The Draft

This country is now involved in a war. It will be involved in war--hot or cold--for many years, perhaps many decades to come. So runs the reasoning of these plotting the country's policy, and there is little basis for disagreeing with them. Somehow the nation must provide the manpower and the skills over a long period both for a large army and for its civilian needs. This is why the present draft program soon must be replaced by a long-range plan, one which will balance off the needs of civil professions and the military.

Now under discussion are three proposals for such a long-run program. The first, Universal Military Training, is embodied in an Administration bill before Congress. Put forward long before the international situation deteriorated to its present condition, this measure is much too cumbersome to be effective: its provisions for a special Training Corps, partly under civilian control, do not get men for the necessarily large standing army now needed. The President will probably kill this proposal, in favor of one of the other two possibilities, Universal Military Service or some sort of deferment plan.

Universal Service would draft all men at 18, or when they complete secondary school, and give them two years of Army training. There would be no deferments; even 4-F's would serve in some capacity. Opposed to this proposal are several plans, all providing for deferments for some students.

Proponents of U.M.S. feel that deferring men for school would create an elite in the colleges, and that there would be a race for grades which could destroy college life. They also attack any national test to decide who serves and who goes to school; it would, they say, merely discriminate against those who have poor backgrounds rather than actually measure intelligence. And only men who can afford college and get admitted to one would be deferred.

Arguments Against

Advocates of deferments, however, argue that U.M.S. would get only 18-year-olds for the army, that the services would have to draft experts, technicians, and doctors twice--once when they are 18 and again after they have received their professional training. During the first two years of U.M.S., colleges would not have students. Small schools might have to close altogether, and many would perhaps never reopen. There would also be a break in the flow of trained personnel into civilian professions, a loss which, deferment plan backers think, would seriously hurt the nation's ability to come through the international crisis.

No matter which program the Congress chooses, there will be harmful effects. It is a question of which plan's defects will hurt the fewer people and do so for the shorter time. The situation ten years away must be considered now.

From this point of view Universal Service is the better plan. The problem of the college elite, the discriminatory test, the grade, rat race will always be with the country under a deferment system, while the most harmful results of installing U.M.S. will affect the nation only for the first two years.

If Congress adopts U.M.S., the plan should take effect slowly, with some induction postponements allowed during the opening years. Colleges would be helped over the initial break, and then the full plan could be installed when the first men begin returning after their service.

If the army makes its positions for technically trained men more attractive, volunteers might provide all the skill the standing army needs. Of course, it might be necessary for the army to set up its own training program for doctors and other experts, sending them through college itself.

In any case there will be a great amount of trouble. But there is no doubt that this nation now faces a long-term crisis, and that our decision in this situation is between trouble and annihilation.