It certainly was not when President Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to suppress the rebellion in 1861.

Walt

And the affluent paid Irish immigrants to fill their billets.

How many of those volunteers, two years later, went straight from Gettysburg to New York City to suppress rioting draft protestors who were pissed off because of the commutation fee that allowed the rich to get out of the war?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_draft_riots

and, I would add, partisan and does not reflect a genuine ideological rejection of America's providential duty and great burden. Rejection may come in time, as our grandchildren tell us we were simultaneously utopian idiots and greedy fools. What is worrisome is what will happen in the meantime, actions carried out by the State and non-state actors, foreign and domestic, all acting and reacting to each other in a vicious cycle. Empires rarely go down quietly, they tend to thrash.

On Bacevich's inclusion of Gates, Bearcat, perhaps the point he was making is the growing distance between the population and our leaders, who see themselves as world statesmen, not limited by anything so parochial as national interests. And by interests I mean that which benefits the largest number of Americans. I feel the need to define "interests", because I'm never quite sure what commentators mean by our interests when they promote policies that do not benefit the majority of Americans.

Besides ideology and hubris, our leaders, and this does not contradict the ideological argument, act in the interests of multinational corporations who also know no real boundaries.

On Gates, my two cents is that he seems to be a team player and institutionally loyal. I'm not accusing him of bad faith, rather, he seems to have conflated the interests of institutions like the Pentagon or CIA with the interests of the population at large. Those interests are not the same.

Sir - no offense intended but I don't buy the argument that a draft would do anything but change the social issues involved briefly before coming back around to the same ones.

The wealthy still woudn't serve.

The educated elite still would avoid service.

(most of) The political class would ensure their children never spent a day in harms way.

Truth is - the days when we expected our young men to head off to war and do their duty are long passed. I could've gone to any school I wanted, done whatever I wanted - but I chose the military. My friends thought I was insane - and that's the typical mentality of the elite. Unless we draft only the best and brightest (which is sure to increase the speed with which we develop a warrior class), their parents will almost always keep them from having to serve.

An answer might be to increase exposure. You'd probably get a broader selection for the force if people were exposed to it more - not through a draft, but through more JRTOC and ROTC type programs.

But in the end - it's easy for some folks to advocate the draft, especially knowing most of them would end up in the Army or Marine Corps. It's hard enough dealing with folks who regret joining - what do you want me to do with a draftee who doesn't want to be there? Throw him out? According to you, that's not a punishment. I guess I could imprison him - but we've got enough Americans in jail... better to just avoid the problem altogether.

Bottom line Sir - I don't want anyone who didn't choose to be there standing in my formation. Call me arrogant, call me whatever - but let's find the solution somewhere else. Better a large war tax that makes it politically costly to go to war or to transition all but a handful of the Army into the reserves than to have bitter folks in the military led by bitter leaders who just want Soldiers happy to train.

For the draft to have any kind of equity - ie half of those "eligible" would suddenly have trick knees or need to "find themselves" in seminary - we would have to conscript a TON of 18 year-olds annually -- and what would we do with them all?

Guarding the US border would be very useful, but we all know that's a political non-starter.

Nothing worse for service effectiveness, morale, and readiness than having units filled with short-term conscripts (no way in this political climate we'd be conscripting anybody for more than 12 months, and maybe less), many unwilling, all by necessity in the least challenging MOSs.

The best thing about the "old" (ie Cold War to 1973) draft was that a lot of smart guys, facing 2 years doing something stupid, volunteered for 3 to choose their MOS: a great addition to the service, especially in specialities like intel. Not gonna happen again.

As for COL/Dr /Prof Bacevich, I have the greatest respect for his service and scholarship, and as a parent I cannot imagine his loss, but he has become a crank at this point.

We must not forget that he is yet another COL who failed to promote to GO - and if you know him or the story it's not a happy one - and his academic career is basically one big payback op against the Army and DoD. This was interesting for a while, but has become tedious.

I am in broad agreement with Bacevich on a lot of issues, including this one, but he really needs to tone it down a bit; he is becoming the Chomsky of the Right, not a good place to be.

Sure, although we couldn't legislate fairness (nor can we ever), the last system was workable, but depended heavily on the Soldier, and Marine for that matter, arriving at a command that actually got them trained-up, having arrived from a terrible initial training syllabus.

