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mburbank mburbank is offline
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 12:32 PM        Do We Need a Draft?
"The reason senior Army leaders want to go to a bigger Army," reported ABC News on Monday, "is that they are worried about their ability to fight future threats. One official told ABC News, other than the troops now in Iraq and Afghanistan, there are only two to three combat brigades - that's 7,000 to 10,000 troops - who are fully trained and equipped to respond quickly to a crisis. 'If we keep forces in Iraq too long, we risk running into a situation where the force begins to break,' said former US Army officer Andrew Krepenevich."


Do we at this point need to reinstate compulsory service in order to keep the army functioning and the country safe?

I'm very conflicted by this question. Part of me thinks we need a draft, if for no other reason than that the risks we choose as a country should be shared as equally as possible. The rich and powerful would always find ways around service, or ways to safe service, but at least there would be an attempt at sharing the costs.

But I have an eleven year old daughter, and it's very easy to imagine some form of the war were in now still going on when she's of age.

Here's the other thing I don't understand. Why don't the folks who think we are in a situation comparable to WWII think there should be a draft? Why is our country not on a serious war footing?
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 01:25 PM       
Concider also this article from "slate"

The generals' revolt has spread inside the Pentagon, and the point of the spear is one of Donald Rumsfeld's most favored officers, Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army chief of staff.

This new phase of rebellion isn't aimed at the war in Iraq directly, as was the protest by six retired generals that made headlines last spring. But in some ways, it's more potent, and not just because Schoomaker is very much on active duty. His challenge is dramatic because he's questioning one of the war's consequences—its threat to the Army's ability to keep functioning.

The trumpet sounded last month, when Schoomaker refused to give Rumsfeld a detailed Army budget proposal for fiscal year 2008. The Air Force and Navy met the Aug. 15 deadline for submitting their program requests. But Schoomaker—in an unprecedented move—said he preferred not to.
Click Here!

Rumsfeld had limited the Army's budget for 2008 to $114 billion. Schoomaker told him that the sum wasn't enough to maintain the Army's present commitments. Simply to repair the tanks, radios, and other equipment damaged in Afghanistan and Iraq, he would need at least another $17 billion. If he didn't get it, he said, there was no point drawing up a budget at all.

Today's Los Angeles Times reported on Schoomaker's revolt, but there have been stirrings of a ruffle since the summer. On Aug. 23, at a speech before the National Press Club, Schoomaker publicly threw down the gauntlet: "There is no sense in us submitting a budget that we cannot execute … a broken budget."

A month earlier, Government Executive reported that Schoomaker had told a group of congressional staffers about grave backlogs at the Army's repair depots. Nearly 1,500 Humvees, M2 Bradley fighting vehicles, and other vehicles were awaiting repair at the Red River Army Depot in Texas. The same was true of 500 M1 tanks at the Anniston depot in Alabama. None of the Army's five largest depots was operating at more than 50 percent capacity—all because of a shortage of money.

It's not just the repair depots that are overworked. Friday's New York Times reported that the Army is so bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan that just two or three active-duty combat brigades—7,000 to 10,000 soldiers—are fully ready to deal with a crisis that might erupt elsewhere in the world.

And among the units cycling in and out of Iraq, troubles are brewing. The 3rd Infantry Division, which so quickly roared up the desert to Baghdad at the outset of this war, is scheduled to head back to Iraq soon for its third tour of duty. Yet, according to a story in today's New York Times, two of the division's four brigades aren't ready to go. They have none of their armored vehicles and only half of their troops.

Units throughout the Army are so strained, generals say, that they're going to have to rely even more on the National Guard and Reserves, which are wildly overwhelmed themselves.

