USA goes conscription...

[Daz]

What do you say girls and boys? USA reintroduces conscription and your all off to North Korea or Iran.

What fun , courtesy of Mr. Bush or maybe the next president if he(she) decides to follow the current policy.

Disregard my sarcasm, but really, it could happen. Do you think thats possible and what if?

[Urban Ranger]

Join the National Guard, then you'll be safe.

[Spiffor]

I don't understand the thread...
Is it a "what if the US reintroduce conscription ?" thread, or are there valid elements leading to think the US will really do it ?

[Daz]

Lets say i'll leave you in the dark about that one to get a better reaction

[Rufus T. Firefly]

It's a what-if thread. Now, let's get the obvious out of the way:

[David Floyd]
The government has no right to conscript citizens!!!
[/David Floyd]

I must say that, while I normally regard Floyd's libertarian fundamentalism as simply loopy, I do wonder how one squares the draft with the 13th Amendment of the Constitution, which states:

"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."

How is the draft not "involuntary servitude"? Anybody have the case law on this?

[Daz]

What about Vietnam?

[alva]

Damn, you were really getting my hopes up by formulating the thread as you did...
-

[Daz]

I call that ADVERTISING

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Daz
What about Vietnam?

Vietnam's conscription had the infamous exception for college students, which is how so many of our baby-boomer "leaders" managed not to end up there. Obviously we're dealing in hypotheticals here, but I suspect that any draft that included the college exception would be politically unacceptable today as being far too undemocratic.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Join the National Guard, then you'll be safe.

Tell that to Sprayber.

On topic, I certainly hope that we don't fall back into conscription. It's not that I feel that this generation of kids wouldn't do with a bit of real world experience, but rather that the military is much less capable when staffed by endentured servants. This serves no one well unless we really have our backs to the wall. Keep the professional military in place, it works well.

[Daz]

Lets say the government decides to teach North Korea a lesson. Would there be enough professionals to do the job?

How many men does the US have right now?

[Spiffor]

I don't believe the US will go conscription. Conscription is intended to have a massive land army, with plenty of troops to compensate the lack of technology, or to fight a troop-rich enemy.

There is no incoming war which will need millions of soldiers. Peacekeeping operations often need many soldiers, but the US can rely on many partners to take care of it (other countries or the UN). The American military doctrine of having high technology and skilled troops will continue to be used, rather than risking the PR disaster that a conscritpion would be.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Daz
Lets say the government decides to teach North Korea a lesson. Would there be enough professionals to do the job?

How many men does the US have right now?

It depends on the sort of lesson envisioned. I would recommend either not teaching them a lesson, or teaching them a lesson with a number of tactical nuclear weapons. IIRC total U.S. active duty forces are a little over 2 million.

[Traianvs]

the US has about as much soldiers as they have prisoners

[Daz]

Ooooo, yea, Sikander. Lets make the world a bit more polluted, courtesy of the only friggin country that wont sign the CO2 emmision agreement from Kyoto.

Back to reality, though. I'm talking long term warmongering here. I'm talking US policy to invade the "axis of evil". Why else bother calling the "axis of evil"?

There is never gonna be enough professionals to keep up with the new wars...

This is obviously very speculative, but a couple of years ago, nobody thought 9/11 was possible. Anything is possible.