No, it's the exact opposite- the Nationalists resorted to mass conscription during the civil war, which is one of the reasons they were so unpopular at the end. The PLA were under strict orders not to take anything from the people they encountered. No matter how badly off they were, they had to pay for everything when they went through a village. This was a massive propaganda victory, as Chinese peasants expected to be looted whenever an army came through their village. It had been the norm for thousands of years, and a common experience for the last few decades. The Communists saw massive support from the peasantry and the PLA's numbers swelled.
Came here to say this but you beat me to it and put it better than I probably would have. :gold-communist:
You can start by saying the U.S army would go into the same villages the communists recruit from and massacre them to prevent them from joining the communists. Only gunpoint the villagers faced is from the M-16
Source: The Korean War.
Good. Bring down reality like a crimson fist on his stupid fantasy of American innocence and American exceptionalism.
Or talk about the fucking draft lol
"Force people to join the Army at 18" was official U.S. policy until Vietnam whipped our asses senseless
And then the US switched to a professional military model with a heavy emphasis on bombardment. And liberals congratulated themselves on having solved war.
or bomb/firebomb the villages into ruins because they could.
They would also bomb for strategic reasons like forcing the villagers to move somewhere safer. WTF America that's reasoning.
“we’re anti-communist for a reason”
insane propaganda in the imperial core.
Tbf he’s probably like 12. The sad thing is the dad and millions of other Americans are operating on the same wavelength in their 40s+ lol
The Villages were the heart and soul of the Chinese revolution and the PLA
I get what you mean, but this is a cursed sentence
Even as they push urbanization isn't the peasant nature still celebrated?
For all the stories about people committing suicide for getting 4F (cause it was a different time, the cause was so good, greatest generation blah blah blah), the USA still had a draft for WW2. A large enough war means the government is definitely going to at least try forced recruitment (even if the results are disasters like vietnam).
lol does he think they just nicely ask dissenters to report to prison
so they... had a draft? I mean, its evil as shit, but its kind of just a thing states DO since, like, before there were even proper states.
Drafts are good, actually.
Wars are bad. Bad wars are evil. But if you have to fight a war, forcing the entire society to participate means democratizing the costs of war. Politicians' kids, rich kids - no one is exempt. That means the elites have to think harder before getting into war, try to end it quickly, and take care of the troops (supply them properly, don't send them into meat-grinders) while it lasts.
Drafts can be unfair - giving exemptions to the rich/elites ala Vietnam and drafting minorities at greater rates, and that's bad. But they still spread the costs of war more broadly than professional armies, which employ sadists/militarists and the poor. A professional army will attack its own civilians more readily, too, as it has less in common with them.
But they still spread the costs of war more broadly than professional armies, which employ sadists/militarists and the poor.
Austria still has conscription (for men only, and you can do either 9 months of social work or 6 months of military service). Tbh I'm against it. But the one opinion that's made me hesitate was some guy on Reddit going, "Do you know what kind of person actually wants to join the army in Austria?! You want to have an army of only Nazis and sadists?!" I guess he has a point.
Austria still has conscription (for men only, and you can do either 9 months of social work or 6 months of military service). Tbh I’m against it.
AFAIK in Germany you don't get punished with a longer time for choosing the social work option, which can also be things like doing research as you have choice over what it is. IMO some sort of national service is a good thing - work experience, communal work, sense of solidarity. And of course you want it to be gender-equal.
Peacetime conscription in a country that probably won't fight a war within your lifetime is definitely annoying. But with the alternative service option I see it as an extension of compulsory education - in the wider Bildung sense, the formation of the citizen.
If you're part of a society - you must sweat and bleed for it. If you sweat and bleed for your society - you will demand more from it. The government shouldn't be some distant corporation that you have no relationship with - because if it doesn't need anything from you, it won't give anything back to you.
Yeah the gender imbalance is one of my main problems with it. I think it causes resentment that women aren't conscripted. OTOH I had female friends who were frustrated that they had to pay out of their own pocket to do a social volunteer year while their male friends got paid for the same work. (However Austria kinda lags behind in terms of workplace gender equality in general, so I have friends who argue that has to be fixed first.)
