how can a country survive without army(COSTA RICA) ?
Can't any country attack on this country
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Answer:
Absolutely. It’s not for everyone – I wouldn’t recommend it to Israel or Taiwan. And it goes without saying that it depends entirely on context. Raise this question and within seconds someone will have said ‘what about the Nazis?’. And they’re right that it would have been daft to disband the army in the 1930s, after a long legacy of European wars and a rising tide of aggressive nationalism. But that’s a very different context to today. Who are Britain’s enemies today? And how many of them are a genuine threat?
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Answer:
What Happens When a Country Abolishes its Army?
Posted on July 19, 2013 by Celine Roque
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It’s hard enough to make drastic decisions for yourself, but it’s even harder when you have to make choices on behalf of a collective.
That’s the struggle of entrepreneurs each day, especially when their business is just starting out. What if you had to change your marketing strategy? What if you had to suddenly cut costs? What if, after a year of hard work, you realize that you’re building the wrong product?
These are hard questions to wrestle with, especially if you have employees and contractors depending on you to succeed.
World leaders face this struggle on a much grander scale. In their hands are the lives of millions of people. One drastic decision can make or break those lives – which is why it’s so hard for them to make sweeping changes.
But there are a few leaders who spearhead those drastic changes anyway. For example, abolishing the entire country’s armed forces.
Believe it or not, there are a few countries that seem to survive – and even thrive – without a standing army. All because they made a drastic decision to do this, and committed to it.
Let’s take a look at two of these countries, Costa Rica and Liechtenstein, to see why they made these choices, and what happened to them as a result.
Costa Rica
Sixty-five years ago, the Costa Rican president struck a mallet to the wall. This symbolic act commemorated the abolishment of the Costa Rican military.
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Earlier that year, the country had experienced one of its bloodiest civil wars. Figueres, who was acting president at the end of the war, decided that abolishing the military was a drastic but necessary step for rebuilding Costa Rica.
Since then, they’ve redirected their funds to education, environmental conservation, culture, and their internal police force.
While their police force and border guards handle internal law enforcement and border patrol, less than 1% of their GDP goes to funding these programs – a sign that the country is still disinterested in re-militarization.
After all these decades without a military, how has Costa Rica fared?
Happy, Educated, and Green
Costa Ricans are arguably the happiest people on earth, rating their average happiness at 8.5 out of 10. They also report having the most number of happy years per lifetime.
Since the military funds were redirected partly to education, it’s also no surprise that Costa Rica has an above average literacy rate in Latin America, plus there’s almost no visible gender gap when it comes to educational attainment. Most Costa Ricans finish secondary education, regardless of whether they are male or female.
More importantly, Costa Rica is best known for their environmental protection programs. Half of the country’s land is considered forested area, even if these areas could’ve easily gone to agriculture and industrial use long ago. Ecotourism is also a booming industry, and their natural parks are well preserved.
Their results aren’t perfect, of course. But it’s hard to imagine how they would’ve achieved the above things in a 65-year window if most of their funds were still being directed to a standing military force.
Liechtenstein
It was almost 150 years ago when Liechtenstein last had an army. This was during the Austro-Prussian War, which was the setting of this apocryphal anecdote:
“In its last military engagement in 1866, none of its 80 soldiers were killed. In fact 81 returned, including a new Italian ‘friend’.”
Soon after this war, Liechtenstein disbanded their army because they found it too costly.