Size of Armed Forces

While the size of a country's armed forces is still an indicator of national power on the international scene, it is no longer as important as it once was. The increasingly high technology of military hardware allows smaller numbers of military personnel to be more effective. There are some countries, such as China, with massive numbers of military personnel but with relatively limited military power because of a lack of modern weaponry.

Additionally, the use of rapid transportation allows personnel to be deployed about the globe or any region of it quickly; this also increases effectiveness of highly trained and well-armed smaller military units. Nevertheless, the world is still a long way from the predicted "push-button warfare" that many experts have long anticipated. Indeed, the pattern of the last few years has been for most military conflicts to involve ground troops engaged in fairly traditional patterns of operation. Even in the Persian Gulf conflict, with its highly-publicized "smart bombs," the bulk of the military operation that ended the conflict was carried out by infantry and armor operating on the ground and supported by traditional air cover using conventional weaponry. Thus, while the size of a country's armed forces may not be as important as it once was, it is still a major factor in measuring the ability of nations to engage successfully in armed conflict.