Bring Back the Draft

Demolocke’s Agenda Article/Post Caveat (Read First Please: Click the Link)

The cornerstone of every tribe, of every society and of every family is a certain level of understanding of our very survival. It has been a necessity, a need of society be they family, tribe or larger social entity, for every tribe member to be inducted into and experience the most dangerous teaching tool of human kind, military service. 

In the military they teach things not taught in families, most modern families anyway today, and not often taught in social structures not of military construct. When I think of my military time I am gladdened I volunteered even tho the draft has just been stopped a few months prior to joining up. 

As a Marine I was introduced to certain military social structures that have been the greatest benefit to my life after service. It created a sense of brotherhood where our very lives depended on one another, the connections we held and the ability to work both independent and in tandem with out brothers. 

Human survival since the time we gathered together in caves has depended solely and heavily on such brotherhood collectives, i.e., a tribe of family and families who gathered together to fight for survival. It is a hallmark of military training and service where, “Every day, the men and women of the military are challenged and put into situations where that brotherhood, the camaraderie, builds itself, and those military men and women then build each other both as individual and brothers in arms.” 

I quote, “It is the call to duty, the ideals, the shared understanding they are all Americans, a family; a tribe, and come to believe in what that means and how it binds the men and women of the military together building strength, endurance and a mind-state unparalleled in the history of our species.”

The military provides its members choices often faced, especially and importantly in times of conflict, exposed to dangerous situations where grave harm and death exist. It instills a esprit de corps, brotherhood, that embraces, is instilled in, and propagated in our armed forces. It binds us to make decisions of self and others, our brothers, natural and instinctive. It creates a connection and rapport that spans not just military service but the remainder of every military persons life long after active duty.  

It is only by facing such extremes that we all come to understand the importance of things both big and small, an ability to see things through a different set of eyes and ideals so that all things take a proper perspective in life. It is a way of life that fortifies each member to face, endure, succeed and survive the most dangerous things all in the name of family, country and brotherhood of men and women. It builds a strong kinship among the men and women that provides the mind-set and collective of men and women that allow survival and the ability to thrive against all odds for the world is conflict and violent from the argument to the ability and will to kill for survival. 

A brother, a Seal, described to me the other night at dinner an exercise he and his brothers in arms did that shows how brotherhood creates a tribe like closeness that speaks to the very core of brotherhood. They are to tie rope around themselves where the knot and rope are their means of surviving the exercise then the team is to connect themselves to one another by linking their arms and then the rope being fastened to the helo is connected. The helo takes off, the group is out the rear at altitude and they are then swung around like the old playground whip then the helo takes them down close to the ocean where they fly and the men skim just at the top of the waves at 150 knots. If the rope is not checked, if the knots are not tied properly and securely, if the men panic and let go of one another then there is real danger of dying out there. 

In short, when you are exposed to the unknown, tested to the limits of the physical and stressed beyond understanding YET remain alive, active and able you learn that most of life’s obstacles are not enough to cause stress or concern beyond a need to get the job done regardless - this is only achieve through the military service and it is the one cornerstone to a tribes, societies, very survival. When we lose that brotherhood it leaves the society exposed to things that eat away its life, it kills that society. 

As you can see, my attempts at describing borhterhood is poor and in truth the only way anyone can begin to understand it is to experience it. Everyone in this great country at one time served, even if only for two years under the draft. They understood but today the majority don’t serve so they have no clue.

Let me put it this way, if all of us served for two years in the military there would be a lot less of this disconnect between citizenry and police and military, etc. Understanding through common experiences such as military brotherhood wouldn’t allow such things to happen or even exist. Think of it as a connection of fraternity brothers but a lot more than fraternity brothers. The very same type of stuff fraternity brothers will endure to bring together people through a brotherhood only more is how we achieve a brotherhood of men and women in the military. 

It is about belonging to something greater, bigger and more critically important then self, the individual. It connects us back to our very nature and necessity toward security and survival even in the relatively safe modern times. There is something visceral in the nature of brotherhood of men and women in the military, something indiscernible that binds us toward a common survival. 

I get these chills up and down my spine writing about brotherhood, a brother of Marines that I am, and there is no other feeling like it. Not even great sex reaches the height of a feeling of brotherhood. One brother in arms said, “Brotherhood is the very price and condition of man’s survival.” Even a quote from Mark Twain, “The universal brotherhood of man is our most precious possession, what there is of it.” And finally, from Edwin Markham, “The crest and crowing of all good, life’s final star, is Brotherhood.”

Bring back the draft, rediscover our countries courage of brotherhood and re-create a greater nation!