White: Draft would change war proponents’ minds
It’s easier to support armed conflict when not called up to fight.
By Zach White
Monday, October 22nd, 2007
We’ve all been taught that the draft was terrible, and a last resort in a case of extreme military emergency or some such thing. But I beg to differ. Now there is something inherently bad about a forced recruitment, but it’s not the fact that it forces people to enter the army.
What’s bad about it is that we would ever be in a position that we need any people to fight, much less so many people that we have to force other people to fight as well.
People don’t want to go to wars themselves. People don’t want their kids to go to wars. And if it was a possibility that either they or their kids could be forced to go and possibly die in the name of something, then people are going to pay a lot more attention to, and be far more critical of, these attempted causes for military action.
The draft would scare the hell out of a lot of people our age, more so than any movement on the chameleon scale at Homeland Security.
As is, the military is fairly distant or a lot of people. So it’s pretty easy to decide that they should go out to another country and fight, and then say how much you appreciate it with a bumper sticker or Toby Keith CD.
So we end up with this situation where we get into military conflicts more easily and probably placidly without a draft, which in turns creates a greater need for soldiers, which then may lead to even more conflicts, via a sort of Madeline Albright, “if you got it, use it” foreign policy. Or we could reinstate the draft, which would make a lot of people angry.
But in the powerful, justified and important kind of angry that actually causes changes.
The draft would scare the hell out of a lot of people our age, more so than any movement on the chameleon scale at Homeland Security. And it would probably have the opposite effect. People would search a lot harder for ways to get out of our sticky situations and to, in the future, do everything we can to avoid any kind of mire, quag or not.
But the draft that our predecessors railed against would not really be effective to this end. To spread practical pacifism we need to have the range be broad and all inclusive.
Men and women, across all classes and occupations, between 18 and 30 years old, should all be eligible, with no exceptions. No deferrals for school, and especially no nepotistic exemptions for congressional family members.
If war was real a real possibility for everyone, then the Man is going to have to try a lot harder to convince us of any actions real worth.
White is a Colorado Springs, Colo., junior in journalism.
Discussion
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I have some troubles with your opinion on the draft. The majority of Americans are currently against the wars which we are in. They are not subject to the risk of a draft though. Millions of Americans were supportive during World War II, but they were subject to the draft. Both of these situations that have actually happened contradict your thesis which doesn't have an actual test market. What we need to avoid armed conflict has nothing to do with the people at home. Just because someone is a pacifist doesn't mean they won't get hurt. Rather, we proper defenses can prevent a serious armed conflict. In this regards, our all volunteer military is one of the best, probably the best in the world. The reason is that the soldiers can trust each other because the majority want to be there. If we just grab people off the streets, it won't really matter if they get amazing training or not, they will not be as effective as someone who voluntarily entered the service. To best defend ourselves, we need to avoid the draft.
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