It’s really hard to think of revolutionary movements that did not have a lot of help from people who once worked for the enemy. Maybe Cuba?

I can’t help but wonder if some speak in a defeated way about the potential of western marxism in part because of the kind of dismal evaluation of the military combined with this kind of view. If the belief, for example, is that US military, active and veteran, are by and large voluntary and enthusiastic war criminals, then the prospects for revolution are going up against all of that, rather than recruiting help from “defectors” (because “how could a revolution trust war criminals to help with a liberation movement”).

The general answer to this appears to be something like, “Recruit from the most oppressed groups”, which sounds good on paper, but it still doesn’t directly address how you go about dealing with how many have military experience and would be treated as off-limits for assistance because of their tainted association, and how many of those you could end up fighting instead of finding ways to get them to, at the very least, consider it not worth the risk.