Harsh economic truths can’t just be waved away, and one such truth is that keeping a large standing army costs a lot of money. The Great King is no fool. Why keep a dog, he reasons, and bark yourself? Since everybody knows that the king is so strong that his sneezes flatten mountains, why spend an absolute fortune on soldiers and equipment that probably won’t ever be needed? Should the need arise, of course, the mighty Sashan nation will surge up like a river in spate and annihilate the enemy as though he’d never existed. Until then, better to keep the money in the Treasury, or spend it on a
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