Draft vs volunteer army: A political football

At least, a political football between the two duopoly parties, largely dependent on whose occupying the White House and what war they might be mongering.

I got sucked into a Twitter discussion last week when an apparent typical Blue Anon, Brynn Tannehill, (whose bio and even more, whose linked blog, seem to support that) quote tweeted nutter Brigitte Gabriel, who pushed for bringing back the draft. 

Now, I know why Gabriel did that; with her, calling this a political football rather than a troll would be too nice.

But that back story? True, or true with one half of the political football. 

IIRC, way back in BushCo, some more liberal minority (ethnic, not out of power minority) Democrats in the House broached the issue of reviving the draft. They got little support, to the degree they voiced it since the 2006 midterms, and after the big swing, it pretty much went away.

That said, among professional-class Democrats, I think minority ones, and I know whites, dislike for the draft is probably about the same as with non-trolling GOP comrades of the same class level. 

Now, to Tannehill.

First, Tannehill does NOT mention Option 3 of universal service. Why not? IMO, because the neoliberal Democratic ruling class dislikes that almost as much as the draft. And, the second person beyond the original group to jump on the thread claims that national service would have the same loopholes as the draft. Not if it actually IS "universal." You can, just like Shrub Bush's alleged cocaine-dodging, be sent to work at an inner-city (Houston or elsewhere) social services center. And, her claim, and others, that it would be gamed? The same claim is made by good old neoliber Conor Friedersdorf. Shock me. That said, per that link, Champagne Charlie Rangel's idea of national service is not mine. He thought that if you weren't in the military, you should be in military-related national service. I personally reject that as an issue of militarization, and also in support of conscientious objectors.

Second, she thinks My Lai is her ace in the hole. I said Abu Ghraib trumps that, and one Blue Anon fellow traveler, the first in line jumped on my for saying I thought it was worse. No, and I told him I used "trumps" because I inferred she was implying that volunteers didn't do that. Besides, in both Iraq and Afghanistan, as I told the dood (who didn't respond) that we committed other war crimes in both countries that involved outright killing of civilians, just like in Vietnam. Period and end of story. That guy may have shut up because he claimed I could only have said that because I was born after 9/11 and had a dumb take, to which I responded that I grew up in the 70s and my oldest brother was just a year or so short of draft age when Nixon ended it. 

Third, my first interlocutor in various ways tried to claim all-vol armies show their superiority. I said the US hadn't been seriously tested since Nam. He shifted to Argentina-UK, at which point I showed him how much help the US gave Britain, as also detailed here. He admitted he didn't know that, and yes, that was a massive thumb on the scale, though he wouldn't admit that. Then, on my use of the word duopoly, said he's from Europe. By what he retweets, he's British, not continental. And, that would explain his opposition to universal service. The UK, like the US, has an all-volunteer military, with no universal service.

Fourth, he ignores, or may not know, and Tannehill most certainly DOES know, how at the height of the Iraq War, the Army lowered its standards and let in a lot of gangbangers to meet recruitment needs. True, in the draft days, the old "enlist or go to jail" sentence from a local judge might have caused the same, but in a non-volunteer army, it was, IMO, easier to "sit on" such people.

I later asked him, saying I guessed he was British, what his take was on Jezza Corbyn. He didn't respond. Shock me.

In the bigger picture, this whole issue was touched on in Paths of Dissent. But, only touched on.

Paths of Dissent: Soldiers Speak Out Against America's Misguided Wars by Andrew Bacevich
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Not bad but not quite fantastic.

Biggest takeaways from the individual chapters?

1. Only 7 percent of today's America is veterans vs around 50 percent after the Civil War and after WWII. Hence the disconnect of "support the troops" while not actually caring to ask what that really should mean. (Update: One or two of the essays touch on the issue of bringing back the draft, either by itself, or as part of a larger universal service program, but this wasn't a focus for most, whether grunts or officers, short-termers or careerists.)

...

5. It would have been nice for the editors to have had a bigger analysis-driven conclusion. No nation-building was implied, but Bacevich didn't touch on flyspeck military missions, delve further into the draft issue or general military-civilian separation, etc.

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