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Apr. 22, 2004. 01:00 AM
U.S. weighs the return of military conscription
War on terror could last 25 years: Lawmaker
Pentagon needs billions more in cash for Iraq
TIM HARPER
WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON―A war with no end in sight is draining money and manpower from the Bush administration ― and sparking renewed debate about a compulsory military draft in the United States.
The Pentagon has acknowledged it has a plan to keep larger numbers of American troops on the ground longer in Iraq, and yesterday U.S. Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said keeping 20,000 U.S. troops in Iraq at least three months longer will cost about $700 million (U.S.)
Myers said the war is costing $4.7 billion per month and said money would run out by August, leading to charges on Capitol Hill that U.S. President George W. Bush is attempting to wait until after this year's election campaign to request an additional $50 billion from the U.S. Congress.
Senior lawmakers from both parties have also begun floating the idea of drafting conscripts into the military.
They cite the disproportionate number of middle- and lower-class Americans among the 700 troops who have so far been killed in Iraq ― and the fact, as a Republican senator said yesterday, that the war on terror could go on for a generation.
"Who's doing all the fighting?" Nebraska Republican Chuck Hagel asked on NBC's Today show.
"Should we continue to burden the middle class, who represents most all of our soldiers ― the lower middle class? Should we burden them with the fighting and the dying if, in fact, this is a generational, probably 25-year war?"
He said Americans should "take seriously" some type of mandatory service which would not exempt the privileged and the rich.
Senator Joe Biden of Delaware, a Democrat, said on the same program that the U.S. military is too small and he wasn't sure whether it could be brought up to the needed strength with volunteers.
He, too, said there has to be more equitable wartime burden sharing among the American people.
Charles Rangel, a Democratic congressman from New York, was among the first in Congress to call for a draft and he made the same argument yesterday.
During a debate on CNN's Crossfire, Rangel acknowledged the idea of the draft is highly unpopular.
But, he said, if Americans who back the war are not willing to make a sacrifice, they are hypocrites.
"It's like saying, `Let's go fight, I'll hold your coat,'" Rangel said.
Ralph Nader, who is trying to mount a credible independent bid for the presidency is issuing a stark warning to America's university students on his campaign Web site.
"Today, enlistments in the Reserves and National Guard are declining," Nader writes.
"The Pentagon is quietly recruiting new members to fill local draft boards, as the machinery for drafting a new generation of young Americans is being quietly put into place.
"Young Americans need to know that a train is coming, and it could run over their generation in the same way that the Vietnam War devastated the lives of those who came of age in the '60s."
Both the Pentagon and the White House denied the draft, discontinued in 1973, is under active consideration.
Hagel said Bush needs to be honest with Americans and tell them what he needs.
"Every ground squirrel in this country knows that it's going to be $50 billion to $75 billion in additional money required to sustain us in Iraq for this year," he said.
That money would fund the military operation only and would not be used for reconstruction, he said.
Additional articles by Tim Harper
Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved.
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