Pretty long but it's worth reading.
Let's say you are a leader of a faction in country x , if there
is a civil war in country x and an invasion from country y at the
same time, would you settle an invasion or civil war first?
If you say, to counter the invasion first because of nation
pride, would the two factions in country x unite together to fight
effectively?What if the other faction slacks and gather strength
while you bear the brunt of the fighting and becomes weaker?
If you say to finish the civil war first, is it ok to let other
country invade your country easily while you are
fighting the other faction? Furthermore, there might be danger that
the civil war might weaken both factions and the foreign
power may conquer the whole nation more easily.
For example,say the chinese civil war,the nationalists ,the
communists and the japanese.The nationalist wanted to destroy
communism first but under pressure, it are forced to unite
with the communists to defeat the japanese.However,the
communists, who were supposed to be wiped out by then,took the
japanese invasion as a period to grow in strength and ensure
its survival.Furthermore,both sides didnt put in much effort to
counter the japanese because they want to keep their best troops to
fight each other when war with japan is over.
Wouldnt that may as well be considered as negligible
resistance?
In the end, the nationalists got trashed by the communists.
Put this in another way, your skin got some horrible disease but
you got a heart attack too but you can only treat either the skin
or the heart.Treating the heart may save your life,but is it ok
while your skin is rotting away. But,if you treat your skin,your
skin wont rot,but your untreated heart may kill you.
So, i ask, would you choose to eliminate internal or external
threat first? (assuming no foreign aid)