Will the Draft Come Back?

President Bush has denied repeatedly that a draft will be needed for Iraq.  With a little shifting around of existing troops, he insists, American forces, with a little help from other countries in the "Coalition of the Willing," will be equal to the task of rooting out the Iraqi "terrorists." The Draft Orthodoxy The orthodox view among military officers and elected officials since the 1970s is that the all-volunteer "professional" armed force is the best way to go.  This orthodoxy lies behind the official statements on the status of the draft--that it is merely on standby, as it has been since its reinstatement in 1980.  For many months the Selective Service System, which runs the draft, has posted this statement on its website: Notwithstanding recent stories in the news media and on the Internet, Selective Service is not getting ready to conduct a draft for the U.S. Armed Forces -- either with a special skills or regular draft.  Rather, the Agency remains prepared to manage a draft if and when the President and the Congress so direct.  This responsibility has been ongoing since 1980 and is nothing new.  Further, both the President and the Secretary of Defense have stated on more than one occasion that there is no need for a draft for the War on Terrorism or any likely contingency, such as Iraq.  Additionally, the Congress has not acted on any proposed legislation to reinstate a draft.  Therefore, Selective Service continues to refine its plans to be prepared as is required by law, and to register young men who are ages 18 through 25. Rumblings That standard view is widely held among Republicans and Democrats alike.  But recently we have heard unorthodox rumblings and rumors and seen trial balloons sent up into the political skies.  In December 2002 two conservative Republican Representatives introduced a bill to activate the draft; it died in committee.  In 2003 Representatives Rangel and Conyers, both very liberal Democrats in the Black Caucus, put another bill on the table; Hollings introduced it in the Senate; it also gathered little support.  In April of 2004 Senator Hagel, a Republican, said that Congress ought to consider a draft.  An op-ed piece in the New York Times by William Broyles, a former Marine (May 4, 2004), argued that the all-volunteer armed forces makes the underprivileged "others" fight the wars ordered by the elite, but "If this war is truly worth fighting, then the burdens of doing so should fall on all Americans." More telling than these speeches and proposals, however, is the fact that in late 2003 the Selective Service System sent out a call to fill the vacancies on its two thousand local draft boards.  These vacancies had been vacant for years (there are about ten thousand seats on the local boards, and a similar number on the appeal boards), and nobody had cared much.  Is it just a coincidence that in late 2003 it was first becoming obvious that the US "mission" in Iraq had not been "accomplished" after all?  Congress allocated an extra $28 million for the SSS in its 2004 budget--a lot more than it costs to keep up its disingenuous website. Pressures on the Military It is now obvious that, in the third year of the invasion, American and other Coalition forces have not yet pacified large portions of Iraq, or even Baghdad.  Upwards of one hundred US Soldiers or Marines are being killed each month, and many more are badly wounded.  The Islamicist jihadists, whom Saddam Hussein had kept out of Iraq, are now all over the place, and large percentages of Sunni Iraqis have turned against the occupiers, who by mid-2005 had killed upwards of 100,000 Iraqis.  The Shi'a parties that won the election have called for the withdrawal of all foreign troops, and even the Kurds show signs they are fed up with them.  Much of the new Iraqi army and police force is ineffectual against the insurgents unless US forces accompany them.  No new countries are likely to join the occupation at this late date; Spain, Hungary, Honduras, the Philippines, and seven or eight other countries have recently joined the "unwilling."  Having been rebuked in the May 2005 election for misleading his people, Tony Blair will not send more British soldiers either. The Pentagon has virtually admitted that its situation is untenable.  Early in 2004 it extended the stays of 20,000 troops in Iraq, among 50,000 troops overall, in the so-called "stop-loss" policy.  At the end of October 2004 it extended the stays of another 6,500 soldiers by two months.  Soldiers are not re-enlisting in requisite numbers‚Äîonly about half of them, according to a Stars and Stripes report on October 2003.  The same is true of National Guard members: according to an Army survey in the summer of 2004, some 43% plan to leave when their contracts expire.  The retention rate in the military overall fell from 75% in 2003 to 63% in 2004. The Army now has 7,500 recruiters, who prowl around high schools and shopping malls, but they are running into angry parents and PTAs as well as reluctant young men and women.  Desperate to meet their quotas, recruiters have signed up mentally ill teen-agers, threatened those who back out with prison and even a firing squad, and made any number of false promises. Bonuses for joining (or re-enlisting) have doubled (now $10,000 to $15,000), or, for some specialties, tripled.  Even so, the Army fell short of its recruitment goal by 32% in March 2005, 42% in April, and 37% in May.  For the first time in ten years the Marines missed its goal for four consecutive months.  With forces in Iraq already stretched to the breaking point, with the insurgency entrenched and tenacious, with no "exit" in sight and no help on the horizon, the pressure to revive the draft is now very strong.  Indeed, as Kerry said during the campaign, "They have effectively used a stop-loss policy as a backdoor draft."  About 60,000 of the 140,000 US troops in Iraq are in the National Guard or Reserves, and more and more members of the Ready Reserve are being called up.  Only on a technicality can one deny that the draft has already begun. The American Strategic Dilemma Long before the attacks of September 11, a group of strategists connected to something called the Defense Policy Board‚ÄîCheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, and others‚Äîhas bluntly advocated an American invasion of the Middle East, starting with Iraq but not stopping until Syria, Iran, and even Saudi Arabia are "democracies," that is, in safe, pro-western, open-for-business hands.  