Posted on 09/15/2014 7:16:41 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
As drones, cyberattacks and other high-tech developments change the nature of war, two prominent scholars argue that we must also rethink who fights our wars: the time has come, they say, to bring back the draft.
The article, "Universal Conscription as Technology Policy," appears in Issues in Science and Technology, a journal published by the National Defense University. The authors are Mark Hagerott — a distinguished professor of cybersecurity studies at the U.S. Naval Academy, who was cited by Foreign Policy as one of "The Top 70 Military Thinkers "— and Brad Allenby, President's Professor of Sustainable Engineering, and Lincoln Professor of Engineering and Ethics, at Arizona State University.
Allenby and Hagerott base their argument on a contradiction inherent in today's military — technology reduces casualties, making it easier for U.S. policymakers to commit the country to war; yet technology is also increasingly complex, requiring more of the types of skillsets that we see in Silicon Valley startups:
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) such as the Predator, for example, separate the airman physically from the battlefield, thus placing him or her at far less risk. Protecting military personnel from harm is necessary and desirable, but it may also lower the social, political, and psychological barriers to moving from negotiation and policy to military engagement. We believe that broader social participation in the military could ensure an appropriate balance in democratic decisionmaking about when to make the momentous transition to military action.
At the same time, the accelerating evolution of technology across its entire frontier, driven by advances in nanotechnology, biotechnology, information and communications technology (ICT), robotics, and applied cognitive science, is challenging the adaptive capabilities of modern militaries. If the military is to be able to remain competitive globally in such a difficult and complex environment, conscription will be required to bring into the military a broader array of necessary skills. For example, cyberconflict poses not just a technological and geopolitical challenge, but also a challenge to internal military culture: The geeks that, feasting on Coke and Skittles, are fearsome in ICT capability are not the kinds of personalities that will be easily attracted to a traditional, strongly hierarchical, heavily bureaucratic, military organization. Nor do we expect that the institutional leaders, entrepreneurs, and change-makers who work with the geeks, and who understand the political sensitivities and social concerns about privacy, data management, open source, and the like, will be volunteering for military service. Not just cyberskills, but appropriate management skills, will be critical competencies for tomorrow's military.
The real question here is whether technology is truly a game changer. Allenby and Hagerott make some intriguing points, but they also echo existing arguments for bringing back the draft — arguments that span the political spectrum. For instance, Charles Rangel, a liberal Democratic Congressman from New York, recently stated:
Currently the burden of defending our nation is carried by less than 1 percent of the American population. The 2.2 million members of the armed forces in active duty, the National Guard and the Reserve have become a virtual military class that makes the ultimate sacrifice of laying down life and limb for our country.
Since we replaced the compulsory military draft with an all-volunteer force in 1973, our nation has been making decisions about wars without worry over who fights them. I sincerely believe that reinstating the draft would compel the American public to have a stake in the wars we fight as a nation. That is why I wrote the Universal National Service Act, known as the "draft" bill, which requires all men and women between ages 18 and 25 to give two years of service in any capacity that promotes our national defense.
Similarly, Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank believes the draft could be the solution to ending the deep political divisions that have paralyzed the government: "Because so few serving in politics have worn their country's uniform, they have collectively forgotten how to put country before party and self-interest. They have forgotten a 'cause greater than self,' and they have lost the knowledge of how to make compromises for the good of the country."
Allenby and Hagerott acknowledge these arguments but up the ante, saying that the modern military fosters even deeper divisions than those that already exist:
These technologies have…. empowered a progressively smaller numerical group, such as a team sitting in a control room in South Dakota directing an unmanned Predator, that is potentially increasingly alienated from humanity, both the enemy it fights overseas and its fellow citizens, who have fewer and fewer connections with these isolated technocratic warriors.
[Universal conscription] would also expose many more people to the possibility of being drafted, thus giving them and their families a direct interest in national decisions about when to go to war. A well-designed conscription program can, therefore, reduce incentives for the premature resort to violence to resolve geopolitical differences. Simply put, if technology is making war too easy, the draft is one of the few ways to keep it hard.
And, they reason, universal conscription is a twofer, since it not only reduces the democratic deficit, it also reduces the deficit in skills:
Relying on a small volunteer elite to manage major technological revolutions across virtually all security domains is unrealistic; a self-selected volunteer elite, no matter how competent, will not reflect the skills and, more importantly, the perspectives, cultural competencies, and implicit knowledge embodied across the society. Will enough geeks volunteer? Will enough experts in finance, who can help protect critical assets from unrestricted cyberwarfare, be available and aligned with more-traditional military defense institutions?
Speaking as a member of the geek community, it's nice to be wanted. But the people that Allenby and Hagerott want to enlist for national security are the same ones who are valued in civilian society as key drivers of economic growth. Scooping up these innovators in the net of universal conscription would make the hard-sell of reinstating the draft even harder.
