Posted on 05/26/2018 6:41:14 AM PDT by Kaslin
French President Emmanuel Macron this year reintroduced national service, also known as conscription, to France in order to “foster patriotism and heal social divisions.”
At a time when our nation is the most hyperpolarized it has ever been, when our young generation increasingly questions the very worth of America itself, and our country, particularly new generations is at the worst health in history, it is time to consider whether we should implement national service ourselves.
National service is in common use currently across democratic nations in the world as a form of civic duty amidst the freedom one is provided, just like paying taxes. It usually takes the form of mandatory military, or civilian service for objectors or those who choose, for all adults upon reaching the age of 18.
Conscripts are usually paid some form of nominal salary and are required to serve usually between six months to two years. Some nations have it only for men while others have it for both men and women.
Israel’s IDF is perhaps the most widely known conscription force, requiring all citizens, male and female, to serve in the military with very few exemptions. Conscription was common to the nations of Western Europe during the Cold War for obvious reasons, but still remained for many years afterwards until it was usually phased it out during the 2000’s.
Amidst the current time of great social turmoil in Europe, it appears many governments have realized a nostalgia for the widespread benefits of universal service. Beyond France, Sweden recently reintroduced mandatory military service for the first time in about a decade. In Finland, now over 80% of young men perform service. Norway in 2016 expanded its conscription to include women.
Clearly conscription is on the return for a variety of reasons.
In the United States, the idea of national service is as old as our nation itself. In the Revolutionary era, national service existed in quasi-form as part of general citizen participation in the various state and local militias. It was a point of debate among the Founding Fathers, split between those who favored a professional standing army versus general universal service.
Over the centuries national service has gone from its militia form to a variety of permutations, perhaps most notably the wartime draft first officially enacted by the federal government during the U.S. Civil War.
It was instituted again during World War I, raising an army of millions. In 1940, just before U.S. entry into World War II, over 71% of the population polled wanted immediate national military service, resulting in a peacetime draft that would soon be utilized for active service after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
The peacetime draft would continue afterwards into the 1950’s, utilized during Korea and our numerous Cold War bases around the world, as well as during the Vietnam War when public dissatisfaction finally saw its end in 1973.
The call for national service has also materialized in numerous civilian programs, such as the Public Works Administration of the 1930’s, as well as the still-existing Peace Corps and the Corporation for National Service’s AmeriCorps.
The Selective Service, which requires all men to register for potential conscription upon reaching age 18 and be ready until age 25, remains in place since its use during World War I’s draft. In 2016, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton called for women to also be included in Selective Service registration and the United States Senate passed a bill supporting such as well.
Theoretically, the Selective Service system could even now be potentially activated for conscription, although it likely would be better for our country to go through a more thorough deliberative process, with pilot programs, studies, and a national discussion.
National service has always remained present in our national discourse since, with the Universal National Service Act, among other variations, regularly being proposed throughout the years in Congress and the idea seeing occasional bipartisan calls for enactment.
It should be very much apparent why national service in the United States could solve much of our current social problems. Military service promotes discipline, grit, determination and teamwork. It gives life skills and supports physical fitness, both at the time and afterwards. It introduces people to those from all walks of life, as the U.S. proudly remains one of the world’s most diverse organization.
Furthermore, our nation is experiencing an increasing gap between civilians and service-members with a slew of negative externalities and that seems difficult to solve. According to Pew Research, in 1980 veterans accounted for 18% of U.S. adults. In 2016 it was 7% and declining.
National service sounds daunting, but our country is at a difficult point right now. It seems it’s at least an idea worth considering and exploring by our policymakers and discussing among our citizenry.
Thousands of “Civilian Wannabees” do not a strong fighting force make.
Being drafted changed my life for the better, but I didn’t think so at the time. It’s not the kind of “rehab” I would’ve volunteered for.
Macron’s plan is for a month of National service & it appears to be floundering.
On the campaign trail, he said he would bring back “compulsory military service” for French men and women between the ages of 18 and 21, because young people must have “an experience” of “military life”.
However, last month a parliamentary commission including deputies from Macron’s La République En Marche party put forward a completely different set of proposals. Schoolchildren would do a tiny amount of hazily defined civic public service; as young adults, they would be implored, although not forced, to join volunteering groups.
It fell to Macron’s defence minister Florence Parly to insist that the programme would indeed be both military and mandatory. But then the president made his own pronouncement, saying that it would definitely be compulsory. Young people would have to experience some nebulous “exposure” to the military, although they could mainly participate in civic organisations. After that, Macron quite openly said his government wouldn’t decide on the details until later.
