On Organization

but our army must be a national force, equipped from the resources I have named, so that you may be well provided for the performance of your task, and that we may have no repetition of what usually happens now, when you are always bringing your generals to trial and the net result of your exertions is the announcement that So-and-so, the son of So-and-so, has impeached So-and-so.

But what is to be the result for you? In the first place, that your allies may be kept loyal, not by maintaining garrisons among them, but by making their interests identical with yours; next, that our generals may not lead mercenaries to the plunder of our allies without even coming in sight of the enemy, so that the profit is all their own, while the State at large incurs the hatred and the abuse, but that they may have their own citizens at their back, and may so deal with our enemies as they now deal with our friends.

But apart from this, many operations demand your actual presence, and beside the advantage of using a national force in a national quarrel, this is necessary on every other ground. For if you were content to let things slide and not worry about the state of Greece, it would be another matter.

But, as it is, you claim to take the lead and to determine the rights of other states; yet neither in the past nor today have you furnished a sufficient force to superintend and secure this claim. On the contrary, it was when you stood utterly aloof and indifferent that the democracies of Mytilene and of Rhodes were destroyed. Yes, but Rhodes was our enemy, you may say.