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Subject: Draft Delusions Linger
SYSOP    10/26/2014 11:06:16 AM
 
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trenchsol       10/26/2014 12:19:56 PM
I was conscripted back then. What to say ? Training lasted three months, and it is plenty of time to learn regular soldier skills plus learn to deal with discomfort, lack of sleep and all kinds of people you wouldn't hang with otherwise. The rest of the year which I spent there was pure waste of time.
 
However, when I got a job and started to work, it was far worse. Good thing I didn't have a weapon (on the job) ....
 
 
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Harry Huntington    No delusion about the draft   10/26/2014 1:18:16 PM
The folks who want a draft are well aware of public opposition; that is the point.  The thinking is that if every military unit was required to use some percentage of conscript soldiers then the U.S. would be reluctant to engage in misguided overseas [mis]adventures like the Bush invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.
 
There would be no inequity with a future draft.  Service would be universal. You draft everyone at age 18 for three years of training and service.
 
That is not too much manpower. Instead, you expand military (likely Army and Coast Guard) missions to include things like "border security" on the Mexican border, port security (physical inspection of shipping containers), and other similar missions.  Border security and port security do not require advanced training.
 
The "key" component to any conscription scheme, however, is a requirement that ALL combat units include some fixed percentage of conscripts.  The plan, by design, is to require popular support before units are deployed.
 
The nation's founders wanted a civilian army, not a mercenary army.  Today what is euphemistically called a "volunteer army" is a mercenary army with a crony capitalist retirement path for senior officers into defense contractor work.  A draft is designed to provide a counterweight to the cronyism. 
 
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Chris       10/26/2014 6:39:33 PM
This has proved very effective for the United States, especially after September 11, 2001
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The use of the national guard and reserves was so effective during the wasted usage and incompetent management of two war efforts on the part of the G W Bush Administration (and its chicken-hawk excuses of leadership, that still infest the GOP to this day, despite their proven incompetence), that they had to enact "stop-loss",  and repeatedly send diagnosed PTSD suffering soldiers on multiple tours of duty. 
 
They left behind a military at its lowest state of readiness since Viet Nam (JCS report to the POTUS on force readiness, Spring 2009), not counting leaving behind the need to totally overhaul or replace a huge portion of the equipment.   If it wasn't for the fact that they destroyed the US economy at the same time, we might've completed rebuilding/replacing all that equipment by now.  
 
If the draft had been in effect, the invasion of Iraq never would've happened.   Thats why it needs to return:  citizens paid serious attention to what our "leadership" when their children might be committed to battle.  In short - the burden of proof is FAR greater when the draft is in effect - and the draft could easily be made FAIR for ALL citizens.
 
 
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Nate Dog    Don'y buy it, not nearly    10/26/2014 7:14:07 PM
You're idealism of draftees ensuring greater over sight is purely that. Idealism. Not founded on any reality i can see.
 
To whit, Draft was in effect during Vietnam, that little conflagration went on for neigh on a decade. 4 Presidents took part in that little futile excursion of advernturism. Pretty sure concerned parents of Draftees had slim to #### all to do with that perennial stupidity ending.

In WWI and WWII the draft certainly did absolutely nothing to avert leaders making an absolute shambles out of europe for the next half century.
Sight me 1 example where a draftee army in any way shape or form dictated policy.
 
You bunch sound like the crazies this article is referring to.
There is a concept called wisdom of the masses. You may not adhere to it, or think you know better than everyone else. But democracy came from somewhere, and while not perfect, seems to be the most successful form of government going round. Strike the seems to be and lets just shove demonstrably instead. Perhaps you should listen to what people have to say. They may just know the weight of that bull better than you.
 
