> 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
Well said, Doug. The draft is just not going to come back, mainly for the reasons you've articulated. President Kerry won't revive the draft, but he'll scale back military deployment so it can get back to a force that can support more effective covert wars.
All of the recent hot air about the draft coming back is being generated by privileged middle class people who are worried that their comfortable butts might be forced into the military. This is one reason why I've decided to cut back on these op-eds on Infoshop News. How about if we spill more ink about the fact that working class kids are forced into the military for economic reasons? Or how about all of the ROTC programs that exist in high schools? Or all of the "weekend warriors" who were conned into becoming cannon fodder (or make that 'roadside bomb fodder') for the rich (both rich Democrats and Republicans)? Let's make a stink about the class war aspect of the current military and bipartisan war policies, before we waste words on the remote possibility that middle class kids will be drafted.
Chuck Munson Infoshop.org