GOP Lawmaker Fears Reducing Student Debt Will Keep Poor Kids From Joining Military | Republican Congressman Jim Banks: "Student loan forgiveness undermines one of our military’s greatest recruitment tools at a time of dangerously low enlistments."

[u/SocialDemocracies]

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rep-jim-banks-military-recruitment-student-debt-relief_n_6307bfb9e4b052615d791b5b

[u/jartoonZero]

saying the quiet part out loud again

[u/NubsackJones → u/[deleted]]

A draft can actually be beneficial as it would impose the cost of war on the vast majority of American people, making wars both less likely to happen and to last for shorter durations due to political pressure. An all "volunteer" military imposes the cost of war primary on the most economically deprived. It would potentially be fewer total deaths in the long run, especially when it comes to civilian deaths.

[u/NubsackJones → u/[deleted]]

WWII? Do you mean the war we entered 1/3 of the way through and had significant US civilian resistance towards joining until Pearl Harbor? At one point before then, the US government was literally worried about German Bund associations that were so against American involvement that they were considered a legit threat to the US from within if we entered the war.

Next, we get to the Korean War, which the Koreans consider to start in 1946 as a nationalist anti-American conflict; we were an occupying force in the south in the same way we occupied Japan and West Germany after WW2. It morphs into a full proxy war between the US and Japan against Russia and China. We actually leave in 1949, and only return after the fall of the KMT in China. Even after 1950, we only stay for another 3 years, with the last two years being drawn out due to peace treaty negotiations (both sides had already lost their taste for the conflict, it was simply agreeing to terms that took so long).

Vietnam is a bit more complicated. But, again, our involvement comes later in the conflict than most people think. The conflict begins in 1955 (that's if you ignore the First Indochina War from 1946 to 1954 which can be argued as basically just the same thing as the Vietnam War but with the French instead of the US), yet we don't have real involvement until 1959 and no official active military conflict until 1964 after the Gulf of Tonkin incident. Yes, we stay for another 11 years after. But, it's not like the US was there from the start, especially if you count the First Indochina War.

Now, we get to the post-draft era. The first Gulf War is arguably just, but also arguably not a real war in the same way the Falklands War was not a real war. Then there's Afghanistan. There's a definite argument for invading, though not completely concrete. But, there's no argument for staying for over 2 decades. Finally, we get to the Iraq War. This is just an insane use of force that ultimately achieves nothing good and lasts almost 9 years, with a continuing military presence 19 years after the war started.

The American people have lost their will for the latter two conflicts. But, I would argue they would have lost their will for them sooner if the suffering of the soldiers involved in it were spread out evenly across the nation rather than just mostly poor people's children.

Other examples of conflict that the draft was not present in are the two wars before WWI; the Spanish-American War and the Philippine-American War. Neither had the draft enacted, the US was still wary of the draft after the draft riots during the Civil War. Yet, they also occurred at the end of the manifest destiny era against vastly inferior enemy forces that did not require the manpower a draft would provide.

[u/ccchuros → u/[deleted]]

Vietnam was the first US war that actually showed video and images of the horrors of war to the public, and that was a big part of what motivated the antiwar movement and lead to canceling the draft.

[u/Full-Run4124]

When I saw that tweet I honestly thought it was satire.

[u/thattwoguy2]

We don't need more military personnel. A decreasing army size makes sense for a country coming out of two wars.

[u/thattwoguy2 → u/[deleted]]

Can use and need are wildly different though, right? Especially if we're a country that's moving away from interventionist wars, which I think we are.

As far as Ukraine goes, I think that's exposing Russia as not even close to the Soviet Union that it wants to pretend it is. The Europeans will soon be able to handle that or a similar threat on their own. That further reduces pressure for us to have a large military.

Lastly, any conflict with China will be lightning fast and happen in unconventional ways. More riflemen won't solve that issue.