Thread: national service that all greens and do gooders should serve

There is more at: snopes.com: Taliban Detainees and LARK Program

plus a reference to these cartoons:

One of my teachers at High School did his National Service and then stayed on in the Reserves. We had this debate (in 1988) and he recalled the biggest problem with mandatory service was that when you had people there that really didn't want to be there, or who just wanted to be disruptive, they were a disaster for all. He said there were blokes who spent most of their time in the clink and knew they would be kicked out soon enough. Despite the floggings the Army MP's gave, they wouldn't change and dragged the unit down.

I'm not sure how you get people to respect others and exercise personal discipline when they don't want to, but I'm not sure mandatory service would work.

I'm in the US at the moment and the vast majority of people here are polite, respect their elders, love their country and servicemen, and are positive, confident and hard working - despite their Government and economy. I think their attitude is generated from a very young age and that many of their parents and grandparents actually fought for their country and what they have.

Frankly, my opinion of Australians has changed a lot over the past 5 weeks. I reckon many of us are a bunch of sooks who haven't appreciated how good we've had it, and don't understand what we're loosing...

Matt.


Matt.

A lot that is quite true Matt, the yanks are really good at training and deploying cannon fodder. Now they have arrived in Darwin to train our forces.
Yo Rinty.

Robert.

Originally Posted by mudmouse

One of my teachers at High School did his National Service and then stayed on in the Reserves. We had this debate (in 1988) and he recalled the biggest problem with mandatory service was that when you had people there that really didn't want to be there, or who just wanted to be disruptive, they were a disaster for all. He said there were blokes who spent most of their time in the clink and knew they would be kicked out soon enough. Despite the floggings the Army MP's gave, they wouldn't change and dragged the unit down.

Matt.


Matt.

I can't think of a single one of my mates and acquaintances who won a birthday raffle for two years military service in the 1960's who were happy about it. Most regarded it as two years stolen from their lives and spent with a lot of people one wouldn't normally break bread with. One is still deeply resentful about the interruption to his career, putting him two years behind his peers. These guys used the term "reg" as in regular soldier as a term of derision meaning stupid person. Their thinking was that volunteering for military service was proof of stupidity or insanity.

Going further back to the days of three months National Service and two years compulsory CMF service afterwards, the MP's were kept in steady employment chasing up reluctant conscripts who simply didn't bother going to their CMF units unless forced. I have an idea the army simply gave up chasing them. too many of them and too costly.

Originally Posted by mudmouse

Frankly, my opinion of Australians has changed a lot over the past 5 weeks. I reckon many of us are a bunch of sooks who haven't appreciated how good we've had it, and don't understand what we're losing...

Matt.


Matt.

Yup.

Originally Posted by mudmouse

One of my teachers at High School did his National Service and then stayed on in the Reserves. We had this debate (in 1988) and he recalled the biggest problem with mandatory service was that when you had people there that really didn't want to be there, or who just wanted to be disruptive, they were a disaster for all. He said there were blokes who spent most of their time in the clink and knew they would be kicked out soon enough. Despite the floggings the Army MP's gave, they wouldn't change and dragged the unit down.

I'm not sure how you get people to respect others and exercise personal discipline when they don't want to, but I'm not sure mandatory service would work.

I'm in the US at the moment and the vast majority of people here are polite, respect their elders, love their country and servicemen, and are positive, confident and hard working - despite their Government and economy. I think their attitude is generated from a very young age and that many of their parents and grandparents actually fought for their country and what they have.

Frankly, my opinion of Australians has changed a lot over the past 5 weeks. I reckon many of us are a bunch of sooks who haven't appreciated how good we've had it, and don't understand what we're loosing...

Matt.


Matt.

Mate of my older brother did Nasho with Barry Humphries - just imagine .
Bazza decided to let his rifle fall to the ground just at the precise moment during the passing out parade past the brass...

I'm old enough to remember National Service. It's a dim witted idea that causes more pain than it relieves. Volunteering for the armed forces is fine and is a noble profession really. Conscripting people into them cheapens the whole deal for everyone. Why not just let us kick kids in the arse again when they are little? That solves a few problems that need solving. I'm not big on child psychology I'm afraid.

My birthday came up in the national service lottery in the mid-Sixties. Thankfully I failed the Army medical. I had already tried to join the RAAF (I had been an NCO in the Air Cadets) and failed the medical because of myopia.

As far as the Army was concerned, myopia was something that could be cured with glasses. I failed for other reasons that weren't a problem for the RAAF.