On the other hand, idk, I guess I'm just wary about everyone having to go through conscripted training. I feel like when the state is overall right wing, it's just an extra opportunity to pour nationalistic propaganda into impressionable young people. Maybe because I'm a little more familiar with the Russian and Israeli army conscription, where imo that's definitely the case. (All my male Austrian friends did the social work thing.) Ofc it's different if it's a social work year and not army training, but that still leaves the question of what the army should be comprised of.
Finally tbh it's kind of annoying for immigrants 😂 Like it's one thing if you and all your friends do six months of helping out in the old people's home before properly starting work/uni. It's another if you're finally eligible for Austrian citizenship at 28 and either have to quit your job and work for like 600EUR/month for 9 months or cross your fingers and hope that nothing changes so you can wait to get citizenship at 35.
Ofc it’s different if it’s a social work year and not army training, but that still leaves the question of what the army should be comprised of.
True! I guess the logical of democratizing war ultimately means dropping all exemptions (except mental/physical disability) - everyone must have an equal chance to serve. That doesn't mean everyone has to be drafted into soldering, but everyone must have a chance of being drafted by lottery, so that every demographic is represented. An added benefit is every citizen is a potential soldier - every community has veterans capable of resisting oppression by force.
If your country is actually in danger, then you vote that ~50% of all eligible draftees have to become soldiers next year (and 50% do social work). If war is not on the horizon, then it's only some 5% (and 95% do social work). Actually teaching everyone to fight would pose problems - it's like giving everyone a hammer.
when the state is overall right wing, it’s just an extra opportunity to pour nationalistic propaganda into impressionable young people.
No more than at school. And just as at school, when it's you and your peers going through it, you can see through their bullshit better. With a professional army, the young people who already fell for the propaganda are isolated in a bubble.
I think societies like Israel's have militarized cultures. Conscription is not the linchpin of propaganda, it's just one aspect of the system.
To be completely honest, I think this is one of those areas of discussion where for me there's a huge difference between a "hypothetical, ideal situation" and my current, specific one.
When I read through your proposals, I think even if we could quibble over the particularities, I agree with your ideas overall. I think there's a lot of merit to having everyone do a social work year in general, and I think the point about some kind of lottery system for the military is fair.
But when I think about what if Austria were to do this system tomorrow, I feel immediately revolted. I'm an immigrant from the Soviet region. I do really like Austria. The country is beautiful and I like the people and lifestyle, even if I thought it was the most boring place on earth as a teenager lol. If the conscription was extended to women I don't mind doing the social year. But I just don't wanna pick up a fucking gun for this ex Third Reich country that massacred my relatives. When I visited the local concentration camp last, I searched the names for my grandpa's brother - he was MIA and hey you never know. If I won the 5% lottery I think I'd rather serve the jail time. It's illogical but there you go.
I think this is one of those areas of discussion where for me there’s a huge difference between a “hypothetical, ideal situation” and my current, specific one.
You're totally right! Hypothetically supporting having conscription in an ideal society is different from supporting it in a specific place and time.
I’m an immigrant from the Soviet region
Ich auch, aber wohne in der Staaten. Vielleicht verstehen wir einander deshalb )
But I just don’t wanna pick up a fucking gun for this ex Third Reich country that massacred my relatives.
The problem here is of course not conscription in Austria, but rather, like with everything else in life, the dissolution of the Soviet Union! Or, more abstractly, anyone having to move to a place that they aren't willing to fight for. I'd see no problem fighting for (denazified) East Germany, for example.
Starship Troopers are a professional military! You have to volunteer to join - and if you don't you're a soy beta.
"Service guarantees citizenship" - you only get to vote if you have served in the military.
My perception of boot camp and stuff was always that of a giant hazing ritual, which while I’m sure it’s necessary it just feels off.
