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A military draft would effectively end America's involvement in Iraq thereby negating any real need for a Draft
Wha.....?
Interesting points on a military draft, some I have made many times in this forum, from a obviously liberal, Chavez-loving, US Marine....
Why We Need a Draft: A Marine’s Lament
MSNBCAug. 28, 2007 - “Maybe we would have only lost those three instead of 13,” I thought to myself on a dusty Friday in Fallujah in early November 2005. I was picking up the pieces of a truck that hours before had been blown apart by an IED, wondering why our equipment wasn’t better and why three more Marines were dead. Ramadan had just ended, the period in which a suicide bomber gets double and triple the virgins for killing himself in the name of jihad, and my weapons company, Second Battalion Second Marines, had lost 13 men in the last two weeks—not from firefights but from roadside bombs likely being imported from Iran. The insurgents were ramping up their technology, and here we were in the same old trucks. At least these didn’t have cloth doors like the ones last year. But seriously, was this the best technology we have?
Just then I noticed a big vehicle driving by, one owned by a private contracting company. This thing made our truck look like a Pinto in a Ferrari showroom. It was huge, heavy, ominous, indestructible. I wanted to commandeer it. I wanted to live in it. If only we were in one of those, I would definitely come home, and a lot of the guys who won’t would too. As it passed I stared at what I would later learn was called the MRAP vehicle (Mine Resistant Ambush Protective Vehicle). I never thought I would see something in Iraq that enticing, but there it was, rumbling past in all its glory.
...
It’s not hard to figure out who suffers. The 160,000 servicemen and women in Iraq are the latest generation of Americans to represent their country on the field of battle. And like their predecessors, they are abundantly unrepresented in the halls of power. As a result, they’ve adopted what I find to be a disturbing outlook on their situation: many don’t want the draft because they believe it will ruin the military, which they consider their own blue-collar fraternity. They have heard the horror stories from their dads and granddads about “spoiled” rich officers. Have no doubt: there is a distinct disdain for networked America among the fighting class of this country. When a politician would come on TV in the Camp Fallujah chow hall talking about Iraq, the rank-and-file reaction was always something like, “Well, I am blue-collar cannon fodder to this wealthy bureaucrat who never got shot at and whose kids aren’t here. But I know I am making America safer, so I’ll do my job anyway.” And they do, and have been for the last three and a half years, tragically underequipped but always willing to fight.
The real failure of this war, the mistake that has led to all the malaise of Operation Iraqi Freedom, was the failure to not reins ute the draft on Sept. 12, 2001—something I certainly believed would happen after running down 61 flights of the South Tower, dodging the carnage as I made my way to the Hudson River . But President Bush was determined to keep the lives of nonuniformed America—the wealthiest Americans, like himself—uninterrupted by the war. Consequently, we have a severe talent deficiency in the military, which the draft would remedy immediately. While America’s bravest are in the military, America’s brightest are not. Allow me to build a squad of the five brightest students from MIT and Caltech and promise them patrols on the highways connecting Baghdad and Fallujah, and I’ll bet that in six months they could render IED’s about as effective as a “Just Say No” campaign at a Grateful Dead show
A military draft would effectively end America's involvement in Iraq thereby negating any real need for a Draft - unless Dubya bombs Iran....
A military draft would effectively end America's involvement in Iraq thereby negating any real need for a Draft
Wha.....?
But they would be needed to battle the violent uprising that would occur HERE as a result of bringing back the draft.A military draft would effectively end America's involvement in Iraq thereby negating any real need for a Draft
Well, it would do more to convince me that we are in a war for our very survival.
There's not enough votes to stop the war,
and there's not enough votes to start the draft.
So the war continues, and dubya keeps throwing money at the poor ers:
======================
Many Take Army's 'Quick Ship' Bonus
$20,000 Is Lure to Leave Within Days
By Josh White
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 27, 2007; A01
More than 90 percent of the Army's new recruits since late July have accepted a $20,000 "quick ship" bonus to leave for basic combat training by the end of September, putting thousands of Americans into uniform almost immediately.
Many recruits who take the bonus -- scoring in many cases the equivalent of more than a year's pay -- leave their homes within days, recruiters said. The initiative is part of an effort by Army officials to meet year-end recruiting goals after a two-month slump earlier this year. With the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, the Army hopes the extra cash motivates those interested in joining or entices those just considering enlisting.
The program began on July 25, and in three weeks the Army had enlisted 3,814 recruits using the bonus, according to the U.S. Army Recruiting Command in Fort Knox, Ky. Those recruits accounted for 92 percent of the 4,149 recruits who signed contracts between July 25 and Aug. 13.
The $20,000 bonus is a hefty sum for many of the individuals the Army targets most aggressively: young men and women who have not settled on a career. The Army estimates that soldiers coming out of initial training are paid $17,400 a year on average.
