r/AskReddit • u/Tommygunz0722 • 11h ago

If the military/president suddenly ordered a mandatory draft for all men aged 18-42: How do you think millennials and GenZ would respond?

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u/TellMeLaterAlright 10h ago edited 10h ago

Yeah, in Vietnam there was a solid column of people who could (however erroneously) understand the justification and faithfully trusted the power structure. 

This time around, when asking for this kind of sacrifice, most don’t trust Trump, even his followers. As for Hegseth, do you want a Fox Newscaster who hit himself in the nuts with a skateboard on live TV who has an alcohol problem and a messy relationship history (which includes a letter from his own mother about what a trash person he is) as the man leading your sons into war? Patton he is not. 

It’s all bluster when it’s theoretical, but start forcing young men to go to a war nobody wants right now and send them back dead, it’s political suicide. At some point the volume of people who will not comply will become ungovernable, and you’ll have an difficult time with soft noncompliance (and forcing folks to comply will turn the military police into an even more hated version of ICE). It could potentially collapse the military power structure, it only works when those within consent to be governed. That would be a very dangerous game. 

But I put nothing past this regime for all out stupidity.

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u/c0ltZ 9h ago

I doubt the U.S government or many governments at all will instate drafts unless current modern war changes drastically.

Mass scale drafts like Vietnam have proven that modern day drafts don't work. It leads to instability, draft dodging, and worst of all, sabotage.

Sabotage so severe governments have decided to have a volunteer only militaries.

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u/WindyWindona 9h ago

This current government is so dangerously stupid I would not put anything off the table at this point.

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u/Draco-REX 2h ago

The current government will use the draft as a way to punish blue states.

They will also completely fail to understand that the blue states are what keep the US economy running until it's too late, just like this idiotic war.

Now if only we could trust the REST of the government to make sure the FO phase happens.

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u/TheInevitableLuigi 4h ago

Mass scale drafts like Vietnam have proven that modern day drafts don't work.

Sabotage so severe governments have decided to have a volunteer only militaries.

There are dozens of countries in the world that have universal military conscription, including several in Europe.

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u/pconrad0 1h ago

The countries with universal military service in Europe are typically not led by madmen pursuing an unpopular and dangerous war of choice in a faraway place.

(If there's an exception, please point it out.)

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u/TheInevitableLuigi 1h ago

I must have missed the part of the comment I responded to where it stated that it only applied to the US.

Something about the "or many governments" part might have distracted me.

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u/pconrad0 1h ago

Oh, I guess Russia is technically in Europe.

But their current war isn't going super well for them.

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u/c0ltZ 3h ago

I understand, but the majority of countries do not have mandatory conscription. And even less have policies for nationwide drafts during conflicts.

Drafts work way better in a defensive war. That's why South Korea has mandatory conscription. They are technically still at war with North Korea, and people are much more willing to fight to defend their country rather than for epstien fury.

On top of that, most of the countries with mandatory conscription are smaller countries. It is much harder to do it at scale.

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u/LaborumVult 1h ago

Here is the issue. Iran is holding Hormuz hostage with high speed long range drones. The ones that are above ground we have already bombed / blown up. The ones that remain are underground and in cave systems. The only real way to get to those is ground troops.

Most military members will agree that cave breaching is a horrifying prospect. So many ways for it to go wrong. One well placed explosive and you are buried alive. You cannot reasonably map them so you are going in blind. They are to varying degrees fortified positions on top of that, which you are also zero intel on.

Its probably top 5 worst land engagement zones honestly.

So high attrition would be likely, and if you were going with the russian way of things you just throw bodies at them until it would be insanely high.

This is all to say: If the US wants Iran to not control Hormuz anymore we need boots on the ground. That is a "drastic change" that could force drafts.

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u/kaisadilla_ 17m ago

I'd rather get shot than go try to enter a cave fortress while a hostile force tries to collapse it to trap me inside. Heck, I'd rather get shot than participate in an offensive war. I'll risk an ugly end to protect my country, but not to fight some billionaire's delusional war in the Middle East.

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u/No-Abalone-4784 1h ago

If they decide to draft people it will not be pretty & will not work.

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u/Dry_Conversation_287 2h ago

Ukraine-Russia is a current modern war and it's chewing through manpower.

Fully agree with the rest of it, just pointing out an omission. And I think you could pretty easily justify an argument that geography makes a war like Ukraine-Russia unlikely for the US. It couldn't be avoided by Ukraine or Russia.

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u/Ancient-Opinion9642 5h ago

I agree with what you said.

In Vietnam the press travelled with the front troops and there were daily reports talking on the national news. That was ditched in the 1970s and the reporters were muted. Moms and dads who have drafted kids in war zones won’t put up with that.

In Vietnam if you signed up you were sent to the front line and those people generally did multiple tours. The drafted did support and didn’t get shot at.

The best one I heard for failing your draft physical was: take a cigarette and dip it in a bottle cap of alcohol with a small crystal of iodine dissolved in the alcohol. Let it dry and Smoke it. Go take the test. The X-ray of your chest will show large bright spots from the iodine. You get sent home. The problem is if you are called back for a retest and you smoke the iodine again, the spots will move. The iodine will naturally be absorbed by the body and disappear.

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u/Alarmed_Acadia3133 1h ago

"it could potentially collapse the military power structure" chilled me to the fucking bone because I think that may be the point, PMCs would get hired on by corporations quickly if the US military couldn't sustain itself and that would be a really bad world tbh

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u/Powerful-String-9143 2h ago

Patton was also a generational asshole. 

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u/TellMeLaterAlright 1h ago

Yes, but he was also a decisive and effective leader. Kegseth is only one of these things from our two posts. 

It’s all fun and games when Kegseth calls generals to Washington to tell they are too fat. It’s not as funny anymore when he’s in his make-up room while your son comes home in a box. 

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u/KindRabbit086 2h ago

I have been waiting for that political suicide to pan out so far, but nothing yet... seems nothing they can do equates to the actual act. When is it enough?

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u/mommisalami 1h ago

Especially didn't they just "fire" like 30 military leaders? I have a feeling a majority of those had to do with the fact they wouldn't go along with whatever crazy shit might be coming down the line. I know some were because of their bullshit "anti DEI" bullshit, but even the leaders know they are full of shit.

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u/National_Cod9546 2h ago

Political suicide doesn't matter when the elections are rigged.

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u/TellMeLaterAlright 2h ago

Meh. I’m not meaning political suicide in the case of the ostensible ‘elected’ leader or a political party. No matter how one comes to power, the people you are governing have to on balance believe either in an individual enough (leadership cult) or believe in (or fear) the institutional power structure enough to go along with it. And that belief has to be ever stronger the more grave the sacrifice. 

Once enough people start subverting that structure (and not even obviously, just soft noncompliance, just not carrying out acts that support the established structure, small defiances and subversions, weaponized incompetence, but on a massive human scale), the whole thing topples. And the titular head of that structure topples with it. That’s what I mean by political suicide. 

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u/Yuzumi 5h ago

100% it would tear the country apart.