Military considers recruiting foreigners

The Boston Globe ^ | December 26, 2006 | Bryan Bender

[A. Pole]

Likening the plight of the American republic to the Roman Empire is simply intellectual laziness.

See my tagline.

[jazusamo]

I wouldn't write this off as slanted journalism. The following quote from the article shows that at least the American Enterprise Institute is looking at it.

Good point but it gets back to the same old thing of quoting "unnamed" DOD sources which tends to turn off many even though in some cases it's legitimate.

[dljordan]

"This is exactly what ancient Romans started to do at certain point of their history."

Maybe we should try recruiting Gauls!

[Plains Drifter]

Amen

[EGPWS]

"It works as a military idea and it works in the context of American immigration," said Thomas Donnelly,...

Scottie, beam him up!

But Captain, we will lose our warp speed and if we don't wait for repairs to be made we will lose our life support system too!

Scooooottie, don't let me down now.

Spock, what's your take on this.

Captain, beaming him up would be highly illogical for his plan is NOT logical.

My suggestion Captain, as a Vulcan, would be to maintain life support first and beam him up when we no longer are at threat of losing the ship with all on board.

Bone's, what's your take on this.

Damn it Jim, I'm a Doctor NOT a solider!!!

[ARE SOLE]

Another word ... Gurkhas.


Regards.

[spintreebob]

In my personnel clerk activity I had access to the records of many draftees. They were like me in that we VOLUNTEERED FOR THE DRAFT... WE WANTED TO GO... but for only 2 years, not 3. We figured we could always re-up later if so motivated.

We were truly motivated by a sense of duty and obligation to country... that included both conservative Republicans and John Kennedy Democrats who truly lived the words "Ask not what your country can do for you; but what you can do for your country."

I saw numerous files where guys were begging their draft boards to draft them, as I was. In August '64 I wrote my draft board asking them to re-classify me 1A and draft me. It took them 18 months, thanks to the incompetent bureaucracy that is the US Government. My story was typical. Many of us had our lives on hold for ove a year trying to get drafted, and unable to get a good job because we were honest with employers about trying to get drafted.

Don't believe the lies of the MSM on this. The vast majority of us who went in LBJ's buildup of 66-67 wanted to go.

Coming out of basic training, it was the same. Overwhelmingly guys wanted to go to Vietnam. Some were assigned to Germany, Korea, etc and actively tried to get their orders changed to Vietnam.

[F.J. Mitchell]

So,who in the Pentagon does this fiction writer cite as the source of this crap? As far as I can see, no one.

This is propaganda intended to stir up sentiment in favor of resurrecting the draft.

Old codgers are chomping at the bit for a chance to kick Islamic terrorist @$$. Raise the age of eligibility for Military service to 80.

[EGPWS]

...that most of our people are not really patriotic anymore they talk the talk, but can not or will not walk the walk.

They talk the talk and then walk to the appropriate trough to vote...

[ansel12]

"In my personnel clerk activity I had access to the records of many draftees. They were like me in that we VOLUNTEERED FOR THE DRAFT... WE WANTED TO GO... but for only 2 years, not 3. We figured we could always re-up later if so motivated."
" I saw numerous files where guys were begging their draft boards to draft them, as I was. In August '64 I wrote my draft board asking them to re-classify me 1A and draft me."





True, I remember that, in fact the army started 2 year enlistments to accommodate the guys that wanted to serve during the war, but weren't interested in hanging around for years afterward.

There are a lot of adventurous young men that will do wild stuff for two years, but to whom a 3 or 4 year contract seems like an eternity.

[Boris99]

So far spy satellites and 6ft. tall white guys speaking broken Arabic/Farsi have been unable to find Bin Laden. Maybe it's time to recruit some sort of locals that we can ensure are loyal to the US. I'm sure I'm not the first and/or only guy to think of this. Hopefully we have some really smart guys already working on this.

[dakine]

"I'm afraid there's a little too much flag waving and not enough actual patriotism."

True...worth repeating...

[21stCenturyFreeThinker]

... it gets back to the same old thing of quoting "unnamed" DOD sources which tends to turn off many even though in some cases it's legitimate.

Yeah, unfortunately unnamed sources are a part of the game. The White House uses them all the time to float trial balloons and soften up public opinion for something that's not very popular. It's the same for the rest of government and business as well. This means that even if something doesn't come true the reporter may have reported it accurately.

Of course that leaves the system open to being abused by reporters but I'm not sure what the alternative is. If every article was fully sourced we wouldn't get much news about this stuff.

This article had a good mix of sourced and unsourced quotes. I'll bet there's fire behind this smoke.

Thanks for the thoughtful reply :).

[ex-snook]

Sure beats the draft doesn't it since we have 'better things to do'. War is for volunteers. Shop till you drop, baby.

[21stCenturyFreeThinker]

Scottie, beam him up!

Very creative. I didn't realize I was responding to a cartoonist.

[ApplegateRanch]

almost 80% of the combat deaths in Vietnam were volunteers, not draftees.

My point was not that it was to avoid combat; but to have CHOICES. Prequalification, no 6 years of N.G. camps after discharge from Active, etc.

OTOH, a volunteer was not given one choice that a draftee had: when a "volunteer" for a nasty assignment was needed, a draftee didn't need to step forward, but a volunteer was considered to have ALREADY volunteered for any duty needed.

OTOOH, a buddy of mine was drafted into the Marines. His bad luck to be sitting up front, & too close to the aisle, and that the Marines were coming up short for the month, when he reported to his Draft Board.

I enlisted in a deferred service program, near the end of my junior year of high school. Spent 2 years in the Navy Reserve, then was medicalled out and reclassified 4-F for a disqualifying congenital condition that the original enlisting doc had noted on my med records, but was overlooked. Two years later, time to go active & get a year of Electronics School, it was seen on there by the active duty physical doc, who took official notice of it.

I spent another 6 months in the Inactive Reserve fighting the discharge, and lost.

[EGPWS]

I didn't realize I was responding to a cartoonist.

You didn't.

[21stCenturyFreeThinker]

So,who in the Pentagon does this fiction writer cite as the source of this crap? As far as I can see, no one.

It was the first squad of the trial balloon corps. They have a big problem with balloons bursting into flames shortly after launch lol.

[PISANO]

Does anyone sense a social change taking place in a more and more rapid rate here in the United States?

We have elected a MUSLIM, who shouts Allahu Akbar at rallies with his constituents, to the US Congress......we are trying to RECRUIT more foreigners for service in the US Military and we just agreed to a UN resolution that increases Amadinejad and his henchmen access to our educational and public institutions while allowing for his pursuit of Nuclear Weapons!!

[21stCenturyFreeThinker]

There are a lot of adventurous young men that will do wild stuff for two years, but to whom a 3 or 4 year contract seems like an eternity.

Great thought.

I was a kid during the war so I remember it from that point of view. But a boss I had later on had been drafted and was doing time in Germany. He got bored there and asked to be transferred to Viet Nam.

People do things for all kinds of reasons. At least his wild stuff was a lot more useful than what I did at that age lol.