We believe that The United States Government should either bring our troops home only from Iraq or commit the nation's youth to shared national sacrifice in Our War on Terrorism with a closely monitored Draft with no exceptions for the privileged among us.

In his at Calvin College's commencement speech on May 21 2005, President Bush mentioned advancing freedom around the world and voiced his support for faith-based, or religious, groups getting involved in social service.

"To make a difference in this world, you must be involved by serving a higher calling here and abroad,’’ Bush said. "You will make your lives richer and build a more hopeful future for our world.’’

One of those means would be for these young people to join our Armed Forces which desperately need their service, but he failed to mention that at this Christian College. Or isn't serving in the Armed Forces abroad when we are at war a "higher calling?"

If you don't think the Draft is coming maybe this well give you some idea of how short the Army is on recruits. 

Even Infantrymen Facing IRR Call-Ups
05.17.2005

By Nathaniel R. Helms

Chris Bray knows the Army's dirty little secret: Now they're even going after the grunts.

After a year of bad-news reports that the U.S. Army has resorted to rummaging through the Individual Ready Reserve roster to mobilize soldiers with critical MOS designators such as Military Police, intelligence and medical, the personnel situation has become even more serious.

Even 11 Bravo infantrymen who have completed their active-duty enlistment obligations now find themselves the targets of a manpower-starved U.S. Army Resource Command, DefenseWatch has learned. And the Army doesn't want to talk about it. Full Story

One of the founding members of this site expressing his feelings about the War in Iraq it's relationship to Vietnam and Military Recruiting and the Draft.

THE AMERICAN WAR IN VIETNAM

Over time the draft brought resistance to the war into the military at home and in Vietnam… The first “official” American casualty in Vietnam occurred in 1961… I was 14 years of age. By the time I enlisted in the Army at 18 years of age, over 150,000 troops were on the ground. By 1969 when I processed out of active duty at the tender age of 21, officers and senior NCOs were being killed by their own men. By the time I was an active organizer for Vietnam Veterans Against the War, one of the active duty GI cases we were supporting was the defense of Billie D. Smith, charged with fragging his commanding officer. By then most of the top brass were at their wits end trying to handle the total breakdown of discipline and morale in the Army and Marine units in Vietnam and around the world.  Full Story

 

The Selective Service Act was amended on July 9, 2003. All that is required is the following steps to be taken: 

Sec. 470. Effective date

This title (sections 451 to 471a of this Appendix) shall become effective immediately; except that unless the President, or the Congress by concurrent resolution, declares a national emergency after the date of enactment of this Act (June 24, 1948), no person shall be inducted or ordered into active service without his consent under this title (said sections) within ninety days after the date of its enactment.

Compilation of the Military Selective Service Act

( 50 U.S.C. App. 451 et seq. )

THE MILITARY SELECTIVE SERVICE ACT

As Amended Through

July 9, 2003

 

Letting in the Draft

By Michael Schwartz, Tomdispatch.com. Posted April 30, 2005.

Just past the two-year anniversary of our invasion, the military is under increasing pressure to replenish Army Reserves and National Guards -- without much of an idea of how to do so.

After two years of intensive fighting in Iraq, the Pentagon is feeling the strain in every military muscle and has been looking for relief in just about every direction but one -- the draft. All across the United States today, young people are wondering whether, sooner or later, in its increasingly airless military universe, the Bush administration will open the window a crack and let the draft in. Full Story

Some of the best information on the draft can be found on the Alliance For Security website.

How Many Have Gone to War?
 By Mark Benjamin, Salon.com  April 12,  2005

Even experts are surprised at the vast numbers of US soldiers who have been deployed after 9/11. Even if troop levels in Iraq are cut next year, the military may be permanently damaged.

An increasing number of military experts believe those forces -- the Army and Marines -- are months away from being overtaxed to the point of serious dysfunction. The situation in Iraq must continue to stabilize. If it doesn't, and the Bush administration continues to both reject the idea of a draft and rebuff efforts to permanently increase the size of the Army and Marines, U.S. ground forces will break down to a point not seen since just after Vietnam.

"Unless things start to improve, we will start to see a serious problem in six to nine months," said Bernard E. Trainor, a retired Marine Corps three-star general and a former Marine Corps deputy chief of staff under Ronald Reagan. "I think they [the Pentagon] are betting that things are going to get better. But that could be a miscalculation," said Trainor. "This crowd has been pretty good at miscalculating." Full Story

The website Soldiers For The Truth has an excellent series of articles on "Mission Impossible for Army Recruiters" 

The articles are: 

Army Lures Recruits with Popular Combat Video Game

Marketing the 'Army of One' an Uphill Struggle

Why Are They 'Just Saying No' to Recruiters?

Army Woes: Apathy, Hostility and a Healthy Economy

Recruiting: Put the Warrior Back into Society

Military Service Can Open The Eyes Of Country's 'Elite', by Kathryn Roth-Douquet, January 28, 2005
Today, 1 percent of those serving in Congress have a child in the armed forces — an institution that, according to military sociologist Charles Moskos, is bereft of "children of the privileged." That's too bad. The real losers here are the young and privileged adults themselves.

 

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