But the effort, experts said, could pose problems for the Army in the coming months, because those who might have helped fill recruiting quotas later this year or in early 2008 are instead joining now.
Bethany Moore, 19, of Jessup, visited a recruiting station Wednesday, knowing that she wanted to sign up in the hopes of building a stable career. A 2006 graduate of Northern High School in Calvert County, Moore had worked a series of "regular jobs" and wanted to make a serious change. "I just wanted to do something better with my life," she said.
Although she expected a six-month waiting period to go to basic training, she learned of the bonus and immediately accepted. She will ship out within a week. "It was a welcome surprise," Moore said. "And it's a lot of money."
Military personnel experts said the signing bonuses are a transparent way for the Army to meet its annual goal of 80,000 recruits amid an increasingly difficult recruiting environment. They also said the rush to get people into uniform might have more to do with meeting numerical targets than with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, though many of those who join the Army face the possibility of deployment to combat soon.
The Army hopes the bonus will increase its recruiting numbers for August, a month whose goals are among the largest of the year. The Army will announce the August numbers in early September.
"The Army is intent on trying to meet its recruitment goals in terms of numbers by the end of the fiscal year, so they're doing just about anything they can to bring those numbers up," said Cindy Williams, an analyst at the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Ins ute of Technology. "To me it signals something that we've been seeing already from the Army, a trade-off in terms of quality and quan y. My sense is that right now, they're willing to take anybody who is willing to walk in the door and ship by Sept. 30."
Army officials have lowered standards and increased waivers in recent years to meet their recruiting goals, in part to deal with the strain of the wars and to quickly expand the Army. But the Army has been more concerned with nose-diving public opinion about the war in Iraq and the role of "influencers" -- parents, teachers and coaches -- who have been increasingly unwilling to recommend the military as a career option to young people.
The $20,000 bonus can be enticing, especially to those who lack a steady job, languish in debt or are worried about their future. Staff Sgt. Kevin Gordon, a recruiter in Glen Burnie, said a majority of the people who come into his office have already decided to join the service and then jump at the chance to leave now.
"They have school loans, mortgages, they have family concerns," said Gordon, whose three recent recruits all took the bonus. "It's a great incentive because something like that leaves families in a good financial posture, and they feel a little more comfortable knowing their bills will be taken care of."
The way the bonus works is simple: Recruits willing to ship out within the next month will receive $10,000 upon completion of basic training and advanced individual training. Then, over the course of their initial active-duty enlistment, they will receive $10,000 in even annual sums. For a young recruit with no college education, the bonus, which is taxable, could be the equivalent of a year of pay over the course of a three-year enlistment. And the recruit can still qualify for other sign-up bonuses.
The quick-ship bonus spurred John C. Davis III, 24, of East Baltimore to sign his enlistment papers on July 27, two days after the program began. Davis received a two-year college degree in graphic design in 2005 but has been stuck in a "dead end" job without much pay, loading tractor-trailers. He will ship out Wednesday after doing regular workouts with his recruiter in Towson, Staff Sgt. Brian Grotz.
Davis will also get a $25,000 bonus for taking an Army position as a petroleum specialist, meaning he will have a year's salary in his bank account before he starts his first Army job.
For Davis, who has 4-year-old twins and relies on his mother for help, the bonuses will give him a start on finding a nice place to live and a foundation for a graphic design business someday.
"When I first heard about the bonus, I thought that I could really get my life in order," Davis said. "Pay some bills, put some money aside, help my mother. I was really going to go in anyway; I just wasn't planning to go this soon."
Sgt. Willie Thomas, a recruiter in the Woodbridge office, said the quick-ship bonus is helpful as an eye-catcher, but he thinks that it is not enough to change at udes about the military or the Iraq war. Although his office has a sign on its door advertising the bonus, he said it is one of the last things he mentions to a potential recruit.
He says he emphasizes "Army benefits" above all else, such as a stable job, work experience and health care.
"They would have to be really interested in the Army before I would mention the bonus," Thomas said. "I don't want anyone making a commitment based on $20,000. That amount of money doesn't last a lifetime."
But James Hosek, a defense manpower expert at the Rand Corp., said that though the quick-ship bonus is a "very smart move" by the Army, it could attract people who are less motivated to be in the service.
"There's a risk of bringing people in with lesser attachment or commitment to the Army," Hosek said. "Adding money will, for some people, sweeten the deal enough to persuade them to enter."
It would force everyone else in this country who is otherwise unsure or merely indifferent to consider if, in fact, Iraq is essential to "our very survival", and the sober conclusion would be "no"...which is exaclty why there won't be a draft.
Why didn't you attach the rest of the article?
