Admiral Mullen: Stop-Loss to Continue

(from the Army Times):

Addressing a group of about 600 soldiers of the Army's 3rd Infantry Division, Admiral Mike Mullen, the highest ranking military officer in the United States, admitted that the military's present draft system - euphemistically referred to as "stop loss" - will continue and possibly expand over the next few years.

Stop loss is an evil, corrupt breach of contract that is legal solely because the party responsible for the breach is the United States government. Presently, the stop loss program affects approximately 11,000 soldiers. The official reason for the policy is to maintain trained soldiers who are ready to deploy in support of the War on Terror.

By any other measure, maintaining an individual against his or her will, and coercing them to serve in a capacity after which their agreed upon length of service has expired, would be considered slavery. Indeed, the word slavery conjures up images of the pre-Civil War era in United States history, but slavery in its simplest terms is defined as "the state of being under control of another person." Therefore, these soldiers, by virture of being pressed into service against their will and with the threat of violence or imprisonment should they resist or desert, are slaves to the United States military.

The usual argument in favor of stop loss stems from necessity for trained, experienced soldiers in a time of war. Although military officials and commanders do not like having to enforce the policy, they express greater concern over having to adjust to life in a war zone without adequately trained personnel.

The obvious response to these concerns is to wonder what kind of management is responsible for the oversight of training and turnover of soldiers who are slated to deploy. If a privately-owned company failed to adequately plan ahead and adjust to fluctuating numbers of employees, that company would quickly go out of business. It goes without saying that because privately-owned businesses do not have the "luxury" of enslavement available to them, the importance of personnel management is much more vital than it is to an organization like the US military who maintains a coercive authority over its "employees."

Some proponents of the program go so far as to eschew the importance of honoring a contract between employer and employee, calling stop loss a necessity in a time of war. Such arguments, while they are certain to generate patriotic fervor amongst the flag-waving (but chickenshit) neoconservatives, ignore the fact that stop-loss is implemented as a preventative measure rather than a reactive one. In other words, the Pentagon enacts stop loss before the country goes to war. According to the LA Times, the Army has twice implemented the stop loss program prior to US involvment in major conflict: just prior to the first Gulf War and again in 2002.

The message sent to soldiers by the government cannot be any more clear - the government considers you her property, and you are a slave to her bidding. The importance of war supercedes any agreement made with the individual soldier, and that soldier is nothing but a cog in the war machine. While military leaders may lament having to maintain soldiers beyond the original terms of the contract, that they have done nothing to protest the program only underscores the faux leadership prospective recruits can expect to encounter should they join the armed forces. That fact, coupled with the knowledge that America now goes to war on a whim, makes me wonder why anyone would want to join today's military.