In the end you are right, discussing the merits of conscription doesn’t matter because if for no other reason, it isn’t politically feasible. But keep in mind the technical demands, and pace placed on our ground forces yesterday was much less than today, and it does matter that we don't have a pack of 18 and 19 year olds in uniform that don't qualify to be firemen coming from a society that sees the military as a make work job rotating in and out ever 19 to 24 months.

The answer is no - a system could not be devised which is workable. The wealthy elite and governing class would continue to find ways to keep their kids out of the military and therefore would never have a sufficient stake in it to really consider war. Demographically - our military would look much the same under a draft as it does today.

I like the idea of a war tax - it would do much more (especially if it hit the elite hardest) to prevent silly wars.

@Strykercavscout: I can well understand the reluctance of the career military to deal with short-term draftees. Heck, the job is a lot easier if you don't have soldiers who are "civilians-at-heart." I imagine that was one of the major reasons for going AVF decades ago. But the understandable attitude that you have brings up another of the reasons for a draft (citizen army): it prevents the formation of an exclusive miitary caste separate from the rest of society. But aside from that, I wonder how the Israeli Army (and the West German Army up until this year) managed to deal with having an annual inflow of draftees. Both those armies seem to have done OK, even conceding that it might be a pain in the a-- to deal with conscripts.

We aren't Israel or Germany. Our citizens don't have the same concerns they do (did in the case of W. Germany).

I'm not opposed to a solution that helps prevent the rise/entrenchment of a Warrior Class - but a draft isn't the way. Even if you could develop a system that fairly conscripts the population - they'd only serve for what? Two years? How many would stay in the force? Or would the same sort of folks who join and stay today be the ones to stayed after conscription? You'd have a serious divide between the regulars and the conscripts - and the regulars would very possibly go on to form this "caste".

I think there are solutions - and some form of conscription might help, but the idea that the draft is some real and significant solution is flawed. They won't serve long enough and the target audience won't ever serve. I'm an optimist though - if and when some threat like WW II comes along - the nation would be able to enact a draft if need be, but I'm not convinced we need one today.

The draft prior to the Civil War was primarily a state run thing and involved all able bodied men showing up to train in the militia - if at all. Wars were largely fought by volunteers. In fact - the federal government never conscripted directly until the Civil War (in which the wealthy could buy their way out in many cases) and only about 2% of the force was directly conscripted with another 6% (estimated) serving in lieu of - so less than 10% of the Union Army. Many who protested compared Conscription to Slavery - and protest was widespread.

For world war I, when we really got serious about conscription to raise our army we court martialed folks who refused - and there wasn't any shortage.

World War II was different - people saw it as a real threat and fought our enemies. Opposition was limited to the fringe.

Opposition to the draft came back after World War II.

So for folks who say we have this long history of conscription militaries - that's true in some ways, but we've also got a long history of resistance to it. I find it objectionable as an officer who'd have to lead troopers who don't want to be there and absent a clear and present threat in which we need to build up really quickly - I find it objectionable as a citizen.

I met a few Israeli troops back in the day, and there was a HUGE difference between the career guys and the one-contract conscripts. According to some of them, the Israeli Army is actually ranking its units based on how motivated its members are, and then sending conscripts to the unit that most closely matches their motivation.
The result is obvious: Israel has a warrior caste of long-service professionals, and a huge, bloated, bureacratic monster of an "Army" that no one in the country takes seriously.
We blame low training standards for many of the US military's problems, but imagine how much more lax those standards would have to be for a drafted force. (The Israelis, for example, have no discernible grooming standards, and uniform wear appeared to be incomplete bordering on optional.)

Hunter's semi-quote juxtaposes SecState 'sockem' Albright to Clinton's Chief of Staff Powell. My read of the post-Korean (limited war) era is that the cabinet diplomats of both parties (Kissinger, Team LBJ, George Schulz etc.) have been quick to loudly threaten action by the other guy and his oversize budget and schtick. The mess in Lebanon (twice[?] calling off our airstrikes after the French had their wing launched) was the Weinburger - Schultz clusterF---. SecState's Clinton and Rice were advocates of DoD mission creep, after taking the job at State.

Rumsfeld and SecState Powell were the exception, inverting the usual dynamic. Powell's vision of loose canons battering the ship of state turned out to be more predictive. Rumsfeld clearly didn't want a quagmire, even banishing the term for a while, but saw a budget multiplier for his team, and thought he could roll that into more missiles, after another easy Gulf victory using expired Fulda Gap inventory.

Back on topic, the term 'elites' is being thrown around in this kind of discussion without qualification or differentiation. Elite=money or B-school? Yeah to the first, in a shallow sense.

