The All-Volunteer Illusion

[iyah360]

http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=813

First a crooked draft, then a cunning economic draft, and now an obscene mercenary force. Why can't America devise a fair, equitable system to recruit its soldiers?

By Stewart Nusbaumer

It is widely believed that the military draft is bad and reinstating it would be wrong. Whether this is true or not, the assumption that we do not have a draft is certainly wrong. We have a draft, different from the past, but still a military draft.

First, there are all the extensions of Active Duty troops and activation of Guard and Reserve units. Thousands of our troops are prohibited from leaving the military, and part-time reservists are forced to become full-timer soldiers. Americans who were completely out of the military (even a 67-year-old doctor) have been ordered to return to service. This is compulsory--no volunteerism here. Now, forcing people to remain in or return to the military, doesn't this sound like a military draft?

More basic to our current military draft is money. A recent study showed that lower-level enlisted soldiers and young officers have significantly higher salaries and benefits than their peers in the civilian sector. In fact, military recruiters target those with less opportunity for economic advancement and have a greater need for tuition assistance for college and vocational school. This is not called coercion, but in the context of an increasingly unequal and unfair society, in the context of historical racism and continuing class discrimination, in the context of the Bush Administration's cutback on the safety network, rising economic pressure and monetary incentives is an effective means to channel a class of Americans into fighting our wars. Let's be honest. This is an economic draft.

It is not surprising that the poorest regions of the United States are over-represented in our national military, and minorities are overwhelmingly more likely to fight our wars than white males from the suburbs. Southerners are not necessarily more patriotic and minorities more militaristic; they just have less money and less opportunity . . . (continued at http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=813)

[ptaured7]

For a quarter century there are many of us who have called for the draft and its necessity to insure universal suffrage in war.  The draft was ended because in large measure it was the means by which the Viet Nam war ended, not the party protests.   today, the party protests go on, with people in funny costumes throwing rocks at police, cowards with bandanas over their faces (many cointelpro paid charlatans) overturning trash cans into store front windows......and then they go home.  Yet we've had exponenetial Viet Nams, etc, for the last 35 years with no end in sight.  

The republic cannot stand with out the draft.   The Roman Republic fell tø the empire based on servitude to a "great leader" from a "professional" army, not a citizen army.  

War is reprehensible.....the draft is a brake on war and a call to serious consideration by all potential parties to the conflict.   It has been said that a cønvention among all nations to create only one united universal treaty over all others......that all nations will honor the draft system and that paid professional armies can only be a certain percentage of the population.  the draft forces the issue.  the draft protects democratic republicanism.  NO COLLEGE DEFERMENT EITHER, that was dead wrong in the Viet Nam War.  But alot of official left liberal types decry the draft.   They certainly haven't fought too hard of late over these imperialist wars, as long as it's someone else;s son or daughter.