Posted on 03/18/2003 2:08:37 AM PST by JohnHuang2
If today's U.S. armed forces could count draftee airmen, sailors, soldiers and Marines among those who will soon be doing the dying during our second go at Saddam Hussein, you can bet good money that more American parents and grandparents would have been asking hard questions of their Washington pols long before the drumbeat of war became headline news. Important questions such as:
But at long last the realities of war have been brought home by massive global peace marches, gas prices spiraling into the stratosphere, the economy tanking alongside the Titanic and tens of thousands of reserve soldiers from every city in this great land – neighbors, friends and workmates of the formerly disconnected – being called to arms. Finally, millions of Americans are listening more carefully to a chorus of world leaders and a few gutsy national politicians righteously concerned about the consequences of the shootout in the desert.
Except that with 230,000 of our warriors already staring down Saddam's cannons, this new consciousness might have come too late.
I believe it's been far too easy for the vast majority of Americans to pay little or no attention to George W. Bush's march to war, because most folks' pride and joy aren't prime candidates for body bags. And few average citizens have ongoing personal contact with a uniformed defender from the 1 million-plus regular warriors who make up our All-Volunteer Force. To them, our warriors are just uniforms they occasionally see floating around at airports or as background color in TV war dispatches.
Most recruits in the AVF come from non-vocal, working-class families – a disproportionate number from the poor and from minority groups – while more privileged Americans are conspicuous by their absence. For example, the Congress that voted overwhelmingly for the military solution against Iraq includes only one member with a son who's an enlisted grunt. The rest, like the majority of Americans since the draft went south, no longer share directly in the sacrifice that comes with sending our youth to face the dragon.
The poor join up because the job prospects on the outside are marginal. By going into the military, they learn a skill, gain the benefits of the GI Bill and get a better shot at the American dream.
Meanwhile, teens from families with political punch – read: cash and /or clout – are safely bunkered down at universities out of harm's way. And when asked: "Should we 'do' Iraq?" their answer is often a roaring "Yes!" But ask those same young aristo-hawks: "Will you go and fight?" and rarely does a Tommy Hilfiger-clad arm shoot up. When it comes to blood sports, they don't need to be taught that the spectators have it cushier than the gladiators.
Just as if all Americans knew their kids would likely serve dead-center on the killing fields, there'd be far sharper focus on how our politicians are voting and a lot more calls for caution and careful consideration before we got out there in the sand and slapped leather. For sure, the draft would give us 20/20 vigilance.
As the father of a reservist now in Kuwait recently said: "I suspect once folks start thinking about their kids standing in the line of fire, they'll make a whole bunch of noise. When that happens, hopefully this insanity will stop."
History has taught us that draftees serve this country well. Not only are they natural-born whistle-blowers who keep both the war-makers and the brass honest, but because their service keeps all our citizens more closely involved and invested, they are our bottom-line deterrent to war.
Service in our country's ranks used to be widely accepted as the price of citizenship. So why not bring back the draft? Since so many of our leaders seem to be currently suffering from empiritis, we'd all probably be better protected from this country-destroying disease if every American family shared the burden for defending our way of life.
In a related story: Most Americans consider David Hackworth a bloated sack of fecal matter and don't give an airborne rodents rectum what he says.
Developing...
Yes, because Saddam would deal any day of the week with terrorists willing to bring WMD to the US.
Why can't we – with a united world behind us – disarm Iraq without war?
Because most of the UN have two things in common: 1) They hate the US and 2) they're just there for the handouts.
Why the unilateral intervention?
Because the UN is a bunch of wimps who won't stand behind their own resolutions.
What are the projected costs and casualties, and is there an exit plan?
Costs will be high, but cheaper than waiting for terrorists to detonate a nuclear weapon in say, Houston.
The DemocRATs have discovered the "social" side of the Military budget I am afraid. It was clear that FDR and crew had also done so three generations ago, but those lessons had been forgotten and eliminated during Viet Nam and the scornful generation.
Bingo, my friend. That's the bottom line.
Handoff of WMD to Al Qaeda and other Jihadists. Gets to call the shots in the Middle East unless we take him out. Saddam is the weakest link amongst our Islamic enemies so we get rid of him first.
It's bedtime for me -- y'all have a nice day.
Pentagon says most front-line fighters are white, working class
03/11/2003
By ARNOLD HAMILTON / The Dallas Morning News
As a medic in Vietnam, John Butler never gave thought to the race of wounded and dying soldiers he served. As a graduate student, though, he became fascinated with the popular notion that blacks are overrepresented in the military's front lines.
