There's not going to be a military draft. There will be a National Skills Inventory or something similar. 18-34, both sexes, no excuses and no deferments and no exceptions. BushCo is very quick and very precise to use the term "military" before they say "draft", and "army" after "all-vounteer". Because if they decide they want you, you won't be military and you won't be army -- you'd likely be under the DHS, not the DOD. But good luck explaining the difference to your wife/husband and your kids when Tom Ridge sends a letter saying that your typing and organizational skills are needed in Qatar for the next 12 months to fight the global war on terror. How do they sell it and not lose power? Easy. They sell it as (a) civilian-style work, and (b) protecting our homeland in the global war, not as protecting Iraqis in that limited war. If you opt out of this, you just don't care about stopping the next major terrorist attack, you Osama-loving traitor.
Yeah, I too was wondering about everyone's opinion on this. First I would try to find some legal way to get out of it. If that didn't work, I would probably try to find some Al Gore-type job to do well behind the front lines. But if all else failed and I got the order to board a plane to Baghdad... well I think I might have to accidentally renounce my citizenship and use my British passport from now on. Or would that be considered treason and get me landed at Guantanamo?
Bring back the draft, no deferments and no excuses. And draft women too. Of course, I'm too old to get drafted.
If Bush lied about the reasons for invading Iraq(which he did ,hence why he stopped running on it after the GOP convention), his promise to be 'a uniter not a divider' and the cost of his medicare add-on(to his own party, no less!?!) do you seriously think ,with this track record, that he is telling the truth about a draft? The neo-con death cult is already talking up Syria and Iran(countries that did not attack us on 9/11) and with the army especially stretched thin, we can't do these 'pet projects'of Wolfiwitz and Perle and friends without a draft and still win. P.S if thier is a draft, i'm enlisting in the air force. I always wanted to be a fighter pilot.
I am amazed this thread has any legs at all. The only reason this even came up at all was because 2 DEMOCRAT senators proposed it only to create a talking point. The actual vote failed by 80%. Add to that the fact that the Marine corps still has a 6 month backlog of inductees waiting to be processed and it it hard to make any need case. Now if you want to buy into some conspiracy theory about starting another war front, I can't help you, but this draft thing was another failed Dem talking point that went down in flames.
So since there's a backlog of enlistees and the military is getting huge increases in spending, why don't they just increase the size of the military? I'm not trying to be sarcastic, I'm curious why we can't add a few thousand troops if we have the money and the enlistment numbers. We can't expect part time reservists to happily accept their 1-year deployments.
This is just not true. The administration started the process of creating the draft infrastructure (like populating the draft boards) well before those sentors came up with that bill. It was brought up here in this very forum. The only one to blame for starting the rumor is Bush.
Never!!!!! The military doesn't want it. Rumsfeld does not want it. Bush does not want it. The "evil" Republicans don't want it. The country does not want it. Simple. There was a Frontline on last week, that pointed out that many of the people in Bush's cabinet and leading in the army cut their teeth in Vietnam, and they know that the sure fire way to loose a war is to institute a draft for a war that is somewhat controversial. They feel that the draft essentially destroyed the army in the 60's and 70's because it brought down morale, acceptance in the country, and decimated the quality of non-commissioned officers. They absolutely want a volunteer army only. The only way there will be a draft is if we are invaded by Russia. That ain't going to happen. If any of you get drafted, I will go in your place.
One nuclear terrorist attack (or even possibly a chemical or biological one) and 90% of Americans would support the draft.
Clearly not for front line units, its anti-thetical to the current force structure. Medical is much more likely. I could see NG some units incorporating draftees as well. But a draft short of incredible circumstances would be political suicide for any party or candidate to support it.
No, you are wrong. What was correctly mentioned in this forum was the periodic adjustment made on certain internal functions in the case that a draft would be put in place. This happened twice during the Clinton years with no notice whatsoever. It is of significance that the draft bill proposed by Charlie Rangell came just prior to the planned realignment of the medical and administrative personell. Don't think this was just all circumstance. The introduction of the draft bill was designed to do exactly what this thread has done; put a cloud of fear over Americans about Iraq with the ultimate result of a Kerry victory. It failed.
Second question first: most reservists have other skills than just combat. Many are mechanics, technicians, etc. As such their skills have taken more than 6 months to develop. The Marines are providing a good number of combat soldiers who can be trained more quickly than some of the other needs. Even so, they can only provide so many in a certain period of time, but that number has been meeting the request of the commanders so far.
Looks like the army is ready to restart the Fighting Hellfish now... 84-year-old receives Army recruiting letters