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The AFP points out that the "call to consider a imposing a draft comes just days after the Pentagon moved to extend the missions of some 20,000 US troops in Iraq." [http://www.spacewar.com/2004/040420154719.soi8dhtt.html] See [[Iraqi sovereignty: June 30, 2004]] and [[Operation Iraqi Freedom: Year Two]] for context.
There is no general support for a draft. While Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) and Sen. Fritz Hollings (D-SC) introduced proposals to restore the draft in 2003, it enjoys no support in Congress. As Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) observes, "I think I'm the only member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who would reinstate the draft." There is no support from the military for a draft. Robert Scales Jr., Retired general, former commandant of the Army War College and historian, observes, <blockquote> A return to the draft is a very bad idea whose time passed with the world wars, Korea and Vietnam. These wars were tragically wasteful because in large measure they were fought with drafted soldiers.
Drafted soldiers are far more likely to die in combat than long-service professionals. Military leaders know from painful experience that it takes years to produce a fully competent combat soldier. They also know that older soldiers live longer in combat. Drafting teenagers and committing them to combat within only a year of enlistment will create an Army of amateurs. Our Army in particular has a sad history of committing to battle men who are too young and inexperienced to have much hope of surviving against a hardened and skillful enemy.
Drafted units can be kept together for only a short time and invariably march to war as random collections of strangers. Our soldiers performed so superbly in Iraq because they were seasoned. Good soldiers, like good wine, can be produced only with careful cultivation and patient aging. Unfortunately, amateur armies learn to fight only by fighting. Inevitably, the cost of that education is too horrific for the American people to bear. </blockquote>[http://www.time.com/time/personoftheyear/2003/poyforum.html]
Because of Sen. Kerry's (D-MA) recurring claims that a draft under President Bush was imminent--based on a bill introduced by two Democrats--the House voted on that bill, defeating it 402-2. Democrats, such as Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA), who voted against the Iraq War, "criticized this week's draft-killing vote as a Republican effort to manipulate public opinion in favor of President Bush just weeks before voters head to the polls."
[http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/Stories/0,1413,91~3089~2460561,00.html]
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