- hasn't the army as it stands now shown itself to be a disaster as a fighting force - at least in the Middle Eastern theatre? and the idea of a 'risk of political backlash' assumes that we are dealing with a state that is worried about political backlash from the anti-war movement.
Look, I am not 'making an argument' for the draft, merely discussing it as a real possibility that should not be ignored and should be, if possible, pre-empted.
>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] The Return of the Draft
>Date: Wed, 2 Jun 2004 15:06:32 -0400
>
>All these draft-is-coming-back arguments ignore at least two important
>points: 1) the conscript army of the Vietnam era was a disaster as a
>fighting force (see the piece quoted below), and 2) the risk of political
>backlash would be enormous, the best recruiting assistance the antiwar
>movement could ever ask for.
>
>Doug
>
><http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/Vietnam/heinl.html>
>
>THE COLLAPSE OF THE ARMED FORCES
>
>By Col. Robert D. Heinl, Jr.
>North American Newspaper Alliance
>Armed Forces Journal, 7 June, 1971
>
>[...]
>
>THE MORALE, DISCIPLINE and battleworthiness of the U.S. Armed Forces are,
>with a few salient exceptions, lower and worse than at anytime in this
>century and possibly in the history of the United States.
>
>By every conceivable indicator, our army that now remains in Vietnam is in
>a state approaching collapse, with individual units avoiding or having
>_refused_ combat, murdering their officers and non commissioned officers,
>drug-ridden, and dispirited where not near mutinous.
>
>Elsewhere than Vietnam, the situation is nearly as serious.
>___________________________________
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