Just How Bad Was The Draft?
Ann Friedman writes “Today’s social-justice activists start with very different conditions than those that existed in the 1960s. Yes, the student protests against the Vietnam War shook the country to its core. But it’s not hard to connect the dots between the absence of a draft for the Iraq War and the lack of ongoing protest today.”
This sentiment seems to undermine the righteousness of Vietnam war protestors. They weren’t protesting the inherent wrongness of the War, or the killing of Vietnamese civilians, they were instead looking out for themselves. This argument strikes me not only as wrong, but also as a little offensive to someone (unlike Ann) who could potentially be drafted.
Let’s go back and think about what the draft meant in Vietnam. It mean that young American men would be randomly selected to serve in the military, and to fight in a war that was interminable, unwinnable, founded on lies and directly lead to the killing of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese civilians. Just under 18,000 American draftees were killed in Vietnam. (For comparison, some 4,100 volunteers have died in Iraq) These were 18,000 young men who had been arbitrarily picked to die in a pointless war. Isn’t that a massive crime, not even withstanding all the other reasons the Vietnam war was wrong? There are few governmental actions more worth protesting than the Vietnam wartime draft.
The reason I write about the draft so passionately is that many on the Left don’t seem to take it seriously enough. David Sirota, for instance, supports a draft because he thinks it would jumpstart an anti-war movement. Sirota probably would never get drafted. I, on the other hand, could very well be cannon-fodder for his double-bankshot plan to build up public opposition to the war. The draft is something that shouldn’t be discussed likely, and opposition to it should never be trivialized. It’s a horrible, offensive, murderous institution that ought to be abolished.
My previous impassioned anti-draft post is here. But if there’s one blogger who’s written great, impassioned stuff about how awful the selective service is, it’s Mike Meginnis.
I’m pretty confused by this post.
You find it offensive, as someone who is eligible for the draft, that a person who isn’t eligible for the draft would suggest the potential to be drafted might have an effect on the urgency with which someone opposes war. You think to suggest their own personal stake in the war might affect a person’s level of opposition to it is not only wrong but also offensive. And then, you express that as someone eligible for the draft, you have a much greater aversion to the draft than someone like Sirota, who doesn’t have as much to lose. Clearly, eligibility for the draft affects your level of interest in war policies, then, no? It hits closer to home for you, so it isn’t just something to mess around with in abstracts.*
Plus, I think you add more evidence to support Friedman’s hypothesis later in the post.
“Let’s go back and think about what the draft meant in Vietnam. It mean that young American men would be randomly selected to serve in the military, and to fight in a war that was interminable, unwinnable, founded on lies and directly lead to the killing of hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese civilians.”
See, this is pretty much the description of the Iraq War. So looking at this logically, why might the grassroots protests against Vietnam have been so much more prominent than protests against the Iraq War? I think you answer it right here:
“Just under 18,000 American draftees were killed in Vietnam. (For comparison, some 4,100 volunteers have died in Iraq) These were 18,000 young men who had been arbitrarily picked to die in a pointless war. Isn’t that a massive crime, not even withstanding all the other reasons the Vietnam war was wrong? There are few governmental actions more worth protesting than the Vietnam wartime draft.”
I’m really not sure you’ve demonstrated in any way why Friedman’s point should be offensive OR that it could be wrong. In fact, you do pretty much the opposite. As you say, it’s hard to imagine anything more worthy of protest than selective service, let alone that a draft wouldn’t ignite wartime protests. It sounds like you just don’t want anyone who doesn’t have to register for the draft hypothesizing about its effects.
*just a side note: Just because only young males are the only ones registered for the draft, doesn’t mean Friedman is suggesting only they would have become war protesters as a result. The draft of young men affects their families and girlfriends and everyone they know, and the presence of the draft very well could have a deep impact on the personal lives of all Americans, including women who are themselves exempt from the draft. I honestly don’t see many people, men or women, young or old, who trivialize the draft.
haley1018
August 20, 2008 at 2:30 pm
I think Haley pretty much gotcha there.
batojar
August 20, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Haley, you make a ton of good points and you’re right, this post is pretty confusing and inconsistent.
I was trying to get across two things with “trivialization.” One is the implication(maybe this is paranoia on my part) that Vietnam protesters were “only” protesting the draft. I vibe I get from these types of comments is that draft protests were trivial and that the American people only cared about a horrible war when it was their own children getting killed. Now, I don’t think Friedman was quite phrasing it that way, but I think this general popular consensus severely understates just how bad the draft was, and how it’s a uniquely horrible thing that deserved massive protest. This wasn’t just selfishness on the part of young people, it was a protest against state-sponsored militaristic slavery.
On the comparison between Vietnam and Iraq, I’d argue that Vietnam was much worse, and that it’s rather simplistic to say that all the protests were draft-driven (I know I sound like I’m contradicting myself here). For one, more than 10x more American soldiers died in Vietnam, probably more Vietnamese civilians and then there was the expansion of the war into Cambodia and Laos. One detail that is forgotten in remembering the war protest is that the anti-war movement gained a ton of steam when the war expanded into Cambodia, which had noting to do with the draft. I think that captures how the Vietnam War, even without the draft, was much worse than what’s going on in Iraq.
As far as people who trivialize the draft, I’d argue that those liberals like Sirota who want to implement draft so to stoke an anti-war group are trivializing a draft, and are essentially using young men as pawns in their political schemes. That’s a priori wrong. I also don’t think that a draft would necessarily make us less warlike. The Korean and Vietnam wars were both massive, lasted a long time and killed tens of thousands of American soldiers, and all were fought while there was a draft. Also, I think if we had a much larger military, we would be more likely to engage in more wars, especially if there’s another terrorist attack.
But Haley, I really shouldn’t be writing this much in response. You pointed out a bunch of inconsistencies and unfair insinuations throughout my post, and hopefully your criticisms will make my writing better in the future.
Matt Zeitlin
August 20, 2008 at 5:59 pm
Thanks for clarifying what you were attempting to convey, Matt. I agree with pretty much everything you say in your comment, when you flesh out your points this way.
I also didn’t mean to say the ONLY difference between Iraq and Vietnam was the draft, just wanted to stress that it seems impossible to me that the draft didn’t have something to do with the massive numbers of protesters.
If people have suggested it was only fear of personal loss and not a greater opposition to the ethics of a selective service motivating ‘Nam protests, I would agree completely that that trivializes the commitment and positions of those who have opposed the draft in the present and the past. But from Friedman’s article, her allusion to the draft was so brief, I don’t think it’s fair to imply that was her position. Instead, I assumed it was a recognition that with the added stress a draft puts on the nation and the injustice it adds to an unjust war, it’s easy to see why students might be more invigorated protesters. And that point just seems like common sense to me…it seems like it does to you as well.
haley1018
August 20, 2008 at 6:28 pm
[...] — who has a good and gracious reply to my last post in the comments, incidentally — has reminded me that I meant to make something of a crusade against the Selective Service Administration. [...]
Ways to End the World › How the draft, and registration, warp and degrade men and women.
August 20, 2008 at 9:46 pm