Meanwhile, to meet enlistment targets, the Army has raised the maximum age of recruits to 41, lowered their required aptitude scores, and—in another recent gulp—relaxed moral and disciplinary standards. The Army has always waived these standards to let in a small number of applicants. But since the Iraq war, this number has risen substantially. In 2001, just 10.07 percent of Army recruits were given moral waivers—i.e., were allowed into the Army, even though they had committed misdemeanors or had once-prohibited problems with drugs and alcohol, records of serious misconduct, or disqualifying medical conditions. By 2004, this number had risen to 11.98 percent. But in 2005, it soared to 15.02 percent. And as of April 2006, according to a fact sheet obtained from an Army officer, the number has leapt to 15.49 percent.

This is one reason so many Army officers, active and retired, have been so skeptical of the war all along—not so much because they oppose the war itself (though some do), but because they feared it would wreck the Army.

The Army's crisis threatens the entire structure of defense spending. Since the late 1960s, the Army, Air Force, and Navy (of which the Marines are a part) have abided by an informal agreement that gives each of them a roughly equal share of the total military budget. No service has ever wavered from its share by more than a percentage point. In this way, the chiefs have avoided the interservice rivalries that tore the military establishments apart throughout the 1940s and '50s—and let civilian secretaries of defense, especially Robert McNamara, step in and take control in the early '60s, reshaping their missions and slashing their weapons programs.

The Army is clearly in need of a higher share of the budget now. It is the service that's dominating the fighting, losing most of its troops, and getting most of its equipment chewed up in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Schoomaker gets his demand, the Army would get a significantly higher share—and the Pentagon wars would start in again.

There are ways to treat the Army's ailments without opening the purse strings. For instance, Schoomaker could cancel or postpone the Army's Future Combat Systems, a $200 billion confabulation that may be way overdesigned for any realistic scenario of future combat. But the FCS is the Army's only big-ticket weapon system, and the procurement commanders wouldn't surrender it unless the Air Force and Navy chiefs junked their big fighter planes and submarines, which isn't about to happen, either.

Early on in his regime, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld might have had the clout to force such a bargain, but no longer. He has already abdicated his authority, allowing Schoomaker to appeal directly for more money to the White House's Office of Management and Budget. (According to Army Times, this is another unprecedented move: No service secretary has ever dealt directly with the OMB—all such appeals are supposed to be made through the secretary of defense.)

This bureaucratic turbulence only reflects a broader dilemma that higher political authorities will soon have to address, whether they'd like to or not. Schoomaker's central complaint is that he doesn't have the money to maintain the Army's global missions. The president and the Congress can pony up the money (a lot more money) or scale back the missions. To do otherwise—to stay the course with inadequate resources—is to invite defeats and disasters.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 01:31 PM       
I think the threat we face now is greater than the one we faced in 1812, that doesn't mean I think we should start building up our navy. This threat is on par with the Spanish-American War, so where are all of the god damn horses!!?

I think we certainly need a greater domestic investment in the war. I primarily blame the president and the GOP in Congress for that, but a part of the blame goes to the Democrats as well. We shouldn't be laying out massive tax breaks, or waiting for gas prices to drop so we can gas up our sherman tank utility vehicles.

A draft would never pass, but do we need one? I think we need to figure out and reach some kind of a consensus on what this war is before we start drafting men and women. You laugh at labels, but "Iron Curtain" was also a label in 1946. By 1948 it was the "Cold War."

Americans need to figure out the threat before they decide if they care about it or not. Right now, they just don't seem to care a whole lot. A draft would be a pretty hard sell.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 01:41 PM       
Max can be counted on to seriously consider the need for a draft, since a draft would definitely make many more Americans, especially those drafted into the military, hate this war, which would hurt the Bush Administration and the war.

No matter that a draft is even less feasible than it would be necessary. No matter that no one is seriously considering instituting a draft, and the only time it's been mentioned was when Kerry brought it up two years ago to use unsuccessfully as a boogey-man...

Who knows, though? This just might be the thing that brings Bush down, right?
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How can someone who obviously thinks so much of their ideas have so little respect for expressing them? How can someone who so yearns to be taken seriously make so little effort?!
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 01:43 PM       
I take your point.