Military service remains a major crucible and pathway for upward mobility and achievement in business and gov't. Some reach congress and cabinet level, from single-car families. Eagle Scout Donny Rumsfeld got thru Princeton using NROTC money. Mustered out marines are statistically represented in Congress beyond their service force strength.

"The Fighting 69th", which I saw recommended here at BD, offers an interesting parallax view on the 'citizen soldier' and professional cadres. Need both, used both in Iraq. "Washington's Crossing" looks at some of the same issues, in a historical context.

Bearcat, let me lead off and say we probably agree more than disagree.

Grand strategy...means we are supposed to have a better peace as a result of the war effort. So the political purpose and endstate which describes that is critical.

If you were to go back to the previous discussion you'd probably see me advocating for the endstate. I've always pushed for exactly that. Tom stated (paraphrased) that having a single desirable unchangeable endstate is nice but probably unattainable. This book argues similarly. The reasoning it supplied was sufficient enough to make me start to rethink my drink. Haven't settled on the right answer yet - if there is one. Probably situation dependent, in other words METT-T.

Me I want a purpose, a purpose nested in the idea of a better peace. Somalia had a purpose - humanitarian aid, which morphed into intervention. Nathan argues that the political purpose was to show force and American unipolar domination in the easiest way possible. The choices at the time were Somalia and Bosnia - hapless Bush the elder picked Somalia and left Bosnia for the equally hapless Clinton to contend with. (see page 159)

"The choices at the time were Somalia and Bosnia....."

That's precisely what the Bosnians were saying at the time.

Although to be fair Sir - I would be cautiously supportive of a cadre military with a large reserve force that might be composed of conscripts... maybe... it would depend on the way it was executed.

I do agree with you that a draft force might've prevented Iraq... might've. Although it might not have - if we didn't have to worry about retention we might have first put more Soldiers in to begin with and second made them stay longer between rotations. I am convinced that if the same units (and more of them) had stayed in their AOR's longer (3 or 4 years) then it would've been easier to build the relationships we needed to "win".

I also am not certain it would've been easy to restrain conscripts from using too much force - especially if all they had to do was get through their year and then they go home.

Sorry to break up my reply - I replied to the first before I saw this.

Your premise always fails on the same point. The draft didn't prevent us from several misguided wars, what makes you think it will prevent future ones? Bush the moron got re-elected after getting us in to this boondoggle, your theory of political accountability isn't born out by any examples of recent history. Past performance isn't indicative of future potential, but CMON.

Nevermind the failed ethics of conscripting people to fight a war with a gun that says go to war or go to jail. Nevermind StrykerCavScouts well documented point that things are hard enough with the people who WANT to be in the service.

Maybe, coulda, shoulda, woulda.

The only thing you got right is that "War is a political act." Say again all after....you're coming in broken and stupid.

Korea? The fact of the draft essentially ended that war; stalemate along set lines followed by election of Eisenhower, who got us the hell out of there. You can argue the winner there, but it wasn't North Korea or China: South Korea continued to exist and later to prosper.

Vietnam? Ended that war too, after taking LBJ's scalp and Humphrey's as well. Do remember that Nixon was elected on the promise of getting us out of Vietnam, which ultimately he did.

WW-II? Oh wait, we won that one.

Cold War? Yup, won that one too.

WW-I? The Germans signed the Armistice and the Treaty of Versailles. It was a lousy ending and set the stage for Hitler's rise, but we won that one as well.

I've never said that a draft system assured a winning army, only that it assured the proper function of our democracy. But will observe that were it really counts, it really works and overall has a much better record than the AVF.

Stryker:

Much truth there. Vietnam, Iraq, whatever? Draft, No Draft. Whatever?

Turnover and fire control would have been huge problems.

Iraq was already full of mass graves out in the deserts and up in the Hamrin.

It did not need more.

The value of a professional army is a trade-off, unless, of course the pro army fights, and the draftees support. Could the pro army stay on deployment that long, though, without a more normalized British Foreign Service approach?

Always embedded challenges once we go off a-fightin'. Doesn't matter who directs it at the top.

I'd support a draft into the reserves/guard where we could call up folks to support a medium sized professional army. Smaller than the one we have now - larger than the interwar years.

It's exhausting reading all this draft talk. Short of total war with China, it ain't happening! Instead, how about expend our intellectual energy in the reality-based realm?

