[lbo-talk] Hustling The Left

[Michael Hoover]

>>> dhenwood at panix.com 12/18/05 7:51 PM >>>
Christian is probably going to do a piece for The Nation sometime 
next year on the culture of the military. Quick summary of his point: 
today's US army is nothing like that of the 1970s. Today's soldiers 
are mostly loyal, disciplined professionals who want to be there. 
There's no great untapped potential of critique there. And he agrees 
that the notion of a poverty draft is bullshit. The military is made 
up of the "better" echelons of the working class. He also points out 
that the military is a real meritocracy, and that it brings together 
people of different ethnic, regional, and status origins and molds 
them into a collective - and that that mixing promotes a great sense 
of solidarity. Someone - was it Yoshie? - said that there's something 
socialist about the structure of the military (a point that Chalmers 
Johnson also makes). It's true, and it's very effective.
Doug
<<<<<>>>>>

have been saying above for years, see below that i posted to another 
list a couple of years ago, maybe hustler and/or nation will pay me to 
write an article, wait, on second thought, i don't want to...

and fwiw: poverty draft exists simultaneously with 'better' elements,
two are not mutually exclusive, as for military 'socialism', it's a quite
authoritarian variant, the most command control institution in u.s.,
oh, one more thing, not by whim was military draft called 'selective
service...  mh

while minorities in military remain disportionately high relative to 
their proportion of general population, transformed organizational 
structure of u.s.military places smaller percentage at 'front lines' 
than would be expected given disproportion...

'regular' u.s. military is comparatively small (about 1.5 million) today 
but it includes much larger percentage of 'professional' career-service 
soldiers than in past, whether special ops or high-tech personnel 
(pilots/tanks), these people are mostly white...

above forces now - according to plan - supplemented by reserves and 
federalized national guard (additional 3.5 million), group that used to 
be jokingly called 'weekend warriors' is also largely white, while some 
are responsible for supply and other 'secondary' activities, many are 
among first to be deployed into battlefield situations...

present arrangement explains why military officials don't want return of, 
they believe that they are much less susceptible to rebellion from within 
the ranks as occurred in vietnam...  

 
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