military

On special forces in the military and for warfare. Purpose of the military is typically ensuring external security, ie the defense of the country or its allies from threats from outside. The opposite is the provision of internal security in the society from dangers that are developing within the country itself must be protected.

As tasks are described, for example, for the German Armed Forces:

International conflict prevention and crisis management, including the fight against international terrorism,
Support of allies,
Protection of the inner country and its citizens,
Rescue and evacuation,
Partnership and collaboration,
Assistance (assistance, natural disasters, particularly serious accidents).
The instrument, which the military is available for this purpose and after (under the Geneva Conventions) principle is to distinguish combatants from civilians traditionally the force of arms. Particular tension between states can cause armed conflicts, but increasingly also other dangers, such as terrorism are cause for combat missions, which the armed forces are facing more and more nowadays with so-called unconventional warfare. Moreover, the purpose of the military no longer restricted solely to armed conflicts, but also back techniques of information retrieval, international peacekeeping missions, or other types of military conflict, for example, the so-called "cyberwar" to the forefront. For details, see: Military History.

In public, the military has identified especially in the past an important component of the national understanding. While Western society today rather critical of the military is, it was often (for example, at the time of the German Empire) is an important factor of patriotism (See: militarism). Especially in military-dominated countries, such as China, or the U.S. armed forces play a crucial role, to demonstrate power. The armed forces are by nature an important pillar of the policy, especially in foreign and security policy. A proliferation of power of the military can result from the oppression of a people to coups and military governments.

In addition to defending the military has also broader areas of responsibility, such as peacekeeping (eg international peacekeeper), disaster relief (including Hurricane Katrina), enforcement of economic and political interests of a country / alliance (such as the much-criticized "oil wars ") and ceremonial purposes) (including state receptions.

It is always to bear in mind that the maintenance of a military is very expensive and is a large part of government spending. Therefore, and in part because of moral convictions, there are more states without military and military alliances such as NATO, the divide tasks among several members and ensure a mutual protection money. The current quantitative largest military force in the world has followed China with approximately 2.3 million soldiers from the United States, the U.S. $ 574.9 billion with the largest military budget in the world (see: List of armed forces in the world).

The military has traditionally played a leading technology pioneer and pacesetter in the general technical developments. For example, the television, the Internet or GPS was originally developed for military application and initially only used by the military (see defense and armor).