"It never has been true," said Dr. Butler, 55, one of the first black students at Louisiana State University and now a sociology professor at the University of Texas at Austin. "Except maybe with the Buffalo Soldiers who escorted covered wagons into the [19th century] West."
Indeed, as the nation stands on the brink of war in the Middle East, Pentagon figures show that troops most likely to face combat – and death – in Iraq are disproportionately white, and typically working class.
In the Army, nearly three-fourths of the enlisted infantry are white. In the Air Force and Navy, fewer than 3 percent of pilots are black. And experts say the military's special forces units are overwhelmingly white. The disparity is especially intriguing to analysts, and troubling to military officials, because blacks make up about 12 percent of the population and 20 percent of active-duty military but are underrepresented in front-line troops.
The experts agree on one point: Black troops' job choices in no way imply that blacks are any less courageous or patriotic than their white counterparts. Indeed, they said, military service long has been viewed among many blacks as a bold statement of love of country.
Just what led high percentages of black volunteers to migrate to such noncombat tasks as administration, logistics and communication, at the same time white enlistees steered in greater numbers toward high-risk positions, isn't easily answered, analysts say.
Some suggest that many white volunteers sign up for ground combat units because of cash bonuses and as a shorter-term way to earn GI benefits for college. Others theorize that blacks tend to view the military more as a place where skills can be learned and experience gained for a second career later in the private sector.
What is certain is that America's military – including the 300,000 or so amassed in the Middle East – tends to be made up of the nation's socioeconomic middle, experts say. Not the upper one-fourth, typically destined not only for college but also in many cases graduate school. Nor the bottom quarter, where lower educational levels, criminal records and physical or mental problems seem more prevalent.
"They [America's troops] are going to look more like the college-bound youth than the one working at McDonald's," said James Burk, a political sociologist at Texas A&M University.
"We can think about the military as a bridging institution from wherever you are, bridging to a better place in America for economic mobility but also for educational mobility."
In January, a senior defense official conceded that military demographics don't mirror society when it comes to ethnicity, noting concerns that Hispanics are underrepresented in all branches but the Marines. But he also hailed the diversity achieved in the 30 years since the all-volunteer force was instituted.
"We all want a force that, roughly speaking, looks like America, and by and large that's what we have [today]," said the official, who briefed reporters on the condition he not be named. "It's a great force, it performs very well, it's the envy of the world."
Convention challenged
The statistics counter a decades-old convention – that blacks are disproportionately assigned to the front lines – that still pervades American politics. "I thought we had disabused that myth," said Charles Moskos, a Northwestern University military sociologist who co-authored with Dr. Butler the book All That We Can Be: Black Leadership and Racial Integration the Army Way. "But it never did go away."
The misconception remains, military analysts say, because early in the Vietnam War, blacks were dying at a disproportionately high rate, creating – as the Moskos-Butler book noted – the impression among many Americans that blacks "have been used by their country as cannon fodder."
But at war's end, blacks accounted for 12.1 percent of all Americans who died in Southeast Asia – a figure that almost mirrored their percentage in the U.S. population.
Questions about the makeup of the troops were raised last fall in Texas' Senate race when former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk said American fighting forces in Iraq would be "disproportionately minority."
More recently, Rep. Charles Rangel, a Korean War veteran, proposed reinstating the draft, contending "the burden of military service was being borne disproportionately by members of disadvantaged groups."
The New York Democrat said he believed Congress would be more cautious in its approach to war if a broader cross section of the nation's sons and daughters were at risk.
Cultural variations
Overall, minorities make up just under 25 percent of the American population – but nearly 35 percent of the nation's enlisted military force. Military experts say the number of Hispanics in the military is increasing, but the figure is less than 8 percent. Some say blacks may be drawn to administration, logistics and communication because of tradition – often the duties their fathers or other relatives carried out in the military.
Most important, though, blacks may pursue such jobs out of a sense of economic necessity. Since the all-volunteer military commenced, black unemployment often has been double the rate for whites.
As a result, experts say, blacks have pursued tasks designed to provide skills and experience that can be transferred later to the civilian workforce.
The numbers reflect such a strategy: A recent Pentagon report said blacks account for 36 percent of functional support and administration and 27 percent of medical and dental career fields.
"This is, after all, what an all-volunteer military is about," the report stated. "Volunteers making choices to join and remain in the military, and to select certain occupations, including those associated with combat or those that provide skills more readily transferable to the private section."
Military analysts and Pentagon officials note, however, that all American forces – whether in front-line combat or support – are just as likely to be targeted these days by terrorists or anti-American activists.
http://www.dallasnews.com/dmn/news/stories/031103dntextroops.24eb4.html
Do I need a "sarcasm" alert here?
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