A 7-year old girl bent over her table game while the 6 o’clock TV news droned in the background. Suddenly, there was news about American soldiers dying in Iraq.
Her head popped up and she asked if that news was about her Uncle Jake who is in the Army. Hearing that it wasn’t her uncle, she went back to her game.
An adult refused for months to discuss the pros and cons of the war in Iraq. When her nephew returned safely, she could once again intellectually debate the war.
During the Gulf War in 1991, I asked a friend if she watched the news carefully to catch sight of her son. She said some of her friends did that, but she couldn’t bear to watch the war news at all.
American families with sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts or uncles fighting in Iraq feel differently about the war than other people do. Their concerns about the war are more intense because their concerns are of the heart.
Whether they are for or against the war, the issues are personal, close, living inside them.
People who have loved ones in Iraq are themselves more vulnerable. They live every minute knowing that in the next minute they could plunge into grief.
There are, of course, huge differences between the lives of men and women who fight in the war and those who do not. There are also big differences between the day-to-day lives of their loved ones.
Which is one persuasive argument for bringing back the draft.
Simply stated, if each and every parent believed that their son or daughter could be drafted sometime during the next, say, five years, they would pay more attention to the war today.
If each and every man or woman believed that their wife or husband could be drafted before New Year’s Eve 2004, they would pay attention.
If each and every parent had to be concerned that their child’s other parent would be drafted before the Fourth of July 2005, they would think regularly about the war.
The war would be personal, and we would all pay close attention.
It is not that way now.
Just before the election there were Internet-driven discussions about two bills in the U.S. Legislature that could restart the draft. People who never write letters to legislators and political candidates did then.
Political responses to the citizen unrest were quick and dramatic. A public figure, who will be unnamed here, said citizen concern was – I think the word was – hogwash.
We got e-mail letters at home from candidates in both parties saying the draft was just not going to happen. Both presidential candidates reassured the public that there would not be a draft.
But political reassurances were nowhere near enough. The Congress eliminated both bills overnight. Public expressions of concern exploded and official reaction was quick and total.
Talk about shock and awe.
That raises questions. Most importantly, how would the public respond to hearing that the United States is going to reinstitute the draft out of necessity? The necessity would be, as one general candidly told Congress during World War II, we need bodies to fight the war.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Selective Service Act in 1940. The draft began in 1948. Public arguments were common during the draft years.
One serious argument in Congress was whether the country should draft fathers. Many felt it would permanently change the family structure in the United States.
Another was whether various deferments were fair in a free country. For years, men who could attend college were deferred and women were never drafted.
Then we moved to a lottery, which gave a roughly equal draft chance to most adult males. The lottery made the draft – and the Vietnam War – more personal.
Then, in 1973, the United States eliminated the draft and went to an all-volunteer army and wars are now much less personal to many more people.
But wars should always be personal.
American adults can agree or not with the war in Iraq, but it is only fair for them to make their judgments on the war as parents of children will be sent to fight it.
Bill France, a father of three, is a child advocate in the criminal justice system and has worked as director of clinical programs at Luther Child Center in Everett. Send e-mail to bsjf@gte.net.
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