Kerry part 2

[Watchman]

The tone of your post indicates perhaps a dissatisfaction with a conscripted service. National service may indeed provoke the observations made by your brother.

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Since Senator Kerry was not making misplaced remarks about Finnish conscripts but about US professionals, I don't think your argument helps him.

Argument ? Merely an observation. And I - as well as most Finns, my brother included - actually quite like our concript/reservist system. It has all kinds of neat attributes. One is that it's a cheap way of maintaining troops in the numbers required for credible regional defense. Another is that as it is a civic duty shared by everyone (okay, so it's voluntary for women), the motivation is ultimately high.
The fact that reservist armies frankly suck for foreign adventures also rather helps disperse certain worries people might have of what the ultimately soldiers get employed for, and discourages the governement from getting stupid ideas.

But one of the altogether greatest assets in the system is the fact that not counting certain small groups (some pacifistic religious sects and the inhabitants of the Åland islands, which have been demilitarized with an international treaty since around WW1) and sufficient medical conditions, each and every adult male undergoes it. Rich, poor, upper class, lower class, second-generation Somali immigrant or scion of ancient German noble family, it's all the same. Everyone dons the uniform (affectionately known as "the cucumber suit"), lives in the same dreary barracks, eats the same bland food, undergoes the same training regimes, stands guard over a tent in driving rain deep in the woods, has to put up with the same annoying regulations and officers... Does wonders for a certain sense of social camaraderie and belonging irrespective of individual background, you know ?

More practically, not a few guys rather benefit from the experience of having to arrange their beds and tie their shoelaces themselves. Having to deal with the kinds of idiots you'd normally avoid like the plague also builds interpersonal skills and tolerance.

However, the US Forces and the UK Forces are both volunteer and professional. They provide ways for young people to excel, and build the skills necessary to take that excellence back into the civilian community. Service also builds character and resilience.

It's also an interesting detail that by what I understand of it not a few of the US ones do it to pay for their future education. (I personally rather prefer a system where the poor have fair chances of getting decent upper education without having to risk their lives in uniform, but...)

Which sort of illustrates one of the issues with straight volunteer/professional militaries, namely the inescapable underlying suspicion of "the poor fighting for the rich". I'm willing to bet the lower ends of the social and income scales are rather proportionally over-represented in the ranks, for the rather simple reason the better off have by far fewer concrete incentives to enroll (and those that do are probably dedicated enough to make it into senior positions relatively quickly if they're not terminally stupid or lazy, and are likely somewhat rare too).

Which, by what I know of US education system, would also suggest rather low average base education level in the military in question.

The US and UK aren't exactly the only ones with fully professionalized armies BTW, just so you know. Reservist systems like the Finnish and Swiss ones are becoming increasingly uncommon these days.

The men I was proud to lead were not dumb youngsters and they were not performing a dumb and crappy job. Far, far from it. They were consummate professionals, in many cases brighter (in the sense of more savvy) than some of the MBAs, directors and others I have worked with in other paths of life.

Good for you, although personally I'm slightly dubious of the objectivity of your judgement. I would be singularly surprised if the professional armed forces did not have their quota of rank idiots and jerks like all other walks of life; all the more so as unlike the conscript systems (which get the entire age-group, sometimes also of the women as in Israel) they can't really be all *that* picky about their recruits.

Which, I've read, is actually becoming a bit of an issue in the US. Some merry folks apparently like to draw swastikas on Baghdad walls, and some street gangs reputedly encourage members to sign up so they can bring home decent training in firearms and explosives...

Incidentally, my brother ended up as a squad leader. He was in the unadultered opinion that of his about five subordinates he'd trust about two with a gun in a tight spot. In the service the opinion on the long-serving career personnel also tends to be rather low, should they still be stuck on a junior rank - since there's obviously reasons why they haven't progressed.

The opinion on people who choose to become rank-and-file soldiery tends to be rather low in general around here. Tends to boil down to them being regarded as either disturbingly zealous patriots or hapless sods with no better career opportunities. The vaguely mercenary air that hangs around the financial side of all-professional forces doesn't really help; it probably brings the merry days of "musket, fife and drum" to mind a little too readily.

And, yes, I have personal antipathies against glorifications of militaries. What made you ask ?