Is it time for a military draft in the US?
NORTHAMPTON — Thomas Jefferson believed a democracy can survive only with the aid of an enlightened electorate.
What then would our founding fathers now say about the lowest voter turnout in 72 years in the midterm general election in November?
I imagine “disgust” would not be too strong a word.
I imagine it would be similar to what Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, one of today’s leading advocates for greater civic involvement, said after the 2014 election.
“We should not be satisfied with a ‘democracy’ in which more than 60 percent of our people don’t vote and some 80 percent of young people and low-income Americans fail to vote,” Sanders said. “We can and must do better than that.”
Veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, who volunteered for military service, are often disgusted by the level of apathy the American public has for two undeclared wars that have been ongoing for more than a decade.
Would more people vote if they knew everybody’s sons or daughters — or they themselves — were eligible to fight and be sent on multiple combat tours for months and years at a time?
In his classic 1959 novel, “Starship Troopers,” a book on the reading lists of many military officers, Robert A. Heinlein, one of the greatest science fiction authors ever, described a society in which citizenship, and consequently the right to vote, is available only to veterans.
According to Heinlein’s premise, it’s not that veterans are smarter or more competent, or that military service itself is the only form of public service, but that veterans have shown an ability to put service and the common good before self and therefore can be trusted with the incredible responsibility that comes with voting.
Heinlein’s intergalactic world of the 22nd century has received both wide praise and condemnation. Regardless of what you think about his political philosophy, most often described as libertarian, Heinlein’s idea on earning the right to vote serves as great food for thought.
If the franchise of the vote was just limited to veterans of some kind of federal service, whether it be the military, noncombatant service or something else, what kind of society would we be?
At the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke last weekend, veterans from several wars, from Korea to today’s conflicts in southwest Asia, gathered to remember Pearl Harbor Day and the sacrifices of a World War II generation that accepted conscripted service.
In all, 10 million Americans were drafted during World War II.
President Nixon ended the draft and instituted the all-volunteer force in December 1972 for largely political motives: to try to quell the domestic anger and discontent arising out of the draft during the Vietnam War.
Would reinstating the draft today make it harder for our government to go to war? Would we be more or less inclined as a nation to go to war and under what conditions?
Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to grant President Obama the authority to expand military operations in Iraq and Syria. So if the United States’ objectives in the Middle East are worth fighting for — a proposition that to many American is murky, according to opinion polls — then shouldn’t a higher percentage of Americans share the burden and sacrifice that comes with such a commitment?
Like the vast majority of service members, throughout my active-duty service, I was in favor of an all-volunteer military. I felt that military service should be only for those uniquely qualified and physically fit, and I’d rather serve next to someone who wants to serve than not.
By nearly every account, bringing back conscription would be very costly, at a time when the U.S. Army is drawing down its forces. It would easily cost billions to reinstate the draft while maintaining the present quality of armed forces.
Now I’m beginning to change my mind on the draft because it may be the only way to wake up a detached and nonvoting public that has depersonalized military service. In my mind, the additional cost of managing a draft and training all Americans for some kind of government service would pay dividends.
A draft would ensure that government decision-making regarding military involvement would be undertaken only after consideration and the fullest debate — a debate today that seems to not be part of the national consciousness and hardly registers interest with the public.
A draft would narrow the gap between people in power in Washington and the men and women at peril in fighting our nation’s battles.
A draft would mean that in a healthy democracy, being a citizen incurs a level of responsibility commensurate with the freedom democracy has ensured. More simply said: It should mean giving a damn and at least voting on Election Day.
People should vote as though their life depended on the outcome. It should mean that going to war is worth every citizen’s effort, or it’s not worth any soldier’s life.
John Paradis, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel, lives in Florence and writes a monthly column that appears on the second Friday. He is the deputy superintendent for the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke.
