Hi guys.

I've been reading posts on this forum for a couple of days now, and I thought I'd join in.
I'm From the Netherlands and feel I have to correct the idea that the Netherlands still has compulsory service. We stopped drafting around 1996, I think.
Still I think it wasn't a bad thing.
It taught people discipline. And some people tell me they used their time in the military to think about what to do with their lives (i.e. school) afterwards, seeing a completely different side of life in the military then in school so far.
What was wrong was that only men could get drafted. Never heard feminists complain about that though.


BTW I believe the official reason was that a "modern" army doesn't need as many soldiers as before, because of technology taking over. What do you think about that theory? I think they just tried to save money on defence (again).

Well what threats are their to holland? I mean, your protected by NATO, right...? So, lets say prettey much only if NATO broke up and Germany attacked you...Now, I dont mean any insult, but is hat not a really insane scnario....?

lol
Of course you're probably right. But then again, the last time we thought we didn't need to invest in an Army, Adolf didn't agree. He took us in five days! Dutch soldiers tried to stop the Germans, but the Germans had something we didn't have...tanks. A tank is hard to stop when you're on a bicycle, you know. The only thing we have to be proud of is that it took five days and the bombardment of Rotterdam for us to surrender.

But to get back on topic. all I really meant to say was that we now have an all volunteer army, and I do see downsides to that.

A tank is hard to stop when you're on a bicycle, you know.

LOL

No...the United States does not have the kind of government that should force compulsory service unless the country is in immediate danger.

It is not the government's place to dictate what people should do with their lives.

No...the United States does not have the kind of government that should force compulsory service unless the country is in immediate danger.

It is not the government's place to dictate what people should do with their lives.

I would beg to differ. The U.S. government can re-institute the draft any time it sees fit. It has done so in the past and will likely do so in the future. An all volunteer force can be stretched quite thin and then needs to be supplemented by trained personnel. The quickest way to do that is to mandate military service.

Originally Posted by LCDR_SurfWar

It is not the government's place to dictate what people should do with their lives.

People kid themselves if they think we don't let the US government tell us what to do with our lives. i.e. Helmet laws, seatbelt laws, drug laws, etc. All of these are allegedly done in the name of the "greater social good" - why would this not apply to Compulsory Service? Not just the military defense aspect of it, but the concept of the results yielded by giving 18 year olds discipline and helping them find direction.

The problem with the idea of an all-volunteer military is that American society has been progressing more and more toward an attitude of "let someone else do it." What happens when there is nobody else? Or when the somebody else does it and then gets spit on for doing it?

"A free society should NEVER compel its citizens to serve!"

And should NEVER compel it's citizens to pay taxes!


"People who are doing compulsory service have very low morale when shipped abroad."

Any recruits or soldiers whose training is still in progress and not completed should never been shipped anywhere, not even volunteerly and paid. Usually none of democratic countries ship soldiers in training or no-one compulsory abroad and without pay. All soldiers shipped abroad are volunteers and get paid for that and have completed their training wich is IMO right.


"I can't agree with you universally. For instance I am quite certain that there would be no lack of volunteers should Finland be attacked (According to polls over 80% think that we should defend ourselves with arms even if the outcome looked bleak.) Nevertheless we are in a very secure situation right now and people do not like to have so much trouble if they do not see it to be necessary. (If nobody is going to attack anyway, why serve?)"

Then will be volunteers enough but as you said, no time and no resources to train them all.

And why to serve since there is a lot of else to do like studying and making money for example. Military training is not comfortable as normal civilian life. It's not fun to be all clothes wet in one meter snow and -30Celsius grades frost with lack of sleep.

Many local people like to join and enjoy military and someones not, but the most of men who have passed their training and all the shit in military are usually very proud of it. The most of the unmotivated scum usually quit themselves during first days and weeks of basic training and if not, some of them get booted out.

Somehow usually service fellows don't like unmotivated inviduals in training and generally pussies are the most hated group. The worst pussies use to cause with their actions collective punishments to the entire platoon or company wich causes pussies to get themselves beaten by angry fellows.

Generally military training as education does very good to many people and it is at least unmatched experiment.

South Korea has compulsory service as well.
However, fraggings aren't a common problem because national service is practically part of the culture now. It'd be strange not to go. It happens now and then, seldom though but those are usually because of mistreatment etc.
South Korea's foreign deployments nowadays are completely voluntary so there's no morale problem there. Last thing you want to do is drag abroad a loser.
If there's ever a war at home, I don't think motivation will be a problem.

Are you sure the Chinese have a draft? I think one of the Chinese posters here said it was all volunteer.

"national service is practically part of the culture now. It'd be strange not to go."

Just like here. Military training is a natural part of education and man without military training is not man. Civil service hippies are weird faggots and communists whose only right purpose is to be used as mine ploughts.

"Are you sure the Chinese have a draft? I think one of the Chinese posters here said it was all volunteer."

Chinese will always have the famous "one million volunteers" like in Korea.