Letter Never Sent Tell me when to go.

From A Symposium on Citizenship and Military Service by ELLIOTT ABRAMS and ANDREW J. BACEVICH in PARAMETERS:
US Army War College Quarterly (Summer 2001):

Elliot Abrams is, of course, the infamous democrat-turned-republican Neocon creep Bush appointed to the National Security Council

• First, the mythic tradition of the citizen-soldier is dead, its fate sealed by changes in the nature of modern war, in the aims of US national security strategy since the end of the Cold War, and in the aspirations and expectations of American citizens. Given the changing relationship between the individual and the state, spurred particularly by the cultural revolution touched off in the 1960s, the federal government has effectively forfeited its ability to compel citizens to serve in the military. Conscription has become and will remain implausible. To an increasing extent, the individual, not the state, determines the terms under which service is rendered.
• Second, the identity of the “soldier as warrior” has become obsolete. It does not adequately describe the actual function–or, more accurately, the broader range of functions–of American military men and women in the aftermath of the Cold War. As such, it misleads citizens, creates false expectations among would-be recruits, and breeds cynicism among those already in uniform. Certainly, the US military establishment must retain the ability to “fight and win the nation’s wars.” But warfighting as such is not the task immediately confronting those dispatched to succor hungry Kurds or Somalis, occupy Haiti, separate ethnic groups in the Balkans, or pursue a “strategy of engagement” in places like the former Soviet bloc, Central Asia, Latin America, or, indeed, Yemen. Even the limited bombing campaigns that over the past decade have become the preferred US means of employing force–although providing airmen personal experiences approaching something like “combat”–are quite distinct from war as such.

  Some more relevant identity–a refashioning of what it means to be an American soldier–is in order. The reality of US military history offers a rich trove of experience from which to forge just such an identity. For the greater part of that history, the American soldier’s assigned role has not been the passive one of holding himself in readiness to wage war, but the active one of attending to the nation’s existing priorities. Over time, those priorities changed, but they included fighting Native Americans, exploring the West, developing the nation’s economic infrastructure, opening markets abroad, governing colonies and protectorates, advancing the cause of public health, and building the Panama Canal. The relevance of this history to the current quasi-imperial role of US forces is all but self-evident. In the experiences of bluejackets and blue-coated and khaki-clad soldiers of old lies an identity as servants of the nation that may convey more accurately and more compellingly the vital role that the present-day military plays, however much traditionalists may bridle at that role.
  

Reads to me as completing the transformation of the military from defensive force to totalitarian/fascist borg-like entity.

• Third, the force needed to perform the functions of a global constabulary ought to be, to the maximum extent possible, unencumbered by personal responsibilities and obligations. To state the matter simply, in filling the junior enlisted component of that force, the services should recruit mostly 19- or 20-year-old single males and few if any parents, whether single or married, with young children. In short, to the maximum extent possible, the services should abandon their efforts to make military service “family friendly.” Toward that end, the Marine Corps and the Army should adopt the policy proposed in 1993 by General Carl Mundy: that is, enlist only young men and women without family responsibilities. Doing so will oblige the services to reduce their reliance on young single mothers to fill their recruiting quotas. Several benefits will accrue as a result. The number of nondeployables will decline. The perception that women “get over” when it comes to eligibility for long deployments will dissipate. The number of children being raised by caregivers in childcare facilities will diminish.

  Of course, since the creation of the all-volunteer force, the services have found it expedient to do just the opposite, expanding to unprecedented levels the percentage of female soldiers and of soldiers with children in the force. The Army in particular has long since concluded that it cannot fulfill its recruiting missions if it relies on the available pool of single males without children. The feasibility of the recommendation expressed above, therefore, rests in part on overturning that perception. Doing so will require efforts to “de-feminize” the force–instituting policies that will make military service more attractive to males without creating an environment antagonistic to women or formally restricting the opportunities available to those women who do continue to serve.

  Our remaining three findings suggest ways to do just that.

• The fourth finding proposes shifting the “qualifications” debate from gender to standards–from a losing “culture war” battle to a necessary and winnable struggle to restore military professionalism. Specifically, the services should open all specialties to women while simultaneously instituting specialty-specific single performance standards–physical, mental, psychological–specifying what it takes to be an infantryman, a fighter pilot, a submariner, a mechanic, etc. The aim here is to eliminate the existing doublespeak and double standards that are eating away at the military’s tradition of integrity and destroying the confidence of junior officers in their seniors. In light of the research conducted by Charles Moskos, Laura Miller, and others, such a policy will not flood infantry units or submarines with women, few of whom are even interested in combat specialties. But it could contribute to rejuvenating a profession that would once again tell the truth about combat standards and manifest a serious commitment to what it takes to prevail on the battlefield. Such an institution would be more likely to attract and retain serious, high-minded young people.
• Fifth, in a society in which male adolescents find it increasingly difficult to discern what it means to be a man or how to become one, we should promote military service as a rite of passage to manhood. Young males yearn to leave boyhood behind and to become men. But in a society in which fathers are increasingly absent, in which gender roles have blurred, and in which adolescents increasingly trade activities once thought to be “manly” in favor of becoming mere spectators, opportunities for the individual to demonstrate to himself that he is indeed a man have dwindled. The rigor and purposefulness of military service can offer just the opportunity to do a man’s work, something that the Marine Corps has long recognized and effectively exploited. The other services and above all the Army need to do the same. There are more than enough men out there to fill the services’ needs.
• Finally, the demise of the citizen-soldier should not mean that the enlisted force should come predominantly from the poorest and least educated elements of American society, as is increasingly the case. Nor should the officer corps be drawn largely from the offspring of serving officers. Such practices deprive elites of any firsthand knowledge of military affairs and insulate them from the consequences of their decisions about the use of force. Citizens of a democratic superpower should view the first as an invitation to ill-advised policy and the second as creating a dangerous gap between those who rule and those who serve. Therefore, the services should redouble their efforts to provide opportunities for college-bound youth and college graduates to serve. Offering a wider range of short-term enlistment options, particularly for those specialties that do not require lengthy technical training, could well do just that. In a society where many young people seek an alternative to the consumer culture, we should promote military service to college students as a way to serve the nation. The same impulses that lead to joining the Foreign Service or the Peace Corps should be tapped for recruiting today’s military.

  We live in an era in which the phrase “military power” conjures up images of high-tech gadgetry. In fact, however, the resources constituting the foundation of present-day US military superiority are first of all human and only secondarily technological. We do not pretend that the findings offered here or the essays that follow offer the last word on how to preserve that foundation. But we are convinced of one thing: to pretend that pay raises, ad campaigns, and new headgear will fend off the forces that threaten that foundation is an illusion. The all-volunteer force is in jeopardy. Bold, imaginative, and courageous action will be required to preserve it.
  

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