I have been thinking recently about the concept of conscientious objector status as it was applied during the years when there was a draft. Why should my opposition to the war in Vietnam, based on what might loosely be called reason, be any less valid than the opposition of someone who was against it because of his, ipso facto, illogical religious belief?
The Supreme Court decision in Welsh v. United States in 1970 upheld the concept of a non-religious-based conscientious objection to war. But still I ask why a conscientious objection to war in general is valid, but a reasoned objection to a particular war is not?
The following is from the Daily Kos, and should piss off most people, I would think. It seems to be a clear violation of what the court decided 43 years ago, aside from the illogic of expecting a 64-year old woman to take up arms.
Margaret Doughty, a 64-year-old woman from the U.K., has lived in the United States for 30 years. Now that she has applied for U.S. citizenship, the Department of Homeland Security might deny her because she's an atheist.
On her application, Margaret declined to “take up arms to defend the United States”—due to her moral opposition to violence. The U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services (a division of DHS) replied that only religious-based objections are valid—instructing her to submit proof of her religion on “official church stationery” by June 21, or they will deny her U.S. citizenship.Requiring proof of religion on citizenship applications is clearly unconstitutional. There is a petition you can sign if you wish to protest this stupidity.
4 comments:
Well, for one thing, it is really difficult to tell the difference between someone who has a "reasoned objection to a particular war" from someone who just doesn't want to serve because it is inconvenient or they worry about being killed.
I have an aversion to several things, among them hard work, killing things and war. But, I understand the need for people who work on the kill floor of packing plants and those who go to war for us. It sickens me that there are innocent and good people being killed today in wars all over the world, but I also know that if left unchecked, the bad guys will take over. Unless human nature has changed.
I totally understand that a 64-year old woman will not be called upon to take up arms, and asking the question doesn't address that lack of likelihood. It really gains her some high moral ground that I cannot claim--she can say it is not her fault when something bad happens because she has a "moral opposition to violence." And I don't have that position. I am partly responsible because I live in this society and bad things happen sometimes.
So, no, don't think I will sign the petition.
That is the obvious answer, of course, and perhaps it is right. People can't decide which wars they want to fight and which they don't, because that would create anarchy. Just like if the serfs had refused to fight and die for their liege.
But then that is more or less what we have now, with an all-volunteer army. People are deciding for themselves whether they want any part of our current roster of wars, which is why the pentagon is having to spend so much more money on recruitment than in the past, and also lower their standards of acceptability.
I am curious, in the context of the Vietnam war, who were the bad guys again, and who were the good guys? And explain again for me the "need" to fight that war. It was all about dominoes, right?
One of the long list of reasons to revile Bush Jr. was his introduction of the inanity "bad guys" into what should have been a serious discussion about issues of life and death.
In your second paragraph, you mention that the "Pentagon" is spending more on recruitment and lowering their standards of acceptability.
I wondered about that, and got some information from the Army:
In recent years, the Army has met its "mission," which looks like its recruitment goal. In 1998, 1999 and 2005, they fell short. It doesn't appear that there is any definite trend except that as the current military involvement winds down, there is lower need for people.
In 2006, the Enlistment Bonus average was $12,000. In 2009, it was $13,300. That last year was down from 2008 when it was $18,300. That cost is about 1/3 the cost of getting a recruit to their first duty station.
In 2004, 9,838 recruits (12.2%) had a college degree or some college. That number in 2011 was 11,124 (17.3%).
The average age of recruits seems to remain fairly constant at about 21.3 years.
The length of time to be served has also remained fairly constant at about 48 months.
I am not seeing, at least in the figures published by the Army, the "increased cost and lowering of standards" to which you refer.
Your curiosity regarding Viet Nam is well-founded, in my opinion. The so-called "South Vietnamese" have proved out to be corrupt, inept and not conscientious in their obligations to govern when examined by most historians. Meanwhile, the North Vietnamese government was not the puppet of "the Communists" that was accepted as common knowledge back then. The so-called "domino" theory.
When Kennedy committed us and Johnson escalated the involvement in that war, they ignored the actions of Eisenhower who refused to be drawn in despite the pleas from the French regarding Dien Ben Phu (I may not be spelling that correctly?). Nixon came along and extracted the US from that tragedy.
Not that I find Nixon's place in history to be much improved by that fact.
While "bad guys" is not elegant use of the language, I am not