In view of all the difficulties, folks on this thread are asking "why a draft?" The only reason is because folks on this thread are asking how can we "bridge the gulf between civilian and military" and "make the military less of a private army for whichever Administration is in power at the time." Sure, one answer is to have a more responsible Congress. But is that going to happen? Can we the people make that happen, especially when the electoral process is increasingly influenced by the Big Money Interests? Sounds as impossible as some say a draft would be.

Sure a draft is inconvenient, and it's not a "necessity." But if folks are concerned, as Col Bacevich is (and I admire that man tremendously), then they need to go back and rethink conscription. It''s true that all our Western Allies (and others too) have gone AVF. But remember that West Germany was the last to convert (just this year). They were the last holdout against an AVF, putting up with the inconvenience and inefficiency of a draft. Why? Because Germany felt that having conscripts serve was important to a democracy....it kept the military closely connected with civilian society. Alas, now they've followed the US example. Time will tell whether the Germans will too start seeing the growth of a military establishment separate from civil society. So that now leaves on only Israel which requires citizens to serve? (Confession: I personally agree with Robert Heinlein who wrote in "Starship Trooper" that no one should be eligible to vote or hold public office unless they have served).

You keep talking about the rise of a Warrior Class (or something like it) in the United States. I've been studying this for quite awhile now and I don't think it's quite as real of an issue as folks think it is. There was a PhD dissertation published not long ago where an Army Major surveyed something like 3600 officers from O1 to 06 to see how real this issues was; there were definitly some issues, but not the ones predicted. MAJ Urben wrote it - Civil Military Relations in a Time of War: Party, Politics, and the Profession of Arms. Good reading if for nothing else providing good data.

The concerns raised in the study are valid - but like I said, they indicate that the division isn't as pronounced as expected.

Gold Star:

I thin the term Compulsory Public Service can mean many things, including military service, and should be viewed separately from war and peace.

I joined the Iraq effort in 2007 as an oldster civilian, after opposing it from inception, solely to help bring an end, and turn it over to Iraqis.

SOFA was done before I came home.

My button says: "Will fight for peace."

I'm with you.

One thing a draft might realistically do is bring to the forefront the wrath of the MOA?

Never heard of the MOA? They are the Mothers of America, and say what you will about our political system and those elected from it, but our politicians are married to mothers also. . .they will sympathize, and collectively the MOA might very well force an end toward what I believe is becoming American imperialism, and its needless shedding of young blood, and sapping money from worthy domestic programs.

they and their backers wish. However, unfortunately, about half of the populace will always be merrily goose-stepping behind their team's leader.

But the problem hinges on immunity. If, for once, an American politician thought to his or herself "if this goes badly, I could get prosecuted and my personal estate confiscated" there might be some reluctance to be so gung ho, away we go! There might be some more Congress critters saying "hey, wait a minute, let's review that evidence you got there. What was that about Niger?" As of now, they know that no matter how badly things go, they themselves won't be held responsible. The same thing goes for the people who run corporations, that's why they can act so cavalierly. If Tony Hayward's home and bank account was on the line, he might have said let's check those rigs one more time boys.

I'm not arguing for a populist, pitch fork revolt, just a pipe dream of codified punishments for gross incompetence and intentions would not be a allowed as a mitigating factor. Of course the last bit runs counter to our legal tradition, but that's a whole other rant.

You've never met my wife, Gold Star Mother. I wish you will some day. She would rip certain members of the last Administration's gonads from their torsos before you could blink.

I used to think that a substantial female component to the armed forces would moderate the periodic drum-beat for a new war, the MOA factor. Odd that I would make that mistake, as if mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters loved the sons less that daughters.

I think we're barking up the wrong tree re citizen soldiers. They already exist, in large numbers, active and retired. For all the vehemence Ducky brings to bashing on AVF, the draft in our history is rare, not common. Even in the 20th century, an active draft only existed for about 30 years, intermittently. The idea that wars of choice are more likely during AVF eras is worth examining. But imo a permanent draft, universal service wouldn't have stopped Cheney-Bush in 2002, given the national mood to volunteer for retribution, kick butt on the 1991 model.

Much of the professional military elite was agin land war in asia in 2001-2. The COIN guys in Special Forces expected an open ended expansion of recent/existing (10 years+) armed Iraqi insurgency, the civil war that GWHB had once openly called for. The serving US military leadership (including many noncoms) are better educated on history and war than Mother's of America, who have the same 12 semesters of patriotic pseudo-history as other native US voters.

