He also insisted that he wasn’t AWOL in the Guard. Shall we take him at his word on that issue as well, or only when it’s expedient wrt the argument you are making? 
You mean the two Houses of Congress that this would have to pass first? If it looked like it had any chance of passing, you’d see the biggest SMM (Soccer Mom March) ever on DC to make sure little Jason, Jennifer, Dylan, and Ashley don’t have to face a draft board.
But wasn’t Iraq a “grave and gathering danger”?
Irrelavent. If it ever was, it isn’t any longer.
Looks to me like we’re building precisely the sort of failed nation state in Iraq that terrorists prosper in. Not only is that a larger threat than Saddam ever was, but it’ll take the long term commitment of many US troops to even have a chance of keeping the lid on. With such a large portion of our forces pinned down in Iraq, we’re faced with the choice of being impotent in other world affairs, trying to grow the volunteer service, or reinstating the draft. Option one is unthinkable for a superpower. Option two may not be possible. That would leave option three.
The first thing we have to understand is that the Pentagon doesn’t want a draft. They like their all-volunteer military. Since most of the senior Pentagon officials went through Vietnam (with Colin Powell being exhibit A), they can see the difference between today’s military and the military of the 60s and 70s.
The department of defense doesn’t want a draft. Not because they are fair, or aren’t complete bastards willing to do whatever it takes to win a war. No, it is because they believe that a conscripted military would be inferior to an all volunteer military, for the jobs our military is projected to have to accomplish in the next couple of decades.
Since the DoD doesn’t want the draft, why would the president want the draft? What would it accomplish? I could understand why the president might want a draft if he thought it would help him win the war in Iraq. But of course the draft won’t help him win the war in Iraq. Instead it would hugely increase domestic opposition to the war, and still fail to provide the military manpower needed over there. Shipping thousands of draftees to Iraq would make the actual fighting more difficult, not easier.
If the war in Iraq can’t be won with an all-volunteer army, then it certainly can’t be won with a conscript army. It seems to me obvious that the president would bring the troops home and hand over power to a friendly dictator ala Chalabi or his ilk and let them deal with the insurgency rather than reinstate the draft.
So given that the DoD doesn’t want the draft, and the president doesn’t want the draft, why are we hearing these stories about reinstating the draft? Who DOES want the draft?
If no one wants a draft, why are you all convinced that someone is going to try to reinstate the draft? Presumably only people who want a draft would try to reinstate the draft, yet no one can point to people who actually want the draft. It seems to me most of the congresscritters who have proposed a draft don’t want a draft to increase our warfighting abilities, they want a draft to make it impossible for the the president to commit troops overseas. So they don’t actually want a draft either.
If the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, the Marines, the DoD, the President, the Congress, the Senate, and the American people don’t want a draft, there isn’t going to be a draft.
Doesn’t that seem logical?
Yes. You are making the exact points I was trying to make through the 2 or 3 threads just like this one. Admittedly you are (IMO at least) doing a better job than I did though.
-XT