Army - Stimulating Simulation

Over the next decade, the draft was
used to help fill out the ranks of the armed
forces, but that was not the primary purpose
intended by the 1948 law. The goal
was to build a larger pool of manpower
with military experience that could be
brought back if the U.S. had to fight
World War III with the Soviet Union.
Relatively few draftees fought or died
during the Eisenhower presidency. Indeed,
only a very small proportion of the
eligible population was actually drafted.
Consequently, conscription was generally
tolerated by a public worried about
the red menace behind the Iron Curtain.
A little over 9 million served in the
armed forces during the Vietnam War;
total draftees for that period were under
2 million. This was not a disproportionate
number compared to other modern
wars. Nevertheless, the controversy over
conscription proved unprecedented.
In To Raise an Army: The Draft Comes
to Modern America, John Whiteclay
Chambers argues that the draft became a
contentious issue because then-President
Lyndon Johnson and his national security
managers overextended use of it beyond
the consensus established in the world
wars and the early Cold War. As the
Vietnam War became increasingly unpopular,
the draft became the major focus
of dissent. President Richard Nixon
ended the draft in 1973, though the Selective
Service System remains in force.
There are two important points to extract
from the American conscription experience.
First, the argument for it was
based on military necessity: generating
the forces necessary for the government
to fulfill its obligation for the common
defense. For example, Marshall made
the case for Universal Military Training
based on operational requirements. He
assumed the military model employed
for the next world war would be similar
to that of the first two: Armed forces
would be drastically reduced in peacetime,
then rapidly mobilized for war.
Marshall saw Universal Military Training
as an efficient way to speed mobilization
for future conflicts.
Second, conscription works when
there is broad, bipartisan support for it.
The draft riots of 1863 reflected, in part,
growing frustration with President Abraham
Lincoln’s handling of the war, similar
to the backlash that built up against
the Johnson administration in the 1960s.
The argument for the all-volunteer
force laid out by the Gates Commission
in 1970 was that an all-volunteer military,
with a mix of active and reserve component
armed forces, was more efficient as
well as more cost-effective than sustaining
a peacetime draft. The rationale of the
commission remains largely sound. Generally,
the U.S. military does not have a
recruiting and retention problem.
While it is true that the cost of human
capital is spiraling uncomfortably
upward, the draft is not a credible
solution for this problem. Shortservice
conscripts are not going to meet
the high-performance standards required
of today’s military personnel.
Conscription is a manpower model designed
for mass mobilization.
Nor is there anything resembling a
national consensus that would tolerate
national service. In 2001, in the wake of
the horrific terrorist attacks on New
York and Washington, D.C., Rep. Nick
Smith, R-Mich., introduced a bill requiring
Universal Military Training and
Service. It went exactly nowhere.
That’s telling. The American polity is
far more divided now than it was in the
aftermath of 9/11. If Smith’s idea was a
nonstarter then, it is even more of a
nonstarter now.
What makes McChrystal and Mc-
Cain’s idea even worse is that it’s not
based on a practical rationale. They see
national service as a mandatory tool for
teaching citizenship. They believe national
service would serve as a “civic rite
of passage.”
There is certainly a case to be made
that civic virtue is a vital component of a
healthy society. That notion is infused in
the Greco-Roman tradition of civil society.
But by the time of America’s founding,
liberal philosophers had concluded
that the best way to build a virtuous civil
society is to maximize the freedom of the
individual.
The concept of freedom that was established
in the liberal ideas of thinkers
like John Locke and Adam Smith remains
relevant today. Habitual conscription
has no role in sustaining a free society.
That was certainly the conclusion
reached by the Gates Commission. Economist
Milton Friedman, who served on
the commission, argued that rather than
inspire civic virtue, the draftee model inspired
quite the opposite. Friedman saw
as key the distinction between being
forced to serve and volunteering to serve.
McChrystal and McCain argue for
more than just another government program.
They advocate a fundamental reimagining
of the government’s role in
creating a healthy society. That’s a big
step. They are spot-on in recognizing
that national service offers an important
venue for those who wish to live a life of
service. But there are plenty of opportunities
for national service, including paid
and volunteer programs like Teach For
America and the Peace Corps.
Still, there does seem to be a lack of
young people who want to pursue some
form of national service. According to
government statistics, in 2013, the number
of people in government service under
30 years old hit an all-time low—just
7 percent, compared to over 25 percent
in the private sector. “Without a pipeline
of young talent,” Rachel Feintzeig reported
in The Wall Street Journal in June
2014, “the government risks falling behind
in an increasingly digital world.”
Arguably, the decline of youth interest
in national service has more to do with
the nature of it rather than a lack of civic
virtue. Government hiring practices and
human capital management are arcane
compared to those of cutting-edge companies
in the private sector. Mandatory
federal service could well exacerbate the
problem. If government doesn’t have to
compete for people, it will lose incentives
to improve recruiting and retention,
making it more likely that talented youth
will flee federal jobs as soon as they can.
Further, it is far from clear how
mandatory national service would teach
civic virtue. Arguably, the act of voluntarily
participating in federal service is
an act of civic virtue. That suggests the
inculcation of the nature and responsibilities
of citizenship happens mostly
before individuals enter the workforce.
Also, making service mandatory removes
the signature opportunity for
youth to make the individual commitment
to serve others.
In addition, there is the issue of the
appropriateness and effectiveness of giving
government the preponderance of
responsibility for defining and teaching
18 ARMY ■ March 2016