Simple question

[rightwinger]

Sorry...

You can't pay our soldiers enough

 

[The Gadfly]

Mercenaries? We've got junior enlisted personnel with families on food stamps, and some of you would call them "mercenaries"? I don't know how many of them join for the benefits, and how many still buy into the "Duty, Honor, Country" ideal, but I do know the quality of the young people serving now, and this American Veteran is damn proud of them!

 

[JBeukema]

Most are not fire breathing "patriots". They are just looking for a leg up.

You have stats for this claim?

 

[AVG-JOE]

Simple question

At what point of compensation, pay, benefits and incentives, does the volunteer soldier become a mercenary???

What's the difference between a whore and a house-wife?









The length and terms of the contract.

 

[Cuyo]

Most are not fire breathing "patriots". They are just looking for a leg up.

You have stats for this claim?

I don't think you can quantify it, but in all likelyhood he is correct... Do you disagree?

 

[AVG-JOE]

Simple answer: At no pay level. In the military sense a mercenary is a professional soldier hired for service in a foreign or private army.

Any more stupid questions?

Yes.

They cannot be mercenaries unless they are employed by a foreign government. Got that.

Now, at what point should they lose the title of "volunteer"?

Seriously? I want what you're

When other soldiers collect them in the dead of night if they don't wanna go.

 

[AVG-JOE]

Yes.

They cannot be mercenaries unless they are employed by a foreign government. Got that.

Now, at what point should they lose the title of "volunteer"?

As soon as we return to the draft. They "volunteer" to serve.

No, they take the job. Does Johnny 'volunteer to serve' at the local hardware store?

As opposed to what?

 

[JBeukema]

Most are not fire breathing "patriots". They are just looking for a leg up.

You have stats for this claim?

I don't think you can quantify it, but in all likelyhood he is correct... Do you disagree?

Dunno. Haven't spoken to most soldiers. I don't doubt less are Über-patriots than was the case during WWII.

 

[JBeukema]

As soon as we return to the draft. They "volunteer" to serve.

No, they take the job. Does Johnny 'volunteer to serve' at the local hardware store?

As opposed to what?

As opposed to volunteering, which implies a deed done out of good will and not in return for compensation. You know, like working with Food Not Bombs.

 

[JBeukema]

 

[JBeukema]

 

[JBeukema]

THE FOOD NOT BOMBS MOVEMENT

 

[Cuyo]

You have stats for this claim?

I don't think you can quantify it, but in all likelyhood he is correct... Do you disagree?

Dunno. Haven't spoken to most soldiers. I don't doubt less are Über-patriots than was the case during WWII.

Well that's kinda what I meant when I said you can't quantify it... No one person has spoken to 'most soldiers...' whose to say they would answer honestly anyway?

But IMHO the overwhelming preponderance suggests that he's correct, just based on the soldiers I do know and the standing army's long standing tradition of being the avenue of last resort.

 

[The Gadfly]

You have stats for this claim?

I don't think you can quantify it, but in all likelyhood he is correct... Do you disagree?

Dunno. Haven't spoken to most soldiers. I don't doubt less are Über-patriots than was the case during WWII.

I don't know about that, JB. I do know, that two-thirds of the combat troops in WWII were draftees; and two-thirds of the combat troops in Vietnam were volunteers. That might seem counter-intuitive, but is true.

 

[JBeukema]

So you're saying more Americans willing took a job suppressing VietNamese democracy and self-determination than got in line to respond to an attack on the homeland?

 

[The Gadfly]

So you're saying more Americans willing took a job suppressing VietNamese democracy and self-determination than got in line to respond to an attack on the homeland?

Percentage-wise, JB, it would appear so. In fairness, though, the Vietnam-era draft was not all-encompassing as the WW II draft; more deferments, plus, once the quota was reached for a given county, eligible registrants with higher draft lottery numbers weren't actually called up for induction during Vietnam. Typically anyone with a lottery number over 150 was pretty "safe" from actually receiving a draft notice, and in some places, anyone with a number over 75 or so wasn't drafted (those numbers are out of a total of 365 based on birthdate). Add in the fact that only about 40% of draftees were actually sent to Vietnam, and it's almost surprising there were as many in combat billets as there were. One of the myths about Vietnam is that it was "a conscript's war", and that most of the casualties were poor, minority conscripts. It's simply not true. Actually the casualty statistics show that those with middle or upper-middle class backgrounds were over-represented in Vietnam casualties (relative to the general population), likely because more were in pilot or infantry officer billets that had a higher casualty rate. The average age was 22, not 19 or 20 (it was 26 for our WW II counterparts).

Reality is that most of us who were there entered service voluntarily, and either volunteered to serve in Vietnam, or at least, made no effort to avoid doing so. It might surprise you (as it did the hippie types) that most of us really were rather idealistic, and that the words "Duty, Honor, Country" were more than a slogan to us. None of this is meant to disparage the draftees who served; most of them fought with as much honor, bravery and spirit as any professional, and when it comes down to it, could have run off to Canada instead, had they been so inclined.

 

[onecut39]

Simple answer: At no pay level. In the military sense a mercenary is a professional soldier hired for service in a foreign or private army.

Any more stupid questions?

Yes.

They cannot be mercenaries unless they are employed by a foreign government. Got that.

Now, at what point should they lose the title of "volunteer"?

I guess at the same moment that you become a stupid ****! Now stop asking fucking asinine questions!

Having trouble with the simple question?

 

[onecut39]

Mercenaries? We've got junior enlisted personnel with families on food stamps, and some of you would call them "mercenaries"? I don't know how many of them join for the benefits, and how many still buy into the "Duty, Honor, Country" ideal, but I do know the quality of the young people serving now, and this American Veteran is damn proud of them!

Being proud has nothing to do with the question.

 

[onecut39]

Most are not fire breathing "patriots". They are just looking for a leg up.

You have stats for this claim?

Only having been there, done that.

 

[onecut39]

[QUOTE ..............most of us really were rather idealistic,........................[/QUOTE]

Were you as idealistic at the end as at the beginning?