavellian" Politics Today 2008). To some extent, the US army tries to maintain a control over the territories in Iraq.

these goals, Machiavelli thinks, are not especially difficult to attain--at least in their minimum form-where a prince has inherited a dominion 'accustomed to the rule of those belonging to the present ruler's family' (Machiavelli 6). But they are very hard for a new prince to achieve, particularly if he owes his position to a stroke of good Fortune. Such regimes "cannot sufficiently develop their roots' and are liable to be blown away by the first unfavorable weather that Fortune chooses to send them" (Machiavelli 23).

They cannot-or rather, they emphatically must not-place any trust in Fortune's continuing benevolence, for this is to rely on the most unreliable force in human affairs. For Machiavelli, the next-and the most-crucial question is accordingly this: what maxims, what precepts, "can be offered to a new ruler such that, if they are 'put into practice skillfully", they will make him "seem very well established'"( Machiavelli 83). The new rule in Iraq shows that it is difficult to establish a democratic government and democracy of the nation opposes these changes.

Guttieri underlines: "The Bush administration wants to see a disarmed and peaceful Iraq governed by a regime with broader internal and regional legitimacy. For this reason we should be clear that the Bush agenda is 'transformation" (Guttieri 2003). It is with the answer to this question that the rest of The Prince is chiefly concerned. you 'is only postponed until the time comes when they are required to fight' (Machiavelli 43). To Machiavelli the implications are obvious, and he states them with great force in chapter 13.

Wise princes will always 'avoid using these troops and form armies composed of their own men'. "So strongly does he feel this that he even adds the almost absurd claim that they will 'prefer to lose using their own troops rather than to conquer through using foreign troops" (Machiavelli 49). The US government does not follow these policies trying to maintain control over the occupied territories (Parallels: "Machiavellian" Politics Today 2008). Arms and the man are two things used the ruler to govern his lands and the nation.

The same situation is typical for Iraq when the