Perhaps shared economic sacrifice can come before shared human sacrifice. But somethings got to give. We're breaking the army, and even I don't think that's a real good idea.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 02:14 PM       
Max, the military did this to itself. I'm serious. I was there. Here's how it happened. Look at the ebb and flow of attrition.

80s: End strength Strong (Cold War)
early 90s: End strength Weak (Desert Storm/Shield)
late 90s: End strength Strong
early 00: End strength Weak (OIF/GWOT)
mid 00: OVER STRENGTH, UNDER BUDGET

How did we get here? How did we manage to cut our own throats? Why are they alloting us more troops but not giving us ample funds?

Because congressionals kept cutting the budget and military leadership folded like a fajita. The HOR and senate were too lazy to get out of their leather chair and take a 1st class trip to a dilapidated military base to see first hand the state of our assets. So they sent their wormy staffers to do their bidding. Uniformed, overeducated staffers. With a pencil and a trapper keeper.

I did PR for uncle Sam for 8 years. (read: spin doctor) I had talking points committed to MEMORY so that when the staffers came through we could some how get them to throw us a bone. We used whatever means we had at our disposal. (it's not like we had advertising dollars - oh, the irony) Cold calls and hook-ups. We would BEG congressionals to tour our bases. (LURE / TRAP) We got some big fish: Tipper Gore & Newt (not at the same time... haha, that would have been great)

Sidenote: Newt came while he was acting Speaker. I can't say for certain, but I'm pretty sure it was weeks before being named "Man of the Year" by Time. He was at the apex of leading a very public republican revolution in congress. All I could think when I shook his hand was, "Wow. This guy is fat."

The dialogue between the military and senate went something like this:

General: Senator, we saved you $2 billion this year by cutting funds for units and reallocating operational target dollars. We also lowered recruitment quotas/discharged servicemembers and replaced them with civilian contractors.
Senator: Thank you General.
General: In return we'd like to invest those saved dollars in to some new aircraft and submarines. We're awfully short these days.
Senator: ROTFLMAO. Don't think so. You've proved that you can operate without that money. Why should you get it now? And in the future, we expect more results with less funding. Okay? Thanks.

But did the Senate tell the military they would be able to reuse the funds? And if not, why would they go to all that trouble and expect a hand out? Because DoD doesn't communicate through public forum it's not affored the same clout. It's true. As an American citizen you have civil liberties... Free speech. When the military whines it's considered insolence.

"If we keep forces in Iraq too long, we risk running into a situation where the force begins to break," said former US Army officer Andrew Krepenevich.

I've got an idea: get them out of Iraq. Army recruiting can't hit quota and retention is horribly low. Monetary incentives aren't good enough. Patriotism is wearing thin. Everyone got so caught up in technological advances and resolve through intimidation (sanctions and embargos - GAY) that we thought the days of having a force with strong end strength was over. WRONG.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 03:06 PM       
Does the Star Wars Missile Defense budget fall under DoD? 'Cause they have an assload of money tey might as well be using for toilet paper.

Thanks for your perspective. I always find it enlightening. You need to write for I-mock again.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 03:16 PM       
Stop it. I'm blushing.

And I have no clue about Star Wars. NA$A?
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 03:42 PM       
I think it's DoD. NASA doesn't do weapons. SUPPOSEDLY!!!

Like we have to go back to the moon for exporation. WHERE THE HELL ELSE ARE GOING TO PUT THE USA MOON CANNON!?
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 05:06 PM       
Well, space exploration is just another form of our hegemony and imperial oppression, isn't it? Everything we do better than anyone else is a weapon.
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mburbank~ Yes, okay, fine, I do know what you meant, but why is it not possible for you to get through a paragraph without making all the words cry?

How can someone who obviously thinks so much of their ideas have so little respect for expressing them? How can someone who so yearns to be taken seriously make so little effort?!
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 07:13 PM       
no, there has only been 2 people in the past 20 years who voted for a draft and both were democrats.

