POLL: Conscription or Pro's?

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What do you people think is the best for a country? A system of conscription where large parts of the population do military service or a standing military of proffesionals?

I am going to express my opinion in a short while, I dont want to influence the poll here, it is my first!

Poll Information
This poll contains 1 question(s). 24 user(s) have voted.
You may not view the results of this poll without voting.

Poll Results: Conscription or Pro's? (24 votes.)

Conscription or Pro's? (Choose 1)
* Let's train every Joe Schmoe how to handle a rocket launcher! - 25% (6)
* We need true proffessionals if we want to kill people properly! - 63% (15)
* Make peace not war, scrap the military! - 13% (3)

 

Proffesionals - Joe Schmoe is more likely to screw up or die, niether which are thought of as good things. Proffesionals might even be able to solve the problem quicker than hundreds of thousands of Jow Schmoes, with less casulties and less friendly fire.

One hopes, anyhow.

 

Professionals. Good economic theory say that it is more efficient for people to specialise than for everyone to try and be good at everything.

Joe Schmoe is more use staying as an accountant, farmer, or international rugby player than trying to learn how to fire an Ak47.

 

Professionals. It's better if they're actually interested in what they're doing. In my country, when we reach the age of twenty, we have to spend 2 and a half years in the armed forces. Kind of stupid, really, and tiring. I have only 4 or 5 years left.

 

Conscripts. That'll make (western) politicians think twice before starting ambitious wars, as conscripts are or at least should be meant to defend the country. Because then, when you do something stupid people start to get angry, enforcing change.

And with 15 months of service you even end up having a very able and useful grunt. For more demanding tasks you use professional soldiers anyway, even in a conscript army. Sweden is a key example that conscripts, when well trained, can be just as able as pros. The same applies to the cold war west german army.

And the draft is not slavery, it's a duty for your country.

 

Speaking from a personal point of view, being a conscript is a major drawback for someone's personal and professional life, not to mention the huge amount of bull**** that you have to put up with during your service. From the government's point of view an army of professionals is more effective than an army of conscripts (in theory at least because I haven't seen more lazy people than some professionals of the Greek army ). Although, on the other hand, an army of conscripts is cheaper than an army of professionals. For example in my country a professional soldier costs as much as almost 90 conscripts (This happens because the good greek state pays the conscripts with the huge amount of 8 or 11 euros per month depending on their rank ).

 

'And the draft is not slavery, it's a duty for your country.'

I'll remember that the next time my country asks conscripts to commit genocide...

 

The draft is amoral, not immoral.

It's a question of how the politicians commanding the military commanders use them.

 

I prefer professional/volunteer soldiers, they tend to be better at their jobs. The only time I'd want conscripts is during an actual large scale war when more troops may be needed than those that volunteer.

 

For a democratic state I think a conscripted military is more or less essential. Normally a democracy have three (four if you count the media) powers, the people, the legislative and the executive. With a professional standing army you get a whole new power factor. The brass of a military consisting of conscriptees have no powerbase while if you have a standing army the top military men can start getting ideas. Even if it isnt a full scale coup they still have a much better position to influence the politicians from.

My second reason for prefering conscription is what Ragusa pointed out, it is very hard for a country to get adventorous if its military consists of people who have no real interest in being in the army and sure as hell have no interest in going somewhere to invade. They might be coerced into defending their country but that is where the line tends to be drawn.

My third reason is something many have mentioned as a reason against conscription, that in a professional military you get people who want to be there. Do we really want people who get a hard on when cleaning their rifle to be the majority of our armed forces? They might make good cannonfodder but they dont make good soldiers. They are the kind of people who make necklaces of enemy ears and shoots first without ever asking any questions. I atleast dont want to give a weapon of incredibly destruction to someone who wants one, and wants to use one.

This leads to my third reason, with a conscripted army you get people with a wide variety of skills and personalities. It doesnt take long to train up a grunt and if you use conscripts you get grunts who are electricians or carpenters or teachers or whatnot in the civilian life, skills who are very useful even in a battlezone. I know I would much prefer to have a normal person by my side in a tight spot before some triggerhappy loon with foam around his mouth who just itches to show them bastards on the other side the inside of his stomach.

I have been a conscriptee myself and it sucks, it sucks a lot. As BOC pointed out it is a blow towards professional life and everything gets put on ice for the time being and one hopes that the skills you acquire there will never come in handy in civilian life. But from a societal point of view I think a conscripted military is much better than a professional.

 

Conscripts. Speaking from experience, training for an all-volunteer military is uneven at best. Some units (the elite ones) do get good training and equipment. Most others get less, often much less. Many assume those who join do so because they WANT to - but this is not true for many - they often join because there were no other decent-paying jobs to be had at the time, or to escape a desparate situation.

