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How To Stay Out of the Military
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(Primer on Draft Resistance)
http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig4/wiggins5.html
The legal requirement to register for the draft demands a decision: give up your freedom and your conscience, or conscientiously resist. All the good reasons that would prevent a free man from volunteering for military service, also apply to resisting the draft. How in a \"free country\" can the first requirement of a young man, when he comes of age, be to sign up to accept orders to kill for the state in an organized way? There is never a need to compel a free man to take up a cause that is both necessary and just; but a man who is drafted is never free, and thus his cause can never be assumed to be either necessary or just.
The draft is not simply an academic interest. There is not enough military manpower to sustain the commitments the President has already undertaken. We constantly hear that our troops are \"stretched too thin.\" To assist the United States, both the President and Secretary of State have made serious requests for significant military manpower contributions from other nations. These requests have largely fallen on deaf ears. The President has repeatedly stated he will not \"back down\" meaning, we must assume, that the military forces will continue to be \"thinly stretched.\" Where will they find relief? It appears they are looking at young Americans who are free to volunteer for military duty, but in good conscience, choose not to do so.
With certain exceptions, all men residing in the United States are required to register for the draft within 30 days of their 18th birthday. The obligation of a man to register is imposed by the Military Selective Service Act, which establishes and governs the operations of the Selective Service System.
In addition to the Military Selective Service Act, the \"Health Care Personnel Delivery System\" was authorized by Congress in 1987 to deal with large-scale casualties that outstripped the active-duty military\'s ability to handle them. If implemented, the bill would require a mass registration of male and female health care workers between the ages of 20 and 45. At this time; however, the Selective Service has no statutory authority to draft medical personnel. That authorization would be provided by legislation to be introduced and passed in Congress at the time of a national defense mobilization. That \"M-Day\" legislative package has not been made available for public comment or congressional debate. See the Center on Conscience and War’s \"Health Care Professionals and the Draft\" for details regarding the Health Care Personnel Delivery System.
The Pentagon is considering other \"special skills\" drafts, to include military linguists, computer experts, or engineers, which could arise from other immediate needs. \"We\'re going to elevate that kind of draft to be a priority,\" said Lewis Brodsky, acting director of the Selective Service System.
A bill before the House Armed Services Committee would require the induction of young men into the military \"to receive basic military training and education for a period of up to one year.\" Representatives Nick Smith and Curt Weldon sponsored the bill, called the \"Universal Military Training and Service Act,\" introduced last fall. The measure is currently before the Armed Services Committee. Youth & Militarism Magazine, published by the American Friends Service Committee, contains an excellent article, \"It’s Not Your Father’s Draft,\" describing this proposed draft.
Deciding What To Do
Deciding what to do when faced with Registration or the Draft can be a difficult and life-altering decision. If you choose to resist, it is helpful to keep two things in mind:
First, if you stand by your convictions, you cannot lose, and the government cannot win. The government may handcuff you or lock you up, but they cannot make you fight. If you give up any freedom, it is completely on your terms. In contrast, if you allow yourself to be coerced into military duties you risk death, disease, and disability, all for a cause you do not believe in.
Second, if you choose to resist, you will be treated as an adversary by the government. The government is no longer your friend – if it ever was. You can expect the Selective Service to use every legal method and argument at their disposal to get you to abandon your convictions and to follow orders.
Keep records carefully, and make your own file of every transaction with the Selective Service, including phone calls. Do not rely on oral promises from Selective Service officials. Put things in writing, and attach receipts and even envelopes to the correspondence in your file. A second set of those records should be in the custody of someone you can rely on to forward copies as needed. When you make a record of a transaction with Selective Service, you should send a copy to Selective Service for inclusion in your file with the Area Office. When local boards become operational, you can see and copy information in your file. You can authorize others to do so on your behalf. Send your letters and claims to Selective Service by Certified Mail, Return Receipt Requested. Observe all deadlines scrupulously. Be sure to include your Selective Service number. Sign and date all papers submitted.
Get help. Check out how the counselor you are consulting was trained. Most attorneys know nothing about Selective Service law; ask their qualifications. Draft counselors will tend to know about qualified attorneys. There are two qualified national counseling organizations: The Center on Conscience & War (CCW), and the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors (CCCO).
Choosing To Not Register
On a percentage basis, not registering is the most likely way to prevent you from being drafted. The book Chance and Circumstance states that between 250,000 and 2 million males did not register for the draft during the Vietnam War. According to reports from the Selective Service System, forty percent of the men who are required to register for the draft don\'t register in the sixty-day time period required by law. At least one or two percent still haven\'t registered by the time they are twenty. At age 26 they are no longer allowed to register. Thus, the number of permanent non-registrants increases daily. There is a known minimum of at least 300,000 people, perhaps a million, who are becoming permanent non-registrants.
If you refuse to register with Selective Service, you\'ll receive threatening letters, at first politely reminding you to register, then threatening prosecution, finally informing you that your name has been turned over to the Department of Justice for possible prosecution. These sound scary, but they\'re mostly bluff. No one has been formally charged since 1986.
In the early 1980s, 21 men were indicted for refusal to register: 19 of those 21 were public resisters. Wherever there were trials, the rates of registration actually went down. This resistance halted prosecutions..... to read the full article click here http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig4/wiggins5.html]continue[/URL]
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