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Departments National Issues Non Volunteers, Non-Recruiters, And A Non War Surveys show that fear of death is a powerful motivator that keeps those same students out of the military, even with the bribes of college tuition, sign up “bonuses” and the supposed benefits of “honor”, medals and more. One survey shows that those fears doubled from the year 2000 to 2004, despite assurances from the administration that the war in Iraq is good for everyone. What is war worth if it means getting killed, especially when that war was based on lies and deception, (as most wars are)? The military faces a huge problem because they base their fundamental strategy on an all volunteer force. Recruiting volunteers is a policy that has been in place since 1973, when the draft was eliminated. Eliminating the draft was a very sustainable policy that gave people the choice of serving in the military rather than forcing them to. Now the US Congress needs to pass a law that gives citizens the choice of paying for this military social program or not as well. Wars will not last long if it depends on the public paying out of their own pockets. War means going into huge debts, and public support for this only lasts as long as they do not feel the pain of it. The problem with an all volunteer military is that volunteers will not continue to sign up for a war without very good reason, as current statistics prove. The military has grown so desperate that they have been forced to plunder the ranks of Army Reserves, The National Guard and more. The military is growing so desperate that they are moving troops around worldwide, which they call “balancing”, in order to cover it up. War drains financial and human resources, especially if there is widespread opposition to it. The national debt has increased at a faster rate than ever before in history largely due to the Iraq war. Further, the Army, Marines and almost all Reserves forces did not meet recruiting goals during 2005, according to Defense department statistics, despite heavy administration lobbying in the media to recruit new boots and to build public support for the war. Despite generals, politicians and movies exalting the many virtues of war, recruitment has dropped as the war in Iraq has ground on. Since Vietnam, the Army has shrunk from 40 divisions that include the National Guard to 28 when the Berlin wall fell to 18 divisions now. The military has been forced to do more with less people volunteering overall from one generation to the next. At the same time, costs are rising. War is growing more and more expensive, so even with less and less people in the military, war is growing so expensive that war is literally becoming a choice between peace and bankruptcy for countries that get involved in armed conflicts that last more than a few weeks. The military claims that poverty has nothing to do with recruitment levels, but statistics prove that when during periods when unemployment drops below 5% and there are plenty of jobs for high school and college students, that recruitment levels drop. As students get more high paying job choices, they increasingly make choices for jobs instead of for guns and killing. Raising the minimum wage and forcing employers to hire full time employees with benefits will force peace to happen because any full time job with benefits is much better than what the military offers. The military attracts people due to their superior social benefits program which is paid for with taxes. This is why (mostly) Republicans and those in favor of war try to keep wages low (with no minimum wage) and jobs part time with no benefits in the public arena, while expanding social benefits such as education, bonuses, healthcare and wages in the military. War is after all, a business like any other. The focus of this business is on killing, so it has to be made attractive somehow. As college attendance rises, recruitment drops as well. If college were free, recruiters would have an almost impossible task to sign up anyone for the military. In Europe all education is free all the way up to the PhD level, so it can be done. The Director of the Accession Policy for the military said of increasing college attendance; "It's times like this….that is a critical level" for undercutting recruitment, says Curtis L. Gilroy. (Tyson, page 3) The Army is using larger and larger bribes to keep people inside of the military machine. To re-enlist existing soldiers and officers, it is raising re-enlistment bonuses. New recruits are promised “free education” and up to $20,000. The military is also adding hundreds of sales people (recruiters) in order to bolster their employment rates. The typical life of a ‘recruiter’ sales person is getting much harder as the economy gets better and as the war grinds on. According to Tyson, a recruiter starts the day at 6:30 AM. Their sales duties include hitting fast food restaurants, where low income young people congregate during lunch. After school is out, they start calling students at home, and do not let up until nighttime. At night, these same salespeople stalk the low income jobs that include 7-11’s and gas stations, trying to pressure these young people in dead end jobs to go for the adventure of the military with guaranteed benefits and bonuses. President Bush declared that the Iraq war ended on May 1, 2003, but since then, violence has only escalated, and the NON war has now claimed over 100,000 civilian lives in Iraq, killing over 1,000 US soldiers, and injuring or disabling tens of thousands more. This non-war is getting harder and harder to build support for. The level of desperation is growing in the military. For the first time ever, ceremonial guards from Arlington cemetery, forces from Alaska and forces from South Korea have been forced to go to Iraq. For the year 2005, 2500 recruiters are being sent to Iraq so the sales people that try to sell the war to others are now tasting war for themselves. The non-war in Iraq is very expensive. This non-war is using up trucks and military gear at a highly accelerated rate. This equipment is expensive to replace, so the military is using up what it has and delaying replacements due to the huge costs involved. Stocks in Asia and Europe are depleted, while a large portion of those stocks stored on ships such as carriers has been used up according to Tyson, (p. 4) Because the military has stretched its resources so thin due to the non-wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it means that the readiness of forces at home in the US is also dropping. Due to lack of manpower, training and equipment, many military divisions have dropped to a rating of C4, which is the lowest level that is measured in terms of military readiness. (Tyson, p. 5) If it were not for the Guard and reserve units, the non-war in Iraq would be lost already. Traditionally, the Guard is used only to defend the US, but now it is being used overseas, again pointing to how desperate the military situation is. The Guard now makes up a large percentage of boots on the ground in the non war zone of Iraq. If another non-war started today, there would not be enough US military forces to deploy to another area as every available body is being used. The news recently showed a 60 year old grandmother being sent to Iraq… mirroring the situation at the end of World War II in Europe, when seniors and young children were thrown into the fray. In another area, few troops have the equipment that they need. Soldier’s families have had to buy armor and other supplies to send to their soldiers based in non-war zones such as Iraq because the military was not supplying them. The military admits that it has had to “cross level” soldiers and equipment to meet the demands of the non-war in Iraq. Cross leveling means that equipment or people are stolen from unit and given to another that needs it more. According to Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau "We were woefully under-equipped before the war started. That situation hasn't gotten any better. As a matter of fact, it gets a little bit worse every day, because we continue to cross-level." (Tyson, p. 5) The National Guard used to be easy military service consisting of a one or two weekends a month for some money which supplemented the family budget, with no risk of being killed or called up for war service overseas. All that has changed. Now the Guard is seen as being the same as active military forces. Signs ups of National Guard are now suffering as a result. Career Guardspeople are leaving at a rate of up to 20% of active forces per year. When 20% of your entire workforce is quitting nationwide each year, there is a huge problem, as that means 100% turnover every five years. Training new career officers and troops in this environment is almost impossible. Predictions are that up to 35% of troops rotating back from Iraq will quit, rather than go back again for another round. This high attrition rate and low enlistment rate will force the military to either quit the war or put a forced draft into place. Self sacrifice is the bedrock of the volunteer military. To sacrifice a life for war means that one has to believe in the non-war. Sacrificing a life also means one has to believe the leader who is calling for more bodies. The lack of willing recruits points to a lack of belief in the merits of the non-war, and also a lack of belief in the honesty of leadership at the top. If President Bush really believed in his non-war, he would have all of this daughters serving over in Iraq. The fact that none of them is serving, points to something fundamentally flawed in his call for military service. Currently out of the hundreds of politicians in Washington, only 1 member of Congress has a son or daughter serving in the non-battle zone of the non-war in Iraq. When the leaders and their families are setting the example of non-support for a non-war, what do they expect ordinary citizens to do? Quotes from: Tyson, Ann Scott. Two Years Later, War Drains Military, MSNBC News http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7235239 |
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