I wanted a new topic for this, because it's really a different discussion. There was some talk in the US about reinstituting the draft, not because we needed warm bodies, but because it might affect policy decisions. Specifically, if everyone's kid had to join the army, they would feel a great deal more responsibility about the application of that military. This is something I'd like to discuss.

Personally, I'm in favor of a volunteer army, mainly because it improves morale. People who are forced to be soldiers are rarely good soldiers. Of course, they are issues with the recruiting methods that the army uses, but the requirement of parental approval takes care of some of those things. Anyway, what do y'all think?

Let the professionals do it.

The draft should be used only as a last resort in desperate situations.

That seems like three topics in your post there, Shadoth. But I wouldn't care to join the army under any circumstances. It's all about killing people, after all.
In my experience all the [three] ex-soldiers I know - and the two navy types I still know - joined because they really enjoyed being at school, which says it all.

My old guru was a guy named Uncle Fuzz. Fought behind the lines in Korea, and was a considerable pundit on matters related to human conflict (a decent poet, as well).

He posited that all Americans should be trained in how to defend themselves. That each of us should be issued the same caliber weapon (preferably a long range rifle), a box of ammo, and know how to use and maintain said device.

Of course, Uncle Fuzz also believed this strategy would keep the government honest (a tall order). haha.

I heard the Swiss have a policy similar to Uncle Fuzz's? Applies to all citizens, male or female. True? If so, it sounds too smart to work here.

Don't know about sweden, but it's true in the philippines. Of course, that's why the filipino terrorists/the PLA/common criminals in that country are so hard to knuckle down on. They're already trained. So it's a slippery thing.

I wasn't asking if you *personally* wanted to be drafted. I was asking if conscription was good social policy. And there could be no exemptions, because let's be honest, the rich guy's kids would find a way out. The point is, would bush be doing this if his own son we're in the 1st MEF? I think he would, honestly, but I can't say.

says, "Rangel and Conyers have written Bush a blank check on the lives of young Americans. Using the draft as an equalizer is a nice theory that never worked. In the Vietnam draft, two times as many black people died as white and three times as many Hispanic."

The Swiss live in Switzerland. Swedes live in Sweden.

Having been an Air Force Brat who spent high school on Okinawa, it was a strange thing for me to realize that the majority of airmen were 17-18, which was roughly the same age as me.

There seem to be two honest types of people who join the Armed Services (at least from my experience).

Those who join because they dropped out of High School, and did not have the skills to go anywhere other than the enlisted ranks.

and

Those who finished High School but those who wanted the college money that the Military provides.

There were of course those who joined for other reasons, but more often than not, those were the two stories that I heard.

As far as the draft, in these times (in the US) most people associate the draft with either Korea or Vietnam. If Bush wants to have a prayer of getting elected again. He will squash any mention of the draft.

-----------------------------
I've got confuse on my lingam
You can too.
www.wire-arcology.com

sorry about the sweden switzerland mistake. I'm at work, and reading fast. My wife's a dane, and is always making fun of me for blurring that part of the world into one big lump. Of course, I do it mainly to piss her off

I'm against a draft.

With a volunteer army, people can decide (to
a certain extent) whether a certain conflict
is worthy enough for them to sign up.

The people who join in peacetime have other
reasons, of course. There will also always be
people who join because they're patriotic and
want to show their support, regardless.

I guess I pretty much prefer that people have
the ability to support or not support the
military, and the war effort, according to their
own decision.

Other problems with a draft...

Drafted soldiers are more ruthless than nondrafted soldiers because they didn't choose to be there and are therefore more interested in getting out of the conflict, even if it means torching villiages.

Drafted soldiers are also more likely to turn against their superior officers and are more difficult to deal with (consider fragging of superior officers in Vietnam and compare it to the one fragging we've had during this war. The American soldier who was lobbing grenades into officers' tents is a clear cut situation....he joined the military, he has a responsibility to do what they tell him to do. If he doesn't like it, that's his problem. Fragging in Vietnam was much, much, much different).

Plus, soldiering is not a safe job at all. Not only is their the chance of dying or getting crippled, but post-traumatic stress syndrome and other psychological disorders can prevent a veteran from living a normal life after the fact. No one should be forced to undergo this type of abuse unwillingly.

Judging by Russian example, draft in a peace time is a very dumb idea -- country ends up with a huge army , most of it is poorly trained, and in peace time absolutely useless, so it ends up "serving" the government in things completely unrelated to the military but experiencing a shortage in manpower. One can blame a government for that use of the army, but seriously, what would one want to do with almost every male 18-20 years old taken away from the rest of society? Being idle and immature, such an army has large amount of pointless cruelty inside, and we are talking about people that mostly finished 10-11 years of secondary education, so if such a thing happened in US, it would be even worse.

