I am not a big fan of a very active military foreign policy. But if we (the United States) are really in the early stages of a very long war on terrorism. don't we need to dramatically increase the number of our troops. The news piece I heard today on NPR said our troop strength was under 500,000. With all of the deployments we have aren't we placing too much responsibility on too few troops? unemployment is up. The country is supposed to be in the patriotic throws of the post-911 reality. Shouldn't we recruit a couple of hundred thousand new troops and give them the proper incentive to join. This way we really could rotate troops and reduce the stress of a normal tour of duty. Any opinions?

Well, one of the good things about an all volunteer military is that it is a natural check on a despotic president (hmmmm, who could that be? LOL) so if we get spread too thin, hopefully the military will mention that to the public and perhaps the public will get rid of the despotic president? Hey, it could happen!

No. I think it would be more expensive than it is now. Even though we started this "Liberation for Iraq" the nations that we have so generously given to over the many decades and are still waiting for possible re-payment should add to our coalition. Should we have to "bribe" Turkey with a multi-billion dollar loan for their help? Where is Korea when we need them? Oh yes we are helping them defend their border- they're busy!


An alternate reality image for everyone-- Hillary Clinton / Al Sharpton win by landslide in 2004

Eeyore,

I fully expect the draft to kick in again before this is all done. I know a guy who joined the Army reserves straight after 9/11. I wonder where he will be sent? So does he.

An alternative I can see as somewhat possible is the formation of corporate units. We already do that for support and policing.

Straight up recruitment is a tough sell during this kind of war. Ergo, draft time again. It won't happen before the elections, though. But what is happening are call-ups of reserves and guards. Also unemployment is driving some to volunteer.

Another thing I expect is at least one book out of the war on terrorism along the lines of Red Badge of Courage.

But if the country was so gung ho on getting justice and new security after 9-11 were are all of the volunteers? Or are we even accepting an increase in troops strength?

And if there has not been an increase of voluntarism, isn't this an indication that there is not that much popular support for military action among the group of people that have to go?

Is there still an increase in volunteerism? I thought that waned after a few months occupation in Iraq. I think the powers that be will do everything they can to avoid a draft (it's bad for war support and votes).

I still have a desparate hope that we'll stop the insanity. Unfortunately, the post-war occupation with Iraq requires around 200,000 troops....almost half of the total Eeyore gave. We just allowed the Baltic states into NATO which requires a defense over there, and other parts of the world are unstable.

Ironically, Bush ran on a platform of decreasing our military oversea commitments. The following is an article with an inside perspective on how things might be better managed: Personnel System Is the Foe
I don't know much about how the army is run, but it's interesting. I'm curious if any of the military members on this forum agree with it.

Getting people to join is not easy. And unless you start implementing the draft again, it will never be easy.

But yes i think we need to increase our troop strength because of threats of war with North Korea over Kim Jong's nuclear ambitions and the demands of the rest of the world.

Ironically, when Bush made his statement, it was before 9/11...

I don't think an increase in troop number is a neccessity. We can win wars without a huge ground force. We cannot hold territory that way, though...

As long as we aren't occupying countries, there is no need for an increase in troop numbers.

With the way our modern military works, after a certain point, increased troops simply become more potential casualties, which no one wants.

The Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps are all on course to make year-end recruiting goals. The Air Force made its recruiting goals for fiscal 2003, enlisting 37,000 new airmen. This was the fourth year in a row it met its goal.

Department of Defense officials report that both new volunteers and re-enlistments continue at a “vigorous rate.”

http://usgovinfo.about.com/b/a/022093.htm

I don't think there is a lack of volunteers signing up for the military.

We DO, however, need to look into how our schools are handling military recruitment. Recruiters have been denied access to about 3,000 U.S. high schools, according to a preliminary report to Congress released in July 2001.

On the subject of volunteers. I live in Tucson, Arizona and after the first few weeks of the war my local news channel 4 KVOA did a segment about temporary citizens. They interviewed recruiters about undocumented but not illegal citizens joining war and thus doing so they could automatically become legal citizens. Has anyone else seen or heard of this?

I'm not sure of the difference between undocumented vs illegal, but many immigrants join the armed forces even during times of peace. As I understand it, recently the citizenship application has been sped up for those non-citizens in the military.

Yep, I've seen news reports on immigrants (mostly Mexican) joining up with the idea that automatic citizenship will be granted.

I think that is fair.

Then we will have a larger community of native Spanish speakers/writers in this country. Good or bad? Eh, whatever. It'll be different.

The point brought up about occupying other countries is important. I don't think we have that mandate (obviously), and so the demands on more people to carry out such a grandiose plan (I'll not run down all the bad reasoning that went into the battle of Iraq) will result in some form of draft.

Hmmmm. Lots of unemployed looking for work. Lots of immigrants looking for citizenship. I guess a carrot/stick approach might work.

To prevent stretching too thin, we need to analyze what missions can be eliminated because the mission is accomplished and the area our guys are at are stable. Take Kosovo, Bosnia, and Liberia. Kosovo and Bosnia is under UN control, so we can move out & I think today is the day that the UN takes control of the situation in Liberia after a month of our guys staying there to cease the fighting.


Edited to add: The reason i think automatic citizenship for illegals is bad is because of the current stint with Gitmo officials like the chaplin and the air force translator. Wedon't bother screening, we jus automatically say "welcome". Wasn't that how the 9/11 hijackers got in?

Good point. Recruiters were denied access to my high school when I enlisted, though I have heard that policy was changed. The school was too concerned about what percentage of the student body went on to college immediately following high school. Those that joined the military hurt their stats. Nevermind of course that many who join the military later use their Montgomery G.I. Bill and go onto college. It's all about the stats. The school also used to deny those who joined the military a day off for their physicals, while seniors were allowed days to visit colleges. The attitude among some in the school's administration was that I was throwing my life away by joining the military. The guidance councilor acted as if I told I her I planned on joining a biker gang.

I think the attitudes many of our schools have towards the military is detrimental to recruitment and it needs to be remedied. The military should have equal access to students, and those that join the military shouldn't be treated as if they are pariahs.



Yes we are. A friend of mine has been almost constantly on deployment for the last 2 years, first in Afghanistan and then Iraq. That is too much of a burden. The Reserves are also being relied upon too heavily. In my opinion the active duty military needs to be expanded. Our military should be geared to fight a two front war effectively. The way it is currently organized it is not, regardless of what some politicians might say. If the North Koreans crossed the 38th Parallel tommorow, we'd be hard pressed to stem the tide. Hopefully the South Koreans can hold.