The Martial Unity

"If we humans were unable to obtain things like food and security that are fundamental to survival with a certain degree of ease and certainty, then we would not have prospered to the degree that we have," He commented. "It is because they are important that nations do everything to make sure that they have enough of both. While there are certain impoverished and vulnerable nations that make heavy concessions to obtain one or both of these interests from foreign parties. Most nations have obtained satisfactory national and food security. Or to be more accurate, most nations have acquired enough of the two to, at the very least, not be in a crisis."

"I see..." Rui nodded as he understood his error. "That definitely makes sense."

"If anything, it is the secondary set of interests that you mentioned that are levied in diplomatic negotiations. Things like securing enough resources to maintain highly vital technological sectors, institutions, and foundations of the country usually play a much bigger role when trying to incentivize foreign parties to engage in a trade with you. You mentioned communications, which is certainly very important. Another important sector of modern society is transport, the ability to move to distant locations in relatively short amounts of time and with no personal effort is an important ability that has become a sector that is akin to the blood of the country," The man noted. "Development and maintenance of infrastructure is yet another highly important aspect of modern society. The fulfillment of each of these interests is much more difficult and thus can be used as powerful incentives in negotiations."

The man paused before continuing. "That is the underlying driving force of diplomacy, negotiation, and trade. Different parties have different needs and desires. One nation may be lacking food security, another may lack national security. Giving food to the latter and protection to the former is, of course, foolish. In order to offer what they want in return for what we want, we need to know what they want in the first place."

most parties will not divulge their weaknesses and shortcomings so easily to others. It gives an advantage to other parties in negotiations. If a man trying to purchase water were to reveal to me that he hasn't drunk water for days due to being stranded in the

as the man droned on about ruthless and dubious ethical practices. Of course, Rui was cognizant enough to recognize that that was the way

However, you cannot do this if you do not know what the interests of said parties are. And as I just mentioned, other parties will not come out and tell you what their interests are, because it generally

in a country through signs that cannot be hidden that would inevitably arise if such interests were not being met, or on the verge of not being met," Rui replied

specific. What exactly does that mean in practice? What signs are you talking about? How will you even come to recognize such signs even if they do

would originate from public records, another

"What data specifically?"

of the nation. This is rather simple to obtain as we can easily estimate this from the population and population demographics of the nation that should be easy enough to obtain. Then, the important question is whether the domestic food production sector of the nation is able to produce the necessary food needed to sustain