Until we are willing to face the collatoral inherent in war (40K WW2 Normandy civilians blasted, the bloody 1900 suppression of the Phillipines, in an Indian Fighting tradition?) we are likely to keep selling the 'glory of victory' to the next generation.

America needs to take another look at the role played by the limited wisdom of militarized British elites in 1780, the flip side of our 'exceptionalism'. The empire victory that really counts is the decision that pays dividends 50 or 100 or 200 years later. Not the tactical glory won in some bloody Afghan border skirmish.

Colonel, Your #1 was Rubber Ducky's comment, not mine. Its important in this argument to point out that a draft is not going to generate 100's of thousands of draftees in the US military. This country can not front those numbers in uniform--we can't afford the numbers that we have now. And, it was the families of the servicepeople who voted in 2004 also. Did they toss out the Bush administration? No. In fact, far more Gold Star Families supported Bush than spoke out against him.
#2 The American public DOES HAVE skin in the game right now. Will the draft create more of the public having a family member in uniform? Is this draft going to generate a 16 million man/women army? I think not. And, there was a hell of an uproar over Bush's and Cheney's stupid comments. Nothing, NOTHING, came of it. Next news cycle--go.
#3 Sir, if you recall, and if you don't please research, there was many instances of mutiny in Vietnam. There was a large segment of draftees and draft-aged people who split this country rather than be drafted and sent to Vietnam. Did that stop the war or even cause and earlier conclusion? Sadly, no.
#4 the "broad involvement by the citizenry" of the USA has spoken. They don't want a draft. In fact, this argument against a draft is fueling a broader call to end the wars. Not a draft in place, but a call for a draft to NOT to be put in place. Big difference.

Flat out, regardless of outwardly apathetic nature, the people of this country, I believe, in most sectors of this country, flat out just hate this shit.

Bring the troops home. Take care of them. They are hurting. And, stop this insane policing of the world, getting involved in other people's civil wars, and chasing boogie men. Lets just leave these indigenous peoples alone in their own countries. We are not going to solve their problems with US ground or air forces, or massive amounts of money placed into their graft systems.

SF. I, like you Sir, don't want to hear about another Marine lossing his young life in some unpronouceable shit-hole on the other side of the globe. Its time for a radical review of how we conduct the Nation's business abroad.

@GSF: When all is said and done, after all the theorizing and intellectualizing, I agree with you, and I really hope that your're right that the public's sentiment is already turning against the cavalier use of our military. You know, when I was in command of Marines, starting from the platoon level, I knew fully that my duty was to "take care of the troops." You learned the same lesson too. But it never struck me then that the troops were so young, maybe because I was young myself. But now, when I see lieutenants and troops who look like they're barely out of their teens, I realize all the more that we have to take care of these kids....and we can't let some disconnected politicians like Madeline Albright or ambitious top brass just use them carelessly like they were widgets. If I keep pushing for a draft even though it seems unrealistic and unworkable, it's because I can't think of anything else that would make the people (voters) wake up and get involved in decisions to go to war. S/F

One of my favorite things about this blog is that most folks genuinly seem motivated by a desire to make the military a better place to serve, more in line with our national values, and to prevent it from being abused.

To that last end - there is some value added for a draft just as there is a war tax and like anything else, it'd be in the details of execution that we'd get to the utility. I'm skeptical of a draft for alot of reasons - but I'm not convinced a war tax would work either. Something about taxes always hitting the wrong targets and all.

Maybe the answer is in a massive draw down - deny political leaders the capability altogether. Enlarge the Navy to buy us time if we need to raise an Army again - I don't know. But I enjoy the debate and hope elected leaders will begin to consider these issues seriously as they prepare massive budget cuts.

Those of us under arms in the mid-1970s experienced that weird transition from draftees to AVF.

My later involvement in Iraq fully immersed me in the new army. While advised that many of my experiences there were way up the food chain (so not an apples to apples comparison), I learned that, in the field, the army is the army regardless. Route clearance and patrolling just doesn't change.

Whether M. Albright or Clinton, female leadership will not produce any magic, nor will putting, say, 1/2 million draftees in the field.

I have seen an MG's pocket full of every soldier who died on his watch, and can't imagine that these presidents are so jaded and isolated that visits to Dover and hospitals does not have some personal impact. No magic there.

This money thing, regrettably, will make the big diff. The price of hubris and delusional empirical thinking.

JTINSC: I hope you're wrong. Because if you're right, then this country is in a downward political spiral that nothing can pull it out of. That would be a hopeless situation, but you're not judging it to be hopeless, are you?