The army is big enough, and if it werent the draft is not the way to supplement it. The draft is a buzzward democrats use to scare people into being afraid of republicans as if they would ever support that.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 07:44 PM       
Republican = Mini-Satan
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 07:48 PM       
If the government even THOUGHT OF making a draft AGARN,
we'd get the same result of people burning their draft cards and
GETTING ARRESTED FOR IT as we did 30 years ago,
under Nixon's rule. But, we all know that Bush is just Nixon's ghost
that found it's way into another retarded host-body.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 07:50 PM       
Awesome.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 08:25 PM       
I know! The clarity is amazing.
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Old Sep 26th, 2006, 08:42 PM       
Where'd you get lost? The Card-burning, or Nixon's Ghost?
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Old Sep 27th, 2006, 12:44 PM       
i'm confused by the AGARN, myself

and the fact that you seem to have tried to structure that post like it's a poem or something
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Old Sep 27th, 2006, 06:28 PM       
Quote:
Originally Posted by Juttin
If the government even THOUGHT OF making a draft AGARN,
we'd get the same result of people burning their draft cards and
GETTING ARRESTED FOR IT as we did 30 years ago,
under Nixon's rule. But, we all know that Bush is just Nixon's ghost
that found it's way into another retarded host-body.
That's odd, I recall American war crimes in Vietnam when we went in under a democrat's orders (Johnson ordered napalm, and agent orange dropped on villages), and Nixon pulled us out of Nam in entirety befor he resigned.

Oh and the only people who have tried to reinstitute the draft were democrats. Representative Charles Rangel, D-N.Y and Sen. Ernest "Fritz" Hollings D-S.C. back in '04. In fact Senator Kerry voted to send us in and opposed immediate pullout, so did his VP candidate Joe Lieberman. In an interview on Letterman he outlined his plan and said we would have troops in well into 2007 at the very least.

My motto is if you oppose it, VOTE AGAINST IT NOT FOR IT! And if you have a better idea, speak up and maybe the opposition will implement it.

If democrats oppose the war why don't they support people who voted against it?
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Old Sep 27th, 2006, 07:39 PM       
I know that there is a loose general tendency for Republicans to support classical liberalism* while Democrats take up progressive causes. But, anyone who assumes "Democrats are the good guys now, ergo Democrats were the good guys eighty years ago" is just stupid.

*"Classical" liberalism is the antithesis of what Ann Coulter rants about as a cause for the apocalypse, and actually holds laissez-faire capitalism as an ideal.
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Old Sep 27th, 2006, 08:41 PM       
Quote:
Originally Posted by executioneer
i'm confused by the AGARN, myself

and the fact that you seem to have tried to structure that post like it's a poem or something
I say AGARN instead of AGAIN. Apparently, I'm 1/4 Zombie :/

The poetic structure was an accident, though.
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Old Sep 27th, 2006, 10:10 PM       
Yes we need a draft. Maybe it will make OAO a man.
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Old Sep 28th, 2006, 06:57 AM       
If for no other reason.
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Old Sep 28th, 2006, 10:18 AM       
I hadn't thought about that. Our nation needs those swollen thighs.
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Old Sep 30th, 2006, 11:07 PM       
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sethomas
I know that there is a loose general tendency for Republicans to support classical liberalism* while Democrats take up progressive causes. But, anyone who assumes "Democrats are the good guys now, ergo Democrats were the good guys eighty years ago" is just stupid.

*"Classical" liberalism is the antithesis of what Ann Coulter rants about as a cause for the apocalypse, and actually holds laissez-faire capitalism as an ideal.
good point. I remember when in a college class I was in some stupid blonde was shocked that Abe Lincoln was a republican.
Honestly though a lot of the "progressive" causes the democrats take up hasnt won me, the only reason i vote democrat tends to be obvious corruption on the opposing candidate, or standing for something i starkly disagree with.

funny though how a person AGIANST the draft is making the draft thread just as the two anti-draft democrats started the new draft legislation as a shameless scare tactic.

BTW they aren't as desperate as you think. The army just turned me down yesterday saying i wasnt healthy enough.
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