On a macro level, we are logistically weakened by the lack of a draft. It takes six to seven soldiers to support one infantryman in combat. So, you are basically asking 30,000 or so “grunts” to secure a nation of 26 million. I assure you, no matter who wins the 2008 election, we are staying in Iraq. But with the Marine Corps and the Army severely stressed after 3.5 years of desert and urban combat in Iraq—equipment needs replacing, recruitment efforts are coming up short—you tell me how we're going to sustain the current force structure without the draft? The president’s new war czar, Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute, essentially said as much earlier this month, when he announced that considering the draft “makes sense.”
Of course, the outcry was swift and predictable. America has rejected selective service before, though always in the guise of antiwar movements. But they should really be viewed as antidraft movements, and they existed, en masse, when the wealthy could buy their way out of serving—as Teddy Roosevelt’s father and his ilk did during the Civil War, or as countless college kids did during the deferment-ridden Vietnam conflict. Not every draftee has to be a front-line Marine or soldier, but history shows us that most entrepreneurial young men, faced with a fair draft, almost always chose the front. A deferment draft, however, is a different story, and ultimately counterproductive because of the acrimony it breeds. By allowing the fortunate and, often, most talented to stay home, those who are drafted feel less important than what they are asked to die for. At the end of the day, it was this bitterness that helped fuel the massive antiwar movement that pushed Nixon to end the draft in ‘73.
I don’t favor a Vietnam-style draft, where men like the current vice president could get five deferments. I am talking about a World War II draft, with the brothers and sons of future and former presidents answering the call (and, unfortunately, dying, as a Roosevelt and a Kennedy once did) on the front line. That is when the war effort is maximized. Quite simply, the military cannot be a faceless horde to those pulling the purse strings of our great economy.
The draft would even hasten a weaning away from foreign oil, I believe, if more Americans felt the nausea that I do every time I go to the pump and underwrite the people who have nearly killed me five times. This war on the jihadists needs to be more discomforting to the average American than just bad news on the tube. Democracies at war abroad cannot wage a protracted ground operation when the only people who are sacrificing are those who choose to go. This is the greatest lesson of my generation. Young Americans: you may not want to kill jihadists, but they are interested in killing you and your loved ones. Wake up.
Cpl. Mark Finelli is an inactive, noncommissioned Marine Corps officer who served in Iraq from July 2005 to February 2006. He is currently writing a book about surviving 9/11 and fighting in Iraq.
Is there any active military on this board?
"you may not want to kill jihadists, but they are interested in killing you and your loved ones. Wake up."
There were no jihadists in Iraq, only oil.
And Finelli probably never killed a jihadist, or even shot at one in Iraq.
Wake the up, Capt Finelli, you simpleton, your CiC should not be followed.
Last edited by boutons_; 08-28-2007 at 08:59 PM.
I LOLed...While America’s bravest are in the military, America’s brightest are not. Allow me to build a squad of the five brightest students from MIT and Caltech and promise them patrols on the highways connecting Baghdad and Fallujah, and I’ll bet that in six months they could render IED’s about as effective as a “Just Say No” campaign at a Grateful Dead show
Still working with that whole reading comprehension thing?
Keep plugging at it, it will come soon enough.
Has there been any political thread, serious or no, in which chumpdumper only adds his opinion without asking a question in an attempt to attack someone elses post which more times than not already contains enough material to convey the fact that it was partly in jest to begin with and not to be taken completely seriously?
Thats the main reason i like CD's austin toros threads.
Couldn't that question have been structured better?
If he really wants a Draft, he should just vote Republican in the next Presidential Election... It worked in 2004. Remember that inevitable 2005 Draft? I'm sure there's another one coming in 2009.
Actually he should vote democrat - Charlie Rangel (D) New York is the one who was pushing for the draft in 2003.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/01/07/rangel.draft/
So...did you volunteer yet?Democracies at war abroad cannot wage a protracted ground operation when the only people who are sacrificing are those who choose to go.
Why do we need a draft? So E20 can dodge it like Micheal Vick does Pitbulls. Sorry for spamming, but I didn't read the article and I'm bored.
Was that directed at me?
1989-1992 USMCR "C" Co. 4th Reconnaissance Battalion/4th AT TOW.
Who were you with?
I was never in the military, but it sounds like it's time for you to re-enlist.
Last time I checked, they didn't want 40 year olds with bad knees.
So you never thought about joining the military?
And, if your on some misguided attempt to question or impugn my dedication to the United States, you need to find someone else's leg to hump.
nope, it never crossed my mind
I don't think that's a deal breaker these days.Last time I checked, they didn't want 40 year olds with bad knees.
Rather have someone else do the heavy lifting then?
I do find it a shame that more people don't feel it necessary to give back to the country that has provided them so much.
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