Beeple-Beep Beep! If guardsman are the elite of the elite from

>>50131397
>If guardsman are the elite of the elite
They are?

>>50131501
Some are, some are just Hive and manufacturia scum

>>50131397
*guardsmen

First, they're fighting against killing machines of various types.
Also, they are more numerous than gaunts, why do you expect people to mother them? Enlistment might as well be a form of population control in the Imperium.
Then, you have incompetent or incompatible commanders, that got a front to fill with units as explicitely named as " 127th Gruddarian Volpikers" or "Arzam's dozen". Don't be surprised if your recon regiment ends up in trenches because some munitorum adept made a mistake in some database.

>>50131397
I mean, the elite of the elite of iowa is still the elite of the elite of fucking iowa

>>50131397
Because even though they are the elite from each planet's PDF, they are still billions of them and they can be replaced easily.

A single hiveworld can provide millions of guardsmen each year.
There are hundreds, possibly thousands of hiveworlds.
Most of them have an overpopulation problem.

The Imperial Palace alone is estimated to house around 10 billions people and that's the "roomy" district of Terra.
Recruiting 0,1% of that population as troopers each year would provide so many regiments that numbering them would make Cadia look bad.
And yet, it wouldn't even register on the demographics of Terra.

Now enlarge that to all hiveworlds, where similar recruitment is not only possible but sustainable and even desirable for the governors who are trying to get rid of the less productive elements of their worlds.

A guardman's life is rarely long enough to die of old age.
But even taking an average of 10 years service makes the number of guardsmen very large.
Even if we assume only 1% of guardsmen are to eventually retire, this would still means there would be a few billions each year. Enough to populate a new planet... or to settle several hundreds.

Unfortunately, despite having a million worlds, the Imperium can't afford to have so many PTSD-affected veterans going back to civilian life.
You can't drop them on a hiveworld where they will simply dillute in the masses. The governors are desesperatly happy to get rid of gangers. They won't accept an even more dangerous breed in exchange.

You cannot drop them "en masse" on sparcely populated world, less you have even more dramatic social unrest.

And you simply don't have that many newly colonized planets...

The guardsmen are cannonfodders because you don't WANT them to survive their service. They are cheap-to-build but high-maintenance ammunitions in a warmachine that is constantly firing.

The top .5% of 10000000000000 people is still a lot of people

>>50132028
>And you simply don't have that many newly colonized planets...
Wrong. The Imperium is like the fucking seaside, constantly contracting and expanding. The main purpose of Rogue Traders is to find new planets to settle and/or reclaim for the Imperium. Yes, the net growth of the Imperium is negative and getting worse every decade, but it obsessively expands its borders as best it can.

>>50131800
Funny enough, the elite of the elite from bumb fuck nowhere tends to be pretty top tier because bumb fuck nowhere has so few opportunities that the best of the best of the best eat each other for any chance. Its why so many sports stars come from slums (that and child labour laws.)

To keep it to military examples, the Republic of Ireland is a neutral country with a piss poor military of only 10,000 but their army rangers are consistently voted be some of the best in the world, why? because they can only afford to keep 100 of them at any one time so those 100 men have to bee the best in the country and stay at the top of their game to avoid getting replaced by a new guy. Meanwhile China can employ thousands of Spec ops dudes so naturally some will get in with just passing grade or a touch of nepotism

>>50132529
aren't canada's special forces also supposed to be really good?

>>50132118
It's a matter of scale, anon.
Scale... and skills.

For skills, you want engineers and other specialists to colonize your brand new planets.
Not sociopaths whose only true talent is killing stuff.

For scale, you have billions of "old" guardsmen to demobilize each year.

While the Imperium's borders are always shifting, they aren't shifting a lot :
The Macharian Crusade was considered one of the most successful crusades in its history... yet it brought "only" 1000 planets in 7 years.
That's like saying a growth of 0,014% is both really good and really rare.
And yet, it is the state of the Imperium, where such growth in territory is seen as spectacular.

If I give you 100 new earth-like virgin planets each year, you could probably accomodate the billions of old guardsmen.
And the Imperium probably does. That doesn't solve the problem of skill but hey, who cares ? If they die, you got more on the way, right ?

Yet, the Imperium can do that BECAUSE there are SO FEW retired guardsmen.
And it has so few because it's using guardsmen like mere ammunition rather than like precious tools.

>>50132588

JTF2 has a rep for being some of the best of the best. As in, among Tier 1 units they're considered damn good and damn professional.

>>50132028
>The guardsmen are cannonfodders because you don't WANT them to survive their service.

Sometimes, I forget that 40k is defined by grim and dark.