WASHINGTON, Oct. 21 (UPI) -- The specter of a military draft in a second Bush term raised by Sen. John Kerry and campaign supporters appeared no more than an election-year spitball Thursday to gin up draft-age voters.
The Selective Service said it has been given no heads-up on preparing for renewed operations and that implementing any conscription proposal would be no uncomplicated matter. And the Army apparently is in no hurry to face the prospect of thousands of unmotivated, reluctant recruits to fill in ranks stretched thin by the increased operations tempo of combat in Iraq.
"None of us are even thinking about that as a way to fill any gaps. There are forces available within the total Army (regulars, plus Reserves and National Guard)" said a Pentagon Army source, who requested anonymity. "The bottom line is there are forces that are available if the country can be convinced it is the right thing to do. We've got the people to do it."
Kerry earlier this month breathed new life into the draft rumor that had been spreading for weeks on Internet weblogs amid reports that the deployment of more than 130,000 troops in Iraq and continued military operations in Afghanistan had left the all-volunteer Army stretched thin, resulting in extended and/or repeated tours of duty in Iraq, down holds on end-of-enlistment leavings and heavy use of Reserve and Guard personnel with much needed specialties as psychological operations, transportation and military police.
'With George Bush, the plan for Iraq is more of the same and the great potential of the draft. Because if we go it alone, I don't know how you do it with the current overextension' of U.S. forces, Kerry said in an interview with the Des Moines (Iowa) Register.
Kerry has repeatedly hammered Bush on Iraq, especially the fact that 90 percent of the forces there are from the United States as a result of the alienation of U.S. allies over Bush's foreign policy.
There would be no draft in a Kerry administration, he has said. Instead he would increase the Army by 40,000 recruits.
The Bush administration immediately cried foul and accused Kerry of attempting to stir up fear among the country's youth, who are traditionally the least likely to cast ballots in an election. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, about 36 percent of the 24 million eligible voters in that age group in 2000 cast ballots.
"We're not going to have a draft, period." Bush has said. "The all-volunteer army works. It works particularly when we pay our troops well. It works when we make sure they've got housing, like we have done in the last military budgets. An all-volunteer army is best suited to fight the new wars of the 21st century, which is to be specialized and to find these people as they hide around the world."
The Selective Service System said Thursday any reintroduction of conscription would require Congress -- with its subcommittees, committees and debates -- to amend the law to bring it back and action to fund the service's field operations, such as local draft boards, which have been dormant since 1973.
There is no consensus to do so. On Oct. 5 the House of Representatives shot down a bill to reinstitute the draft 402-2. Even the measure's sponsor, Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., did not vote for it.
Also, there would be a maximum gap of 193 days from congressional approval until the first draftee was handed over to the military for induction and then months of training.
"We are not funded to run any kind of a draft," Selective Service spokesman Richard Flahavan said. "We are funded for a modest cadre organization that is in business to update the plans, keep them dusted off, and run peacetime registration of men 18 to 25."
The draft, reinstituted in 1948 as the Cold War got well and truly underway, was stopped in 1973 as U.S. forces withdrew from South Vietnam. President Jimmy Carter reinstituted the registration of eligible males in the summer of 1980, a process that continues today with a scaled-down version of the Selective Service. Flahavan said there are about 14 million U.S. males between the ages of 18 and 25 in the service's database.
The New York Times possibly raised new anxieties over the issue of conscription Wednesday when it cited a confidential report by a company contracted by the Selective Service that described how to perform a selective call-up of doctors, nurses and other healthcare professionals. The Democratic National Committee immediately put out excerpts of the story but omitted comments that the study was a required and routine update of on-the-shelf plans.
"It (the contingency plan) has been around for years, since the late 1980s, and it was at the direction of Congress to build a system, the plans, procedures, policies and the automation to support it," Flahavan told UPI. "It was given us in 1987, and that was in fact what we built and what we have on the shelf. The restriction was build it and put it on the shelf, but don't do anything with it until directed to do something with it."
Flahavan said conscription of medical personnel age 45 and under took place from 1950 to 1973, involving some 35,000 people. No database currently exists identifying likely healthcare draftees, and there are no plans to compile one, he said.
"We are not allowed to collect any names. We are not allowed to register anybody, the plans are just on the shelf in case it's needed," he said.
Kerry campaign spokesman Phil Singer, when questioned Thursday about Kerry's warning of a possible draft, said: "We hope there is none. (But) the point here is that the military is stretched thin, it's overextended. George Bush has no plan in place to address that fact and John Kerry does and will."
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