At the time of war a draft is a desperate measure, and it can be justified if the country is attacked, so population can be directly harmed by the attackers no matter what, and at least would be able to defend itself in the army. In US it's an unlikely thing to happen, all US wars are "foreign wars".

Mm, I would defend the draft in extreme situations, like world wars and stuff, where the safety of the nation is directly, imminently threatened. And the 'foreign wars' thing is only about a hundred years old...first half of our history was pretty violent over here. Hell, second half was pretty violent, but a lot of it was self-perpetrated.

Let's not forget that Bush served in a national gaurd unit during Vietnam, but never got shipped out. To me that signifies that even if the children of gov't officials were drafted they would get easy assignments. This would pretty much nullify the point of instituting a draft to have officials think of the consequences of war.

No rich kid deferment in this day an age. The media would be all over that like stink on excrement, not to mention anyone left of center and not a few to the right. People in the National guard and the Reserves are being activated. Anyone who was supposed to get out prior to the war have been added to the resupply pool.

Personally I favor requiring a couple years civil service out of high school graduates. I'm not talking strictly military though that kind of disciple could help quite a few kids. Any kind of away from home teamwork endeavor that instills civic ideals is okay in my book. Basically keep the goofs out of the work force e for a couple extra years and keep em from making college course of study decisions at the age of 18.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Rich:
No rich kid deferment in this day an age. The media would be all over that like stink on excrement, not to mention anyone left of center and not a few to the right.

---

I disagree to a certain extent. In the military,
there is still an old boys network. I think that
the well-connected (not necessarily rich, nor all
the rich) people in the military may end up in
reasonably safer positions.

Yes the media would be all over that, but before
that could happen, someone would have to notice and
report it.

...so you favor brainwashing indivduals before they decide to go to work.

People choose to attend college, serve in the military, be active in politics, or get a job. Frankly the US is supposed to be the land of the free. That includes freedom to choose their own path to happiness.

You really think politicians would not keep their children safe somewhere. Frankly that is just naive. I bet you there are still US troops in Cuba. There hasn't been a whole lot of fighting there for some time.

I think that the main reason given for a draft in the US now is opportunity. Most enlisted soldiers are high school dropouts, or they went straight into the military from high school. The argument is that the only choice these people have is a job at mcdonalds or a job at mcmilitary. If you look at the enlisted population, and where they're from, you'll probably find them tightly clustered in poor inner city areas or poor rural areas. If their families are all clustered in one area, they have fewer representatives in DC. If the enlisted population was spread evenly across the entire country, there would be more representatives. Just numbers out of my head...instead of the rep. from brooklyn having 40% of his district's youth going into the military and the rep from orange county having 2% of his youth enlisting, they would both have equal numbers, say 10%. This would mean that when congress voted to go to war, every member voting would be voting to send kids from his own district to war, and possibly to die. constituent responsibility plays a big part in DC, I think. And maybe people would think differently if it were their kid, or a kid in their neighborhood, that was shipping out.

Look, I know that drafted personnel are less well trained. That's something that would have to addressed. I also don't think that this is an issue of "i'm against the draft cuz I don't want to be drafted", though again, that should be considered. And don't think that I'm actually in support of a mandatory draft. It's just an interesting question, and shouldn't be dimsissed because I, or anyone else, don't want to be drafted. It's about social responsibility, both our duty to country, and the government's duty to the military that dies for it. voting to send some poor kid to war is a lot easier for congressman biffy mcskiresort than it is to vote his own kid off to war. It would lend more personal weight to the decision.

anyway...

I joined the navy when I was 19 and I and damn sure that I went into a rate (pharmacist mate) that made it unlikley for me to be in the line of fire. Being female helped too Now that was easy for me because I scored very high on the entrance exam. You see you can only be trained for what you are capable of. That is why blacks and hispanics were killed more in veitnam. they usually went in the infantry and the infantry will take any witless sob who comes along. not to say that blacks and hispanics are stupid but their degree of education back then as well as now is below that of say asians and caucasians. you see when you join the military you are government property and if you are intelligent and highly trained in something they arent going to make cannon fodder out of you as quickly as they will some poor illiterate black guy. the same goes for the draft if they draft john q public and he is a college grad he or she probably wont go to the front lines.
what do you think guys should women be drafted in the event of a draft?

In war, I can see how having a universal 10% draft
might be good for stopping some warmongers, but in
peacetime, is there really anything wrong with
people using the military as gainful employment?
I know plenty of people who used it to be able to
go to college. They paid their dues, then went on
with a degree to put themselves into a better
economic situation than the one they come from.

I don't like the idea of having more poor people
die than rich, but that's sort of a stupid comment
because I don't want any rich people to die either.