In fact, there's a rather dismal economic theory that the draft could motivate governments to reduce spending on expensive technology, especially when faced with the pressure for deep budget cuts. In 1850, the German economist Johann Heinrich von Thünen wrote: "In time of war we have no hesitation in sacrificing one hundred men in the bloom of their years to save one cannon... the production of the cannon is the cause of an expenditure of the state treasury, while human beings are again available for nothing by means of a simple conscription order."
>>Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) such as the Predator, for example, separate the airman physically from the battlefield, thus placing him or her at far less risk.<<
Obviously the author never read “Ender’s Game.” If he had, he would know really bad angst is a possible war risk...
The military turns liberals into common sense conservatives with a fear of G-d so I doubt they reinstate the draft.../s
Many engineering or computer firms continue thousands and thousands of foreigners ( often refusing to even interview Americans, including graduates of leading USA universities). So what to do with them all? Draft them!?
Must be universal. That means the gals as well, everyone being equal in ability and all that.
I’d suggest that the military already has a demonstrable oversupply of islamists.
The only way I want a draft is if it is UMI Universal Military Service.
Either they need to take EVERYONE for two or three years or they need to have a volunteer army
That said through out history there have been only two kinds of armies, those made up of slaves and those made up of mercenaries. A volunteer army is a nice way of saying mercenary. If you look it is easy to see that of the two the mercenaries are the better army
It worked for John Kerry.
A draft under our current leadership would just be used as a huge re-education camp.
Like the Peace corp. Life-ling libs.
The definition I found for mercenary was “A person hired to fight for a country other than their own”. I disagree with you.
There is no case for bringing back state servitude
That is why I wrote the Universal National Service Act, known as the "draft" bill, which requires all men and women between ages 18 and 25 to give two years of service in any capacity that promotes our national defense.
There are almost 22 million people between the ages of 20 and 24 (inclusive). That's an average of 4.4 million per year. Requiring these people to spend two years in the military would mean that the military size would jump from 2 million to 8.8 million, and that doesn't count those currently in the military above age 25. I suspect that the reason why Rangel has proposed this is not for the benefit of either the country or the military, but to bring back anti-war protests from Vietnam which were primarily anti-draft protests.
Also the budget to pay for a 9 million strong military would require that their pay be greatly reduced or that they would have essentially no equipment and no offensive capability but be required to spend their two years marching around the base or sitting around playing cards. And maybe that's another thing Rangel wants.
It turns them into conservatives? lol. Gay pride and tranny parades but no praying... sounds so conservative
State servitude, learn to bow down to the master and follow his orders.
Repeal the income tax and the payroll taxes....
With this regime in power I would advise my kids to resist and flee the country....then come back with counterrevolutionary forces.
Stupid premise.
The drafts were required as we needed bodies on order of magnitude to meet similar forces.
Today, the Xbox generation are all specialists as we use computer aided arms as force multipliers and the assets can easily be deployed anywhere, anytime.
Do we need boots on the ground? Absolutely. However, we are using technologies that reduce manpower and extend our ability prosecute actions from ever greater distances.
Drones can be on station for hours, loitering until the opportunity to exact pain on a target presents itself.
We are also using self propelled hunters on the ground that can be lie in wait until it’s time to go boom.
Our weapons systems that were typically held by a man and could easily end an aggressor from 500 yards are now equipped with computers that ensure an accurate kill from miles away.
Our literal class ships also carry require 50% less men to operate, carry smart weapons and are 75% more effective than marine based assets of just 50 years ago.
we literally don’t require the number of bodies as a ratio to enemy forces we needed 50, 75 years and for wars fought during the Civil War and Revolution.
I know several drone operators and they don’t really fly their planes or have much involvement until they are on station over a target and a human element is required to ensure they are targeting an enemy, while minimizing injury/death to non-aggressors.
Further, they are able to adjust the mission if the target moves, tracking them until an opportune moment.
We have missile and gun boxes that can be dropped in area where an enemy is expected to be in range and bomb their asses or launch smart bullets.
There is no real need for a draft except that we might need bullet catchers until our elite forced can dispatch, with extreme prejudice any opponent.
I personally think it stupid to grab someone from their existing direction in life, and force them into a life they haven’t any desire to participate, expecting them to perform the critical, and necessary functions of a military operation. It makes no sense.
If I’m out there fighting NOT only for my country, but for my life against an enemy intent upon killing me, I don’t want some dumbass who could care less about his/her training, thoughtless about his/her surroundings, because he/she doesn’t want to be there the one I must depend upon for the support to win the moment, and live another day.
I’d really like to see this topic dismissed as really stupid. It’s been proven.
I sometimes think that the only reason some (not all) conservatives want to to see a draft is so that someone can beat the hell out of the younger generation and make them ‘straighten up’ or kill them off as useless.
Most developed countries have it. When I was stationed in Korea, both times all my lower ranking ROKA counterparts were conscripts. They do it a little differently, they catch you in the middle of college, normally.
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