Massie Opposes This Ridiculous Female Draft Idea
Massie Break With Republicans to Oppose National Defense Authorization Act
You may have voluntarily served in the military at some point in your life. However, could you support involuntary service even if it might come with perks like free college education through the G.I. Bill?
Some Republicans notably broke with their party to vote against the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for Fiscal Year 2025.
Majorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Thomas Massie (R-KY), and Matt Rosendale (R-MT) joined Democrats in opposing items in the NDAA that included requiring women to register for the draft and requiring the Secretary of Defense to reimburse expenses related to abortion services.
Were they right to? Well, when Massie previously opposed a previous iteration of the NDAA (for F.Y. 2013), he called provisions that would have allowed indefinite detention of U.S. citizens without trial a violation of “fundamental rights recognized since the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215 A.D.”
The draft could be seen as nearly the same thing: Forcing citizens into a job they do not want against their will and potentially even forcing them into the “kill or be killed” environment of the front lines. Very few allowances are made for individuals who voice their moral opposition to a war that the United States might just give up on anyway. The Biden Administration’s bungled withdrawal from Afghanistan after more than a decade of fighting the Taliban will still be fresh in many people’s minds, for instance.
Some people who had previously had poor experiences during a major war might simply prefer to sit the next one out. Holocaust survivor and immigrant (and later Orlando-area businessman and philanthropist) Henri Landwirth managed to convince the Army to keep him stateside after being drafted for the Korean War.
The draft might be a little understandable in a situation in which the United States has to respond to a severe enough attack like Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. This triggered the United States’ entry into World War II. It’s fair to say that plenty of young men would have volunteered anyway. Japan had awakened a sleeping dragon despite warnings from its own senior military officers. Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto noted that there would be “a gun behind every blade of grass” if Japan could stage a serious invasion. He wasn’t wrong.
However, the draft has been seen as less critical to the survival of the United States since then. The backlash against drafts for the Vietnam War was so severe that the U.S. Government has not implemented a draft since then. To be fair, unlike World War II, Vietnam was not an earth-shattering conflict for all that it was meant to help contain the spread of Soviet-style communism. No one wanted to die fighting for a small, insignificant country halfway around the world.
The draft has not gained in popularity since then. Young men should theoretically be able to handle the physical demands of military service. Even given the estimated 77% of young men under the age of 25 who are unsuitable for military services due to their physical or mental condition (admittedly a dismal figure), that leaves 23% of young men who could hack it. That should be enough to respond to most emergencies.
So why draft women at all? On its face, this should make sense if women demand equality. Equal rights and privileges should also come with equal responsibilities – up to and including being eligible for the military draft.
However, conservative advocacy groups like the Family Research Council oppose it. It argues that drafting women is “an ill-conceived and reckless policy.” Even if active duty military personnel has to be more than doubled to 5 million people, that would only mean drafting an additional 1.4% of American adult men – far less than the 23% of men who may be eligible for military service. So drafting women would be unnecessary in all but the most dire of conceivable circumstances.
So it makes sense to avoid requiring that women register for the draft. Even the proposed automatic registration of men when they turn 18 years old may be questionable. It requires young people to involuntarily risk signing away years of their lives in the event that a draft is needed – and potentially sending reluctant draftees to the front lines in a war. So the three Republicans who broke with their party to vote against this year’s NDAA may have been justified by doing so.
Nor does the military need draftees for two or three years. They need trained technicians. Helicopter mechanics, not learned in six weeks.
Different needs. Not just bodies.