Finland is sparsely populated, would be defending a long border, but also would be expected to fight on its own territory. That is the perfect prescription for having universal conscription with a large reserve Force, but very small mobile active duty forces.
But most of the rest of NATO does not share a border with Russia, So they need professional forces capable of deploying outside the country.
The other factor arguing against universal conscription, particularly for the United States, is that it doesn't really do much good to have all those conscripts if you're not going to have the equipment necessary to put them in the field. This isn't world War II. Military equipment was much simpler and could be produced much more rapidly back then. The sophisticated stuff with which our military currently is armed has much longer lead times for production. So we'd have a massive number of universal conscripts, but without the equipment necessary for them to contribute to the war effort.
Military equipment was much simpler and could be produced much more rapidly back then. The sophisticated stuff with which our military currently is armed has much longer lead times for production. So we’d have a massive number of universal conscripts, but without the equipment necessary for them to contribute to the war effort.
Relatively small drones can be enormous force multipliers for an armed civilian population.
Drone operators can be useful at home or abroad. Drone operators should be armed with easily concealed firearms, so they can avoid being targets when off duty.
All of this should be connected to communications which will be effective if grid power is down, such as with encrypted Starlink capability.