Securing the oil for America and Europe has much to do with it, of course, along with settling "the Palestine Question" once and for all, but the ultimate target may be China, the only other possible superpower, which needs Middle East oil and will be less likely to cause us trouble if we control it.  This group's ambition is breathtaking, and will certainly require a massive mobilization of American troops.  Iran knows something about warfare, and is not likely to welcome the United States Marines with flowers.  We might topple the Saudi regime, but that would unleash the Islamicist militants, not to mention the Shiites, who agree with Osama bin Laden that "Crusader" troops must never violate the land of Mecca and Medina.  It is a recipe for permanent war against all of Islam.  The plan, however, seems to have fallen to pieces in Baghdad, Fallujah, and Najaf, as US troops are unable to contain the resistance that was supposed to have evaporated two years ago.  We still hear accusations against Iran, but it seems unlikely that we would dare attack it while sinking in the Iraqi quagmire, not to mention our problems in Afghanistan.  If so, then the one plan that would certainly demand a draft has been ruled out.  That leaves Iraq itself.   If US troop strength remains at or near its present level, President Bush will preside over a defeat for US arms.  Perhaps, as the prospect of ruin grows larger and more imminent, another current of the Republican Party will take control, dismiss Rumsfeld and his cohorts, and let Bush, who cannot be re-elected anyway, take the heat.  But the temptation will be very great to escalate the war‚ÄîLyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon could not resist doing so in Vietnam‚Äîin order to force a conclusion that looks like a victory.  Many intelligence and military experts have said that it would require a force three times the present size to contain and control Iraq, and they would have to stay there a long time.  If such a force is sent, a draft is inevitable. What the Draft Might Look Like It is likely that the new draft will be somewhat different from the last one.  The current plan (which could of course be modified) is to draft twenty-year-olds first in a lottery.  There will be no long deferments: if you are a student you may finish your semester, and if you are a senior you may finish your year and graduate.  There is talk of drafting women, for the first time in American history.  Emigrating to Canada will no longer be as easy as it was (at least 75,000 young men went there during the Vietnam war): there is a new understanding with the Canadian government, and economic conditions are worse there than they were in 1968.  If you think you are a conscientious objector on moral or religious grounds you must wait until you are drafted before you file a claim; it cannot be done upon registration at age eighteen. Would the Draft be a Good Thing? Not only the Pentagon and politicians but most Americans are opposed to a return of the draft: liberals and anti-war activists, of course; libertarians; and many conservatives.  It infringes our freedom, it disrupts lives, it forces some young men to do things against their consciences, it gives the government large armies which tempt it to go to war‚Äîthese are some of the arguments that have been mustered against conscription for hundreds of years. But there are good arguments on the other side.  As William Broyles wrote, should not the burden of a war be shouldered by all Americans, not just those in the "economic draft"‚Äîthose to whom the training and pay in the Army looks good?  Only one or two members of Congress has had a child in Iraq, and very few have had a child in the armed forces at all.  Perhaps In a republic, as we have been told for two thousand years, the citizens themselves must fight when necessary, and we should not rely on mercenaries, even mercenaries from our own nation.  The ones who deliberate must be the ones who face the consequences. Of course the trouble with Broyles' demand that the burdens of fighting "should fall on all Americans" is that he knows perfectly well that the burdens would fall, at best, on all young Americans.  Young Americans do not plan wars and give orders to invade, but they are the ones who must do the killing and dying. The main reason Bush will do his best not to bring back the draft is that it would bring back draft resistance.  (I don't mean draft dodging, what George W. Bush did, but draft resistance.)   Twenty thousand young men from 1967 to 1971 turned in their draft cards and pledged to refuse induction.  Thousands stood trial for their own draft refusals, hundreds went to prison, and dozens took "sanctuary" in churches around the country, forcing the police to carry them out over the bodies of parishioners.  They gave the government nightmares, and they were a factor in its decision to withdraw American troops. The draft, then, is not just a tool the government uses to control its young people, but a tool young people can use to control their government.  If it returns, I believe a new generation of young men, and perhaps young women, will arise and say no to it, and those who went through it thirty years ago will be ready to help them.  Such a resistance might drive the pre-emptive warmongers from power and prevent a war against all of Islam, and even the prospect of such a resistance might lead to a withdrawal from Iraq. Michael Ferber June 2005 For more information, visit: AFSC Youth and Militarism Program:  www.afsc.org/youthmil Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors: www.objector.org War Resister's League: www.warresistersleague.org Michael Ferber is a professor of English at the University of New Hampshire, and sits on the board of New Hampshire Peace Action.  In 1967 he helped organize a church ceremony in Boston in which draft cards were returned to the Justice Department; for that act he stood trial in Federal Court for conspiracy to violate the draft law.

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