I'm in favor of a conscription system, if it's done right (disallowing exemptions for the elite), if only to prevent any more "adventures".

 

joacquin wrote:

That's exactly why I'd prefer professional soldiers. I don't want a soldier to stop and wax philosophic about why they're doing a particular job, or if it's moral. In battle, you need to trust that the person next to you will do their job. If they don't, you're dead.

Conscripts by definition are pressed into service against their will. I wouldn't want to fight alongside someone that wasn't committed to being the best soldier they could be. Watch "Band of Brothers." The original 506th PIR were all volunteers that joined the parachute corps. They were professional soldiers who were the best of the best, and they showed it in how well they performed in World War II.

 

Judging by Vietnam, that concern is unfounded.

 

Could you please support these are the sort of people who volunteer for the army? I'm sure that there are some folks like this that join but can you support that there is a higher instance of people who volunteer and are not "normal" than there are these non- "normal" people that end up being drafted.

And to me, the whole, "you have to join the army or go to jail" thing conflicts with certain notions of freedom that I have.

 

Sojourner, there was a draft for Vietnam. Another word for draft is CONSCRIPTION.

 

Professional, I mean I like my country and all but there's no way I'd DIE for it. If it came to fight or die most people would volunteer anyway.

 

Laches: I never said that all who volunteers are gunloving maniacs, my point was that many are and you get a proportionate larger amount of that kind of people in the military than with conscription. From what I have seen and heard about professional militaries the kind of mentality those people have take over if they are no substantially outnumbered while if they are diluted sufficently as in a conscripted military they have to tone themselves down. I saw my fair share of that kind of people when I was in the army and I can tell you that they are not someone I would want to have close to me in a serious situation.

I also agree with your assessment of go in the army or go to jail without passing go, that doesnt rhyme well with notions of freedom. However I think it is a price worth to pay to not have another power factor in a democratic country with no insight and who really dont answers to anyone. I also think it is a price worth paying for robbing whatever hawk might exist in my government of an offensive weapon.

Bel: Actually you should want soldiers who can think first and shoot later, say you are wandering through a village and some kid toss a stone at your group. You dont want one of your soldiers to open fire and plunge you into a firefight against an entire village. As for your band of brother reference and in general the soldiers in WW2 that is a completely different situation. You get all kinds of people to volunteer when there is a serious threat against them and the people they love. They had something tangiable to fight. And of course that it is a tv-series and not real life.

There was a reason though that the this about the mentality of the soldiers was my third on my list, it is the least important and the one which is hardest to defend. It is mostly just my opinion. However as for your Vietnam reference, they didnt start the draft until a bit into when it was already started, the whole thing was started with the help of a professional military who then found themselves overstretched.

 

That's what officers and non-coms are for. THEY do the thinking for the unit. The soldiers (corporals and lower) should fight. Their COs think for them. They give orders with parameters, and the soldiers carry out the orders they are given. Like I said, having troopers stop to wonder about their role leads to death.

[ January 24, 2004, 15:47: Message edited by: Sir Belisarius ]

 

Support? I think it is fair to ask for support since this goes beyond mere opinion and asserts something as fact. This in fact, also does not fit with my anecdotal evidence (provided by my fiancee who was a former Army volunteer, friends, etc.) who say the reason most people join the Army is so that they can take advantage of a free education or receive technical job training. According to them, 'everyone' wanted to be ins ome type of service other than infantry - military intelligence (even if it is an oxymoron) seems to be one of the more desired fields.

Now, I'm sure there are some people who join and want to be infantry. And I'm sure that of these some of them probably would like to "wear a necklace of ears". The implication though is that attrocities are more likely to be committed by a volunteer army rather than an army of conscripts. I'm curious if you have support for that position.

As far as the Army being a separate power in a democratic state when it is a volunteer army - I think you've overgeneralized. In some states the army can become a separate power, even the strongest power, but I suspect there are more serious factors involved. In the US the army doesn't seem to have become this separate and equal power. Indeed, those in the army with the most political power aren't actually in the army - they're in the executive branch and part of the current administration (curren administration meaning whoever has power at the time - not Bush). This has been the way of things for a couple of centuries.

Is the army in the UK a separate power equal to that of the real gov't branches? I know that in Rome the army became a real power but I'm trying to think of stable modern democracies that fell apart BECAUSE a professional army tried to seize control.

 

Exactly my point. And while we're at it, let's not forget the performance of the troops during WWII (another draft). I highly doubt they worried overmuch about whether they could trust their compatriots during battle.