Robert Redford\u2019s latest movie, \u201cThe Company You Keep,\u201d didn\u2019t make me stand up and cheer, but it did make me think. The movie tells the tale of a group of former anti-Vietnam-War protesters, still on the run from the law more than 30 years later. One of the goals of the radical protesters of the 1960s and 1970s that the movie alludes to was to end the military draft. It was unfair\u2014offering too many \u201ceasy outs\u201d to privileged people like Dick Cheney [he had \u201cother priorities\u201d at the time], George W. Bush [he got a cushy assignment\u2014which he may or may not have completed\u2014in the reserves], and even Bill Clinton [who wangled his way out, too.] It was the mechanism that sucked an endless stream of 18- to 21-year-olds into the meat grinder of a futile war.<\/p>\n

Eventually, we got our wish. In 1973, at the end of combat operations in Vietnam, America ended conscription and established a large, professional, all-volunteer military force.<\/p>\n

But that fulfilled wish has had unintended consequences. The military now operates and lives in a world mostly isolated from civilian life, and war has become a spectator sport for most Americans. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan didn’t spark the same intensity of protest that we saw in the Viet Nam years.<\/p>\n

Why? In an op-ed published in the New York Times [May 22, 2013], entitled \u201cAmericans and Their Military, Drifting Apart,\u201d a former Army commander in Afghanistan and an emeritus history professor spell out some of the reasons, and offer arguments for reinstituting a modified military draft\u2014and other ways to re-integrate civilian and military life.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s wrong with the all-volunteer model?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The all-volunteer military is failing America in several ways, say the authors\u2014Karl W. Eikenberry and David M. Kennedy. In the absence of a military draft, Americans have become disengaged from the economics and the experience of war. Civilians are insulated from the military: Fewer serve, and a vastly reduced portion of Americans have contact with, help produce, or profit from the sale of war materials. We\u2019re simply not as connected to the military as we once were, and our awareness of the issues involved in military service\u2014and, of course\u2014war itself\u2014is dramatically diminished. It\u2019s somebody else\u2019s job, somebody else\u2019s risk, somebody else\u2019s war.<\/p>\n

Eikenberry and Kennedy note that:<\/p>\n

The modern force presents presidents with a moral hazard, making it easier for them to resort to arms with little concern for the economic consequences or political accountability. Meanwhile, Americans are happy to thank the volunteer soldiers who make it possible for them not to serve, and deem it somehow unpatriotic to call their armed forces to task when things go awry.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In other words, in the days of the compulsory military draft, more of us had skin in the game. Most civilians knew someone who was serving in the military. We could see the costs\u2014economic, physical and emotional. We protested the Viet Nam war because we and our friends were at risk, as well as because the war itself was unwinnable\u2014and therefore immoral\u2014and ill-advised.<\/p>\n

Moving toward a better system<\/strong><\/p>\n

Eikenberry and Kennedy offer several suggestions, such as:<\/p>\n

-Institute a lottery draft:<\/p>\n

[Such a s system would]…<\/strong>reintroduce the notion of service as civic obligation. The lottery could be activated when volunteer recruitments fell short, and weighted to select the best-educated and most highly skilled Americans, providing an incentive for the most privileged among us to pay greater heed to military matters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

-Re-establish the Total Force Doctrine<\/p>\n

This philosophy\u2026shaped the early years of the all-volunteer force, but was later dismantled. It called for large-scale call up of the reserves and National Guard at the start of any large, long deployment. Because these standby forces tend to contain older men and women, rooted in their communities, their mobilization would serve as a brake on going to war because it would disrupt their communities.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

-Give Congress a larger role in war-making<\/p>\n

Congress hasn\u2019t formally declared war since World War II. Eikenberry and Kennedy say:<\/p>\n

It\u2019s high time to revisit the recommendation, made in 2008 by the bipartisan National War Powers Commission, to replace the 1973 War Powers Act, which requires notification of Congress after <\/i>the president orders military action, with a mandate that the president consult with Congress before<\/i> resorting to force.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

-Pay for wars in real time<\/p>\n

This is a lesson we are learning the hard way, in the wake of the economically disastrous, unpaid-for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Eikenberry and Kennedy say:<\/p>\n

Levying special taxes, rather than borrowing, to finance \u201cspecial appropriations\u201d would compel the body politic to bear the fiscal burden\u2014and encourage citizens to consider war-making a political choice they were involved in, not a fait accompli they must accept.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The authors also suggest ways to break down the wall between civilian and military life, such as:<\/p>\n

-Decrease reliance on contractors for non-combat tasks, so that the true size of the force would be more transparent<\/p>\n

-Integrate veteran and civilian hospitals and rehabilitation facilities, which would let civilians see war\u2019s wounded firsthand.<\/p>\n

-Shrink self-contained residential neighborhoods on domestic military bases, so that more service members could pray, play and educate their children alongside their fellow Americans. We need to break down the civilian-military barrier and reinforce a sense of duty that that is critical to the health of our democratic republic, where the most important office is that of the citizen.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Of course, the best solution would be no wars–or at least no dumb wars and no trumped-up wars– and no need for a military or any kind of a draft. But that\u2019s a utopian dream. If we must live with the reality of a military, we should at least try to do it better.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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