Yeah, war sucks. But if society is gonna do war - then everyone must have a chance of being hazed. What should happen in a democratic/free society is that people hate being hazed enough that they vote for politicians who avoid conflict and resolve differences so eventually no one has to be hazed.
What happens now is only the poor (and bullies) get hazed. That's both unjust AND there's no negative feedback loop for the rest of society not to engage in war.
Note also how the mythologizing of "the troops" really picked up after the draft ended. When the military is a chore, and when a bunch of people who aren't interested in it have to serve anyways, it's harder to maintain a heavily-propagandized view of the institution.
I don't think that's a hard rule though, many right wing governments had conscription and maintained a fantasy view of the military, that's a tenement of fascism.
The mythologizing the troops was already widespread from ww1, ww2, and Korea. Like in the popular consciousness of American conservatives, the Vietnam War did not really disrupt it. Rather all the drafted protesting just become bad troops.
It would make wars much more unpopular and thus less likely. Terrorism/democracy/oil/lithium is enough to justify a line on the news once a month, but not your child driving over IEDs.
And if you're drafted - free revolutionary training plus a chance to radicalize a fraternal organization. Conscientious objection should of course also be an option.
The current shortage of volunteers does constrain the US military to some extent - but they're rapidly shifting toward using more tech and arming locals to counteract that. I think drafts have more benefits than costs.
people that wouldn’t make that connection for it basically just cause suffering for no reason
Yeah, sure, not every worker suffering under capitalism becomes a socialist either. But if everyone has to serve customers at some point, everyone will be a bit nicer to customer service workers, you know?
I would hope the draft wouldn’t be a problem or a necessity in a socialist country because most people in it would be aware that the collapse or takeover of it would be a very bad thing.
That's a thought contradictory to the one above - is everyone conscious of the condition of their society or not? In a utopia, we'd all know when to fight a war and when to boycott one. But I think even in a socialist society the average person would shirk responsibility if left to their own devices - or even if only a minority would shirk responsibility, you'd be creating inequality down the line if you allow that minority to escape paying the costs that everyone else is paying.
you're not wrong about any of that, but I still think drafts are bad, because they're in service to standing militaries. which I don't love.
so every man in brazil when he gets 18 has to present himself for the army and will have to go through the enlistment process, in which we are treated like shit for a day, have to do a body examination in which you have to be naked in a room,a physical test and just have real shitty time for a whole day. If the army wants, they can force you into one to two years of service, and if you do not comply you are unable to use any sort of public service including the public universities, the brazilian public healthcare system, voting and other great things, brazil is not a communist country, so this is dumb (also nowadays, it is not so bad, like, it is mostly one really bad day on your 18th year, so you can hold that feeling and resent the brazilian army for your whole life, as there is not enough jobs in the army to get like 5% of the people that have 18 years old and there are people that want to enlist, it is a job that pays ok, gives you food and a roof if you need to so, i would imagine china probably does not force every single person that is 18 to join the army on pure number like there is no way there is enough capacity for this kind of recruitment with china population anyway, i am technically part of the brazillian army reserves and that makes me and in a sense all brazilian men have a personal interest in brazil never going to war)
In communist China they go into the schools of impoverished communities and promise the young people better lives if they give some years of service to the military. The communist government also incorporates military imagery into sporting events as a form of propaganda
if I were u I'd strike up a conversation with that person later gushing about how cool it is that Israel's forced conscription keeps it ready to defend itself, then the instant they start agreeing in any way switch to ranting angrily about how EVIL it is that COMMUNIST china goes into villages and forces people into the army, and then switch back to gushing about Israel and back & forth until they stop speaking to me and then I don't have to hear from them anymore
Americans put recruiters in their high schools so that the students who survive high school can die in its forever wars in a desperate attempt to receive healthcare and a university education.
tbf, many American high school seniors have experience operating under fire
He's thinking of the animated film "Mulan", which is set in ancient China, and is superimposing it onto the modern Chinese government.
Does anyone feel a draft in here? Anyway, off to Korea, Vietnam, and any other war before 73.
