this post was submitted on 14 Mar 2024
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The alternative is to have a standing professionall army. Then you have people who are actually trained and "combat ready". I wouldn't say that's worse at all. It allows people who want to be in the military to be in the military and people who don't, won't have to.
Mandatory military service isn't doing your bit, it's sitting around for a few months doing nothing useful. Even if war breaks out during your time, you are barely better prepared than someone just picked off the street. And after 2-3 years all the "training" you went through is forgotten anyhow.
I understand the need of drafting people during a time of war. That makes sense. But all mandatory military service does, is waste a year of your time.
Ok, but let’s look at a country like Finland.
They live next to an enormous, aggressive neighbour. Should Russia decide to go Ukraine on them (is that likely? It’s besides the point for the discussion on conscription) they need hundreds of thousand of soldiers to enable a credible defence. If they have that as a standing, professional army, society is wasting huge resources keeping people in uniform that could be out and be productive members of civil society.
And should they wait until things looks threatening they don’t have the time to train this army, nor the time to integrate a sudden, enormous new component in a the standing army that’s used to working only with itself.
Instead they choose a system of conscription. Soldiers are trained, then sent home to be productive. Occasionally they’re recalled for supplementary or refresher training, when equipment or doctrine changes. Invariably, they get older, eventually too old, so while they may remain part of the reserve, they’re recalled less in favour of their younger colleagues.
Undoubtedly they won’t be as effective as a standing army if recalled in war-time. So they’re lead by professional officers, keeping only the squad leaders and platoon leaders in the reserves while anyone of another function are in the standing army. The sergeant’s and lieutenants in the reserve are recalled more often, many having some contract that requires many weeks of service every year.
This makes it possible for Finland to maintain a credible defensive posture without keeping half a million soldiers in their standing army, doing nothing productive for society and costing a fortune.
Conscription has a place when the country is small, the threat nearby and unpredictable.
I can’t help but wonder if your opinion is enabled by the advantaged position of having an ocean between the society you live in and its potential aggressor. Most European states with a front towards Russia has found conscription the best compromises between the vast cost of maintaining a professional army large enough and keeping their societies productive in peace time.
I would agree, but the way, that being trained to be a soldier in a conscripted defence isn’t that particularly useful to the individual receiving the training (other than a change in attitude towards accepting challenges, which many employers later appreciate). It can feel like a waste of YOUR time. In this case, however, the usefulness is for society at large, something I know has been going out of fashion in this day and age.
I grew up in Austria, so while we aren't bordering Russia there is no oceans between us either.
My issue with the mandatory military service is just, I do not belive that the training is actually effective. You aren't training soldiers that you can call up and expect to peform. You are artificially inflating your military number by having "reservists" that are just as effective as untrained people picked up from the street. The 6 months of training your rank-and-file soldier gets is just not helpful anymore. It might have worked 150 years ago when we were fighting with muskets and basic cannons.
Maybe the Finnish military is different and prepare you better in the 6 months. I doubt it. The more usefull training is already voluntary and comes with a longer commitment time (both in Austria and Finland). In Austria you don't even get any training after your 6 months without opting in. Finland gives you an additional 80-150 days over 50 years according to google. Which is at least a little bit usefull.
If countries with mandatory military service bump up their current active standing military by a few thousands and offer a voluntary reservists program, that would provide a military just as if not more effective as the current system. And wouldn't force thousands of people to spend months doing something they aren't interested in.
If you really think mandatory service is necessary for the security of the country, then go the way of Singapore or South Korea where the service is around 2 years. Then the people actually are trained and spend long enough time in active duty to be ready in case of a war. But again, this 6 month mandatory service is nonsense in my opinion.
In 2013 Austria had a vote to get rid of the mandatory military service. 60% were in favor of keeping it (only 52% of people voted). The main arguments of people in favor of keeping: The civil service is essential for Hospitals, Nursinghomes, Schools, etc. as "free" labor. They aren't really free because the state is paying them. The second most common argument was "I had to do it, so they should also have to do it". Which is just stupid. A very small percentage of people actually cared about the military aspect of it.
And arm them with what? Modern wars are extremely expensive and Finland may have conscription but the country's military spending as a portion of GDP is lower than that of many countries with professional armies. Conscription makes sense in Israel. But they get about as much in American arms donations as Finland spend on its entire military.
The whole setup looks Finland looks like the strategy is to copy Stalin's tactic in the winter war: sacrificing soliders en masse.
Sure, without Nato and the EU there could be the scenario we now see in Ukraine: Hundreds of billions of dollars in foreign aid paying for weapons. But since Finland is in Nato it would get actual armies coming to its aid.
And I'm not even talking about the indirect costs of conscription. Diminishing your workforce by a percent also dimishes your GDP by (roughly) a percent. With that money you could create and maintain a serious nuclear arsenal, including second strike capabilities.