The last thing France’s armed forces want is to use their already overstretched money and resources to give young people some ill-defined “experience” and compel the inevitable swathes of the reluctant. They have serious jobs to do on several fronts.
After years of budget cuts, they’re fighting in the Sahel and the Middle East while also patrolling the streets at home. Meanwhile, even according to the Macron’s generous projections, national service would cost 2-3 billion euros a year – on top of a one-off 15-20 billion euro “investment” cost.
So why is Macron so keen on it? His self-proclamation as a “Jupiterian” President is telling. This comparison of himself to the Roman king of gods evinces an ego the size of the planet Jupiter. That explains why Macron made such a grandiosely gimmicky campaign promise and is ploughing on with it despite clear signs that – in all of its suggested manifestations – it is a very bad idea.
https://reaction.life/macrons-plan-bring-back-national-service-baffling/
It is a lousy idea and would be a lousy idea in America as well.
It promotes those values only as long as the “powers that be” support those values. A Hillary! administration would instantly weaponize compulsory service and promote anything and everything leftist.
People who imagine a draft will somehow cure society’s ills have not been paying attention for the last 40 years, or so.
We have a $700 billion defense budget now. How much would drafting tens of thousands of conscripts the military doesn't need add to that?
Written by someone who didn’t serve. And not a word explaining how involuntary servitude doesn’t mean “involuntary servitude”. Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
But last of all, it would be flat out evil to have a draft today when the military is run by perverts. You’ll take good christian kids and force them to submit to some tranny, lesbo, homo, atheist, etc. Furthermore, at this point women would be drafted.
Americans who raise a decent daughter don’t want them forced into that immoral snakepit.
The leaders of our military in WWII are long gone. No man would want his kid subjected to this bunch of deviants.
The system would familiarize the whole population with firearms and reduce the pressure to ban them as well as provide a vast reserve of basically trained potential troops who do not fear service as it is not an unknown and does not relatively disrupt lives. When a mobilization is required we don't get caught with a tiny trained army and many months necessary to increase it. The two oceans no longer give us the time to train that we had in WWII.
There's no way in hell you can ever justify a conscription like this for non-military purposes in a free nation. And there is no justification even for a draft for military purposes if it involves sending troops to fight wars in Third World sh!t-holes.
If I'm drafted tomorrow and I'm not sent to our southern border to repel a Latin American invasion, then there's no reason to have a draft -- period.
This delusional author looks upon a draft as nothing more than an animal control and pet training project.
The article is total bullshit.
No.
“It introduces people to those from all walks of life, “
That used to mean a boy from Texas met a kid from Brooklyn and they rooted for different baseball teams. Or maybe a kid from the midwest met the first Jewish person, or a black guy from the deep south. It was good then.
Today the deal is over, the Air Force academy is run by a lesbian, there is a wiccan altar there, Navy ship captains are women texting friends and getting sailors killed in collisions, Chaplains are punished harshly for saying the word Jesus, Ranger officers might be a 37 year old mommy, and sodomites and trannies are everywhere.
France is the size of what?? One US state. It is ridiculous when people say we should be like Switzerland or Germany or some other state sizwd country. Our military has enough problems withour adding a bunch of crybabies.
Enhance the reserve programs for Navy/Marine, Army, Air Force and Coasties. Let them sign up for what they are qualified to do after a year of community college and then go active in a year for two years and then have 3 more years of active reserve duty.
The last thing our military needs today is to become the Nanny Military to finish raising and maturing the snowflakes in our country.
Keep our volunteer military and enhance the rewards and pro pay for those who deserve it.
“It is ridiculous when people say we should be like Switzerland”
A Swiss model is fine. Nobody invades Switzerland, not even the Nazis gave that a try. A rifle based militia, backed by nuclear weapons is truly the ultimate in national defense.
Where it is less formidable is in launching wars of convenience and profit all over the earth.
America’s national defense has historically been a strong Navy and a relatively weak standing Army. Add in nuclear weapons and that historic posture is nearly perfect.
But America’s statists, right and left, love the idea of ordering and structuring society.
BINGO. Every generation of my family has served all the way back to King Phillips War. No more. I’ll be the last.
If you want to know how bad an idea is, ask yourself whether individual states would experiment with it.
Answer: No. But maybe border states like Texas and Arizona.
At the same time, some form of national obligation might be useful. Maybe requiring a certain number of "volunteer" hours every year for a couple of years. Something like the CCC ...
Just keep the malcontents and slackers away from our armed forces.
Of course it is. Any article with “national service” in the headline is calling for universal indoctrination and promotion of welfare work.
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