LogFAQs > #904529272

WastelandCowboy posted...

Suppose the the draft is reinstated and, assuming you're an American and qualified, you have to report.

If we ever wind up in a war where they start drafting 41-year olds with bad eyes and a broken down body, the country's so absolutely fucked that it honestly won't matter if I go or not.

But back when I actually was of the right age, I freely said often that I'd dodge the ever-living fuck out of the draft (and my Vietnam Vet father who HAD been drafted used to say that he'd do everything in his power to keep me out of the military). But even if they did draft me, I'd be dishonorably discharged fairly quickly - because I'm anti-authoritarian and stubborn as fuck, so I'd never make it through boot camp without multiple beatings, and then them eventually throwing me out to keep me from being a bad example to all the other people they're trying to break down.



Not that any of this matters, because in our current political environment, we're never going to have a draft again (and if we did, they wouldn't have enough MPs in the military to arrest all of the people who would dodge, nor prisons to hold them all). Nor do we really WANT one - the mechanized and technical nature of the modern military makes it less efficient to force part-time service troops into combat, because by the time you're done training them to fight effectively, you've used up a large portion of their mandatory service period. We're better off with a smaller volunteer army supported by high technology than we are a larger mass of meat.

The only time it ever comes up at all is when one side in Congress is trying to make a point, and it's usually the anti-war side of the argument that brings it up as a deterrent, because they KNOW the pro-war side won't approve a draft (and it sort of calls them out in a "put your money where your mouth is" sort of scenario). No politician these days would ever seriously push for a draft, because if they did those politicians are never getting elected again, and in a world of career politicians doing what's necessary to keep their jobs as opposed to what they sincerely believe is right for the nation, no one is going to commit that sort of career suicide (especially when most politicians these days aren't qualified to do much of anything else).


---

"Wall of Text'D!" --- oldskoolplayr76
"POwned again." --- blight family