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Contributors
Gordon
Cucullu- Contributor
Former Green
Beret lieutenant colonel, Gordon Cucullu is now an editorialist,
author and a popular speaker. Born into a military
family, he lived and served for more than thirteen years in East
Asia, including eight years in Korea. For his Special Forces
service in Vietnam he was awarded a Bronze Star, Vietnamese Cross
of Gallantry, and the Presidential Unit Commendation. After separation
from the Army, he worked on Korea and East Asian affairs at both
the Pentagon and Department of State as well as an executive
for General Electric in Korea. His first major non-fiction work,
Separated
at Birth: How North Korea became the Evil Twin, is
based in large part on his extensive experience in
Korea and East Asia as a governmental insider and businessman.
[website]
[go to Cucullu index]
 Save
Those Matches
The
Democrat draft...
[Gordon Cucullu] 10/27/04
Sometimes
urban legends arise, seemingly from nowhere, other times they
are deliberately created. One of the
most blatant creations is John F. Kerry and the Democrat Party’s
accusation that President George W. Bush has a ‘secret plan’ that
will be activated in January to reinstate national military conscription
- a draft. Factually this one is as bogus as the ‘giant alligators
in the NY sewers’ story. But it has been launched with malicious
premeditation.
The
purpose of the lie is, of course, to frighten young people,
and their families and friends into voting for
Kerry to keep little Johnny from donning desert camo BDUs and
heading to the war. The draft lie (like the ‘privatization of
Social Security,’ ‘disenfranchisement of Black voters,’ and ‘end
of Medicare’ lies) is designed strictly for the purpose of seeding
confusion, dissention and division in the minds of voters. When
Kerry and John Edwards speak of a ‘country more divided than
any time in our history,’ they need only look at their own Democrat
National Committee strategy to understand why that is so. They
are promulgating the divisive myths.
What this strategy reflects is Democrat contempt
for the voter that is breathtaking in its scope and implications.
Its very foundation is a belief in the culpability and stupidity
of the American people and on the fact that Americans are too
cowardly, unpatriotic and selfish to recognize that they may
be legitimately called upon to help their country in time of
need. It also reflects a troubling fact: the DNC has consciously
adopted a strategy based on lies and disinformation because the
ultimate objective of recapturing political power justifies all
means used, including the most repugnant.
Their quest for power is so naked and
grasping that we may end up looking to Afghanistan and Iraq for
guidance on what a ‘clean’ election is. How did we end up this
way? is a less important question than What are we going to do
to change things? Frankly the only way to change this disgusting
strategy of lie, innuendo and rumor is at the polling place.
A sound defeat will put the DNC back on its heels and descredit
the shoddy characters who run it now, the MacAuliffs, Carvilles,
Begalas, and others of their ilk. A Kerry win validates their
strategy and perpetuates it.
What
about the issue of a draft? In the face of rising military
shortfalls is reinstatement of a draft out
of the question? Quite simply, yes. A draft is not required or
desirable for several reasons. Practically, it would take time,
effort and selection to implement a workable system that would
eventually produce adequately trained troops. Today’s confrontations
don’t require sheer numbers as were needed in WW II, Korea or
Vietnam. Today we need soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines
who are consummate professionals mastering a variety of technology-based,
complex skills. Pentagon officials categorically reject reinstatement
of a draft.
Many
of our previous wars too many perhaps were
characterized by the tactics of ‘hey, diddle diddle, right up
the middle.’ We used massive troop formations to assault objectives
that we now degrade with precision guided munitions, unmanned
drones and superior weaponry. Earlier generations stumbled around
in the dark fighting by Braille. This generation owns the night
and prefers to fight in
the dark, knowing full well that advanced night vision gives
them the capability to minimize friendly casualties and inflict
maximum damage on the enemy. Troops learn to fight with advanced
infantry and armor tactics. They control artillery, direct air
strikes and utilize information management right down into the
foxholes via the laptop.
Most
critically, our troops have become skilled at and aware of
the need to interact with a population of an
entirely foreign culture. They are sensitive to foreign religious
sites and civilian population centers, sometimes to the fault
of absorbing casualties. They are language-trained, informed
on cultural issues, aware of religious prohibitions and disciplined
toward the civilian population. Abuses like rape, looting, assaults
and murders things that were all too common during the US Army’s
march across Europe in WWII - are virtually absent in today’s
army. A volunteer army first demanded by the American people
post-Vietnam War has been effective.
There is a rather simple, obvious alternative
to the draft if and when our leaders feel the need for more troops:
issue a call to arms and a request for volunteers, preferably
from the president himself. This step has not been taken in the
War on Terror. Perhaps it ought to be; perhaps it will be. That
clarion call will be sufficient to bring America's best and brightest
into the military. Increased pay and benefits are nice inducements,
but our young people serve from a sense of duty, patriotism and
sacrifice. They have carried the war victoriously to the enemy
and will continue to do so. In return we need only give them
the support, gratitude, and respect they have earned.
So
a few words for all of you quaking in your boots contemplating
burning your draft cards: Save your matches,
Spineless Ones. America’s Armed Forces want you only if you walk
through the door with your heads held high and your backs straight,
ready to volunteer to serve your country. Draft dodgers need
not apply. CRO
copyright
Gordon Cucullu 2004
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