Army Recruiting 40 Year Olds
by Ian Mosley
The great neocon conundrum is: how do you conquer the world with no army? The Vietnam War inspired Americans to rebel against and eliminate the draft in the 1970s for fear of their children getting drafted into a needless quagmire. The neocons are in the middle of provoking yet another pointless war, this time with Iran, and yet virtually all their combat troops are tied down in Iraq, leaving virtually no forces left to oppose real enemies like North Korea. How they propose to conquer the huge land mass of Iran remains a mystery.
One answer to the perpetual problem modern-day tyrants saddled with a “volunteer army” have in recruiting soldiers is to loosen the standards. A recent news article reports “The US Army said it is raising the maximum age for enlistment from 40 to 42 in an effort to expand its pool of potential recruits. The move comes just six months after the army raised the maximum age from 35 to 40, reflecting continuing concerns about recruiting even though it has met its monthly goals for the past 12 months… It said recruits between the ages of 40 to 42 must meet the same physical standards as younger ones but will be subjected to additional medical screening. Both men and women in that age bracket can enlist and are eligible for the same signing bonuses and other incentives as younger recruits. The command said more than 1,000 individuals over the age of 35 have enlisted since the maximum age was raised in January.”
The next step after repeatedly raising the age of enlistment will be to lower it. Our government is almost certain to float a “trial balloon” to lower the enlistment age on the young end down to sixteen (preferably without parental consent of course).
The Army recently issued a boastful press release claiming that they had met their recruitment goals for May and June, but this is par for the course–every June America’s high schools spew out thousands of young men and women who have nowhere to go in an economy where all the entry-level jobs are now taken by illegal aliens. The Army has to find 80,000 new recruits before the end of the year, and it will be interesting to see how many statistical tricks and acrobatics they’ll pull to “meet their goal,” at least on paper. Army recruiters have been caught faking entrance test scores, helping recruits evade drug tests, concealing criminal records, and making all kinds of false promises to kids to get them to sign on the dotted line.
Yet it still passes comprehension as to how the military hopes to wage new wars all over the Middle East without bringing back the draft. Even with the economy as bad as it is, the number of young men of all races who are stupid enough or desperate enough to enter the army and be shipped off to death or mutilation in Iraq and Afghanistan is limited. 2,500 Americans have now been killed and at least 20,000 seriously wounded in Iraq, according to the official count (the actual count is almost certainly higher). Casualties in Afghanistan are starting to rise. The resurgent Taliban are coming down out of the mountains and seeking combat with the Americans and the puppet Karzai regime. The draft has to be on Bush’s agenda, but probably will wait until after the 2006 election.