 
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ker    Punisment.   10/27/2014 12:54:38 AM
Core idea of the pro draft camp is to punish the armed forces and the nation for the their past and future actions. I reject it. 1. They falsely argue that a draft would make the force unusable. Then why not just dispand it. The idea of deterance is to deture the enemy not to deture your self. Self detureance is an invatation to the enemy. You still get. Wars but give the enemy more inititive. 2. They falsely argue that a draft is fair by sending more less experanced men (and women?) into combat. It delutes your training and produces a weaker force. That makes everything worce including getting more people killed. That's hardly fair. Any hope of a culturaly skilled force that can avoid civilain causaltys rest in a high skill/high disapline profesional volenteer force. Act like a professional or we will find some one else who will. 3. They falsely argue that national unity could be restored or increased by a draft. This demenstrates a painfully shallow understanding of history and logic. All the WWII newspapers said we had national unity and we had the draft so the draft must cause national unity. No. Press censorship and systematic political education promoted unity and hid evedence of disunity. The preception of political unity made the draft more effective. The draft was a consumer of political unity not the source of political unity. Ask your friends and nabors if there were any race riots during WWII.
 
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ker       10/27/2014 1:35:30 AM
The US consitution says raise an army and maintane a navy. That means we are cosntitutionaly required to rename all of the Air Force and most of the army including gaurd and reserve unitys in the department of the Navy. Marines are already there. Founders also wanted a deeply marshal sosiety where every millitairy aged citesen posesed military weapondry and underwent life long militairy training. The training would be localy organized. Factoring in curant understandings of gender and ecconomic fairness the. state or fed goverments must give every American with infantry weapons and training for their 18th birthday. So that when congrass raises an army they find needed units are avalible. So if you want to give every 18 year old an M4 that's constitutional. If you want to lock every 18 year old in a distant barracks for three years that is deeply uncostitutional.
 
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ker       10/27/2014 2:03:03 AM
The Coast Gaurd and Border Patrol or goverment funtions that call for long service professionals. Drafting every 18 year old for three years and parking all the extra man/woman power on the borders would be counter productive. Buy the way would doing drugs get you kicked out of the force? Well if all it takes to dodge the draft is to smoke a joint then you don't have a draft. But apart from smoking what will the draftys do on the border? Are they going to pick up trash or are they going to shoot people? If their picking up trash we will half to pay drug cartels large bribes not to shoot our draftes. If they are there to shoot people and we find thousands of new quality NCO the political and diplomatic fall out will be more than many administrations will be willing to face. So we are back to picking up litter. If you want to start a war with Mexico putting a million disgruntaled draftes on the border is a hell of a start. Calling a drafty disgruntaled is redundant.
 
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ker       10/27/2014 4:08:51 AM
We need a culture of national service. A national service law is not the. Same as a culture of national service. Impproving the culture requires a lot of moral presation and judicious action. Don't be tricked to think drafting all those Justin Beiber fans is a helpful short cut. People with anti-patrotic intent would highjack patriotic images. We must reconize the differance between diciplined desent in service of patritism and highjacked patritism. That is the kind of sophisticated skill democracy requires. Sending kids to high schools where American flag tee shirts violate the dress code and then drafting them in the name of unity is odd. Letting the army run all the high schools would be much smaller mistake. Building a culture of service require shared effort from every one. This is not the DODs problem to solve.
 
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trenchsol       10/27/2014 10:11:22 AM
Military is supposed to be an instrument, a tool which is applied according to political decisions made. Military is not supposed to be a subject in creating politics decisions and it is not supposed to influence political decisions in any way.
 
So the idea of conscripted military which affect politics is deeply wrong from the start. Military which affects political decisions turns itself into military junta in the end.
 
 
 
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joe6pack       10/27/2014 3:45:42 PM
"The nation's founders wanted a civilian army, not a mercenary army"
 
I'd argue that conscription, which at it's kindest, can be described as a form of indentured servitude... is antithetical to what the majority of founders believed in.  
 
"The administration asserts the right to fill the ranks of the regular army by compulsion...Is this, sir, consistent with the character of a free government? Is this civil liberty? Is this the real character of our Constitution? No, sir, indeed it is not...Where is it written in the Constitution, in what article or section is it contained, that you may take children from their parents, and parents from their children, and compel them to fight the battles of any war, in which the folly or the wickedness of government may engage it? Under what concealment has this power lain hidden, which now for the first time comes forth, with a tremendous and baleful aspect, to trample down and destroy the dearest rights of personal liberty?
Daniel Webster (December 9, 1814 House of Representatives Address)
 
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