A Look at the Effects of a New American Draft

Like most baby boomers, I can easily remember the draft. In fact, I would have been drafted the year I turned 19 except that was the year that the draft was discontinued. The draft was discontinued because it was flawed. The United States military did not go to all volunteers because they had so many young people lining up to get into the service.

The all-volunteer military came about because the majority of the draftees came from the lower middle class and down in American society. Those with money and education could find ways to avoid the draft. Korea and Viet Nam demonstrated to every citizen that if you thought the war was wrong and had money, your child would not be drafted. By entering the National Guard or some other type military related service, you were insulated from the draft. If you had a relative with political connections, you would not likely be drafted.

How would it change the population today? After discontinuing the draft, congress got busy and changed how young people would be drafted. By making the Reserves and National Guard the first call ups, these were removed from places to go hide from the draft. A new draft would now be a representative cross-section of our society. This would mean that an unpopular military action would bring immediate responses from those in power.

Today, our wealthy, powerful, and educated tend to avoid volunteering for military service. They also steer clear of those agencies used to supplement the four branches of the military. With a draft, the sons and now also the daughters of those in power would be caught in the net. As soon as these young people began to be lost in campaigns, new laws would hit the books to restrict the use of military force.

The reason that these laws are not being written today is the fact that if the children of those in power are in the military, it is because they have chosen it. When it is forced upon them, the rhetoric will change dramatically. Loopholes will be contrived to allow those who historically have been kept out of the draft during dangerous times to stay out again.

In America, drafting women will require generations to become popular. Most of us are not too comfortable with the idea that our young ladies are put in danger today. They are volunteers. The mood will shift dramatically downward when they are drafted and injured or killed.

Of course, ROTC might become more popular again. It is not the officer’s training organization, but rather a retread from the sixties when it meant: Run Off To Canada.

A draft would only worsen the problems now caused by National Guard call ups. Many of these are still people who never expected to see foreign duty. When they return home, it is often to family and job problems. Companies will struggle to hold jobs for those who have been plucked from their comfortable lives to go serve for two years or longer. Wives will be tempted to dissolve marriages that already were having problems. The strain of separation will cause them to completely collapse.

With a draft, military wages will probably fall. Since the military no longer needs good wages to entice men and women to enlist, there will be no incentive to hold the wages high. Likewise, re-enlistment bonus will shrink or vanish. If this soldier will not stay, they can just reach out and draft another one.

Finally, the tendency to hold back from military action until all other avenues have been exhausted will be no longer. With soldiers having no choice but to serve, it will remove the safeguards that make military service look good to graduating high school seniors. The attitude will be to just send in the troops because they cannot say no.