Conscription?

[Confed999]

...and Switzerland.

Sure, toss 'em in there too. Anyone who forces people to serve them should go right into that pot...

Let's allow everybody to show they love for the country.

Let me fix that for you: "Let's force everybody to show they love the country."

[fkbello]

Let me fix that for you: "Let's force everybody to show they love the country."

Actually, I wanted to write "Let's allow everybody to show their love for the country", but thank you anyway.

[Confed999]

Actually, I wanted to write "Let's allow everybody to show their love for the country", but thank you anyway.

You're welcome, and I can fix that one too. :) "Let's force everybody to show their love for the country".

[fkbello]

Sure, toss 'em in there too. Anyone who forces people to serve them should go right into that pot...

Until very recently, that would be most of the Western governments, with the exception of Ireland (which doesn't have an army at all) and the UK.
Beware of that day when you start calling just about everybody else fascist or communist. That reminds me of that guy driving on the highway and listening to the radio: "Breaking news!!! A madman is driving on I-80 in the wrong lane". "One my ass!! There must be at least a hundred!"

[Confed999]

Until very recently, that would be most of the Western governments, with the exception of Ireland (which doesn't have an army at all) and the UK.

That doesn't make it right. Either way, like it or not, conscription is not "allowing".

[fkbello]

That doesn't make it right. Either way, like it or not, conscription is not "allowing".

I agree. I meant it in an ironic way. I feel way to many people support our troops nominally, but in fact they just "sit an cheer". Let everybody serve: rich and poor, black and white, PhD's and dropouts all together. A good way to build national spirit, as it was the case in 1941.

[Shek]

I agree. I meant it in an ironic way. I feel way to many people support our troops nominally, but in fact they just "sit an cheer". Let everybody serve: rich and poor, black and white, PhD's and dropouts all together. A good way to build national spirit, as it was the case in 1941.

You have to have a cause and a meaniful position. That's why 1941 can be successful or why a jobs corps during the Great Depression can work. Absent that, just throwing everybody together to "serve" without anything to do becomes a camping trip - it's fun for a while, then that wears off, and your stuck doing nothing. When I was stationed in Italy, all I ever saw their draftees doing were just sitting around.

Now, you want national service. There are approximately 4 million Americans that turn 18 every year. What federal agency is going to run the program or are you going to create a new one? What jobs are they going to perform? When they are performing these jobs, who's going to pay for meals? Who's going to pay for housing? How long will the length of service be? What exceptions are you going to allow for service?

[Shek]

Let everybody serve: rich and poor, black and white, PhD's and dropouts all together.

You are correct that neither the really poor nor the really rich serve in the military. However, there are already PhDs that serve the nation (I presume then that your national service plan includes education deferments).

[Horrido]

Shek, you don't think there's an issue of proportional scale? If 30 million serve in a country of 300 million, or 10 million serve in a country of 100 million, is it not still 10% with proportionate cost, and in many ways, an even lesser burden for the larger nation?

Either way, it's still a waste to have people sitting around just for the sake of running people through the military just because.

[Shek]

Shek, you don't think there's an issue of proportional scale? If 30 million serve in a country of 300 million, or 10 million serve in a country of 100 million, is it not still 10% with proportionate cost, and in many ways, an even lesser burden for the larger nation?

No, because the larger a bureaucracy becomes, the more inefficient it becomes - diminishing returns to scale apply.

[Chino]

Conscription is great for countries that are in danger of being invaded. Being able to mobilise nearly the entire country's male population into armies as they have all done military conscription cannot be a bad thing.

A conscript army will never be as professional. But Israel's conscript and conscript reservists have often proven what tenacious stuff they are made of.

Singapore follows the Israel model of conscription, reservist and mobilisation. I went through the military training serving as a platoon runner (radioman) and also in S2 Branch at Brigade and Battalion level. I thoroughly enjoyed it and moral among many reservist units are very high.

Conscription has its pros and cons, of course. But I felt it made me a better person.

[Shek]

Conscription is great for countries that are in danger of being invaded. Being able to mobilise nearly the entire country's male population into armies as they have all done military conscription cannot be a bad thing.

A conscript army will never be as professional. But Israel's conscript and conscript reservists have often proven what tenacious stuff they are made of.

Singapore follows the Israel model of conscription, reservist and mobilisation. I went through the military training serving as a platoon runner (radioman) and also in S2 Branch at Brigade and Battalion level. I thoroughly enjoyed it and moral among many reservist units are very high.

Conscription has its pros and cons, of course. But I felt it made me a better person.

Israel is the exception to the rule, as the motivation for service is readily apparent. However, they will at some point most likely abandon universal conscription, as they now have to population to sustain a revised system. The number of waivers has increased dramatically over the past decade.

[BenRoethig]

I'll say this, by the time conscription is considered, there should be a line stretching about a kilometer from the recruiter's office.

[SnowLeopard]

There is at least one good thing about conscription, especially in a democratic country. One might end up fighting fewer wars because the public is more aware that it may be their kin that gets killed. The politicians might be more aware to the people for it is the people who vote them in and if too many are not believing in the reasons why their sons and daughters are dying, then they may get voted out.

We cannot look at history to say yea or nay to that. It was a conscripted war with Viet Nam that caused people to look more closely at why the country went to war ..... but only when they were involved. And the draft ended with that war. Now, when it comes to people dying in wars, as far as the general public is concerned, the attitude might be found to be, "Well, they volunteered, they knew what they were getting into. It is a risk and price to pay for the benefits." And so forth. But such an attitude might alter if those dying did not volunteer. IMHO.

On the inside, two possibilities. First of all, those fighting could know that the country is behind them, to a degree, in their battle. That they are not being used as mercenaries to advance one or another political party's objectives. That they are there, for the public at home, but the public at home is not without risk. Shared risk is easier on the mind than bearing the risk alone.

But, on the other hand, conscription almost always means lower standards of entry. Having been in the business of restricted barracks and brigs, that situation comes with a lot of headache. I've seen liars, thieves, idiots, "double agents", postals, addicts, and so forth. Heard of killers. When work doesn't get done, when supplies disappear, when troops are stolen from, when someone kills a good Captain because the Captain came in and turned down the radio because the killer was playing it too loud, things are lost in the battle one is fighting.

This is not to say that one doesn't pick this up to a degree with volunteerism for one does. I did. But with conscription, it is a much wider opening to suck in the bads of society, bads that society itself wouldn't take care of.

The troops have to know how to fight, to protect themselves, to advance the mission. But they also have to know the safety regulations, the legal regulations on how far they can go. When there is someone who feels the thrill of firepower but doesn't care at all, ignores the safety and legal regulations, is thinking only of themselves, of their fun .................. THAT'S A MAJOR PROBLEM. IMHO, conscription increases the potential of that problem.

So it is a two edged sword.
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("We're all in this together, Melville, some of us, a little bit more than others, but we are all in it together."--V.H. Adderly, (wtte), "Adderly")

[Rifleman]

I'm going to answer this one without reading the other posts.

Conscription is a good thing if national survival is at stake. It is not a good thing if you are simply enforcing foreign policy.

I would encourage everyone to read "War is a Racket," by Smedley Butler. You can find it on the net. I don't agree with all of Butler's conclusions, but they can't be dismissed outright either.

You can only push the "fight 'em there, so we won't have to fight 'em here" line so far. It has validity, up to a point, but the public has demonstrated that they will not buy into the notion blindly. You won't be able to use that line of reasoning like a trump card.

If we don't have enough troops to fight foreign wars without it, we need to pick our foreign wars more carefully. At least the ones that aren't necessary to national survival.