We often hear emotional appeals from a big section of people that the
best way to ensure India’s safety and to ‘’discipline’’ the youth, compulsory
military service should be made mandatory.
Is that really the answer?
Conscription, or drafting, is the compulsory enlistment of
people in a national service, most often a military service. This practice dates back to ancient times, and continues
in a number of countries to date. Conscription is controversial for a range of
reasons, ranging from religious to philosophical, to not supporting the
government’s participation in the given conflict.
Compulsory military service is necessary in the following
cases:-
·
When a country has a very limited population. It could be a
country like Israel which is surrounded by enemy states and hence needs every
able bodied man or woman to serve in the army for a specific period. Or it
could be a sparsely populated relatively peaceful country like Finland, which
keeps a bare minimum personnel in the forces and fills the rest by
conscription.
·
Powerful countries like Russia and USA, which are apex powers
with a gigantic military industrial complex. The military influence of these
countries go well beyond their borders. In case of USA, it has been at war
one way or another, for much of its existence as a nation. USA has
more than 800 military bases across the world, and its weapons manufacturing
lobby ensures that the govt has no other option but to buy what they produce.
·
When a country is undergoing a civil war, or is under
existential threat owing to both heavy internal disturbance or external
aggression.
·
When a country has the mechanism to reintegrate the discharged
conscript into meaningful work in civilian life.
Even though conscription has to be used in such cases, its
not always that it gives the desired results.
USA eliminated the draft system in the 1970s, after the Vietnam
war where it got its hands bloodied, and as its military became more high tech.
The US armed services found that they needed
relatively fewer recruits to serve longer than conscription provided. As the
numbers that were needed shrank, the unfairness of the draft became more
prominent. Contrary to the image portrayed, the youth always found ways to
become “draft dodgers”, that included either decamping to Canada, making a
nuisance of themselves to everyone in authority, in case of rich daddy’s kids
straightaway buying their way out, and deriding those who served. Russia too is
no different in this regard , where besides the rich buying their way out of
the draft, allegedly half (75000 out of the annual 150000) of eligible conscripts (ages18-27) dodge the
draft by various means , may it be with PhD enrollment, allowing them to put off
service until they age out of the draft, or by feigning illness by bribing the
medical authorities or serving as policeman or fireguard. This inspite the fact
that the conscription period has been brought down to 18 months.
A huge number of defence personnel find it
exceedingly difficult to find employment after retirement in civilian life
which matches the level of their service in the forces. Barring the technical
people, most find that their skills cannot be used outside the forces, and
hence, in a huge number of cases, they have to inevitably settle for something
which is very less than what they are worth. If this is the condition for
people who have served all their working life in the military, it must be
understood that there is absolutely no mechanism in process to absorb
back a poorly skilled conscript who will be discharged after his compulsory
service is over.
Today’s highly sophisticated and specialized
militaries in the world have little or no use for short term soldiers, and
today’s leaders have no interest in giving significant returns to conscripts
and in many cases, talk about manpower reduction.In old days of foot infantry
and cavalry warfare, with little mechanization, there was a need for just about
every able bodied person as the theatre of the conflict expanded. Today, any competent military , high
tech or otherwise, needs just a small fraction of its country’s population to
operate. Even in case of an all out war breaking out, conscripts trained
for just a few weeks will fall like flies (The western front in WW I is one big
example) and in case of non combat guard duties, could turn into a case
difficult to handle, owing to the lack of temperament that a regular soldier
develops as a part of his training.
“If the object is fighting, a person trained
only for a few months is useless. In a noncombat defense position, he would be
worse than useless. He would be dangerous.” – Philip Gold , Against All
Terrors: This Nation’s Next Defense
The example of our dear neighbor is very telling in case of
military training for ‘’talented youth’’ gone wrong. Its ruled by three A’s-
Allah, Army and America. And it’s the Army that has the country. It got a boost
when US money poured into it for the 1979-89 Soviet Afghan war. Thousands of Deobandi
madrassas were established in Punjab province by CIA-ISI combine, and having
madmen like General Zia ul Haq at helm only made things worse. Thousands of
recruits sprang out of these semenaries and were also sent to wreck mayhem in
India, in Punjab and later in Kashmir. Today, the same set up survives, and has
become a nightmare for Pakistan, as it has found out that not all the terrorist
groups can be used against India, and many of them are openly attacking
Pakistani forces and civilians. Pak army has been fighting a disastrous war in
Waziristan since 2004, which has caused as per official figures more than 10000
deaths and casualties (real figures can be anybody’s guess). The terrorists
that they are fighting come from the same establishment which their own
military and intelligence had set up three decades earlier.
USA has the problem of discharged conscripts/servicemen
facing various issues like homelessness, unemployment, drug abuse, suicide. And
in their last two wars, they have mostly died for Halliburton and Blackwater
than for stars and stripes.
What will happen in India if people of criminal tendencies and
disturbed mindsets get military training, and after discharge are recruited by
gangsters or political parties or jihadi organizations? And even without this
scenario.,how many cases of rage killing will we see?
Wastage of skills will be another
issue. Not everyone is cut out to be a soldier. Not everyone carries the temperament
to wield weapons and execute orders to the best. When labor is both free and
abundant, it will be squandered and abused, and paid the least and this is what
happens always. The US government took advantage of its free supply of
almost unlimited manpower by underpaying its servicemen, thereby losing many
recruits who might have chosen a military career, and also getting
killed/ruining many others who could have had developed necessary skills in
civilian life. In case of US, the draft was abysmal, making the budding scientist
clean trash in the base, giving the sickly guy meal delivering duties to field
hospitals, or the budding sportsman to be sent out to be killed in action.
People with powerful parents got cushy positions, while the poor got the
horrible tasks. If this was the case in days of raising mass armies, what can
be the result today when the military is much more high tech and requires less
manpower to run? Raising the pay happened when volunteer service was introduced
and it eliminated the need for the draft in US.
The cost of compulsory military service will be
astronomical as organized
compulsion costs more than real volunteering. Direct costs would include
assembling, sorting and training millions of youth, their deployment,
mobilization. Indirect costs will include clothing, medical coverage,
accommodation, leaves, law enforcement needed for such huge numbers. Not even
the richest country on earth can afford it, and its out of question for any country
with a population of 200 million plus. Can one thousand conscripted youth be trusted
with a task which is handled by twenty well trained soldiers? Forget about
being a help, they will be a liability to the full time soldier, and might even
compromise the safety of the unit.
India has no dearth of able bodied young men
who can become good soldiers. The shortage is for officers to the rank of major,
which cannot be filled by conscription. And the most important thing is that,
India has no military industrial complex, and inspite of being the third
largest army in the world, has negligible presence in global conflicts. We do
not have any territorial ambitions, not do wish to be part of any international
theatre, besides UN peacekeeping.
The people who make an appeal for
conscription, need to understand that anything that is forced, ceases to be a
''service'', and does not ensure the personnel best suited for the job to be
recruited in it. Infact it brings down the quality of the entire organization.
The Indian armed forces are professional and voluntary, and thats how they
function the best. There are many noble ways to serve one’s country. Bearing
arms happens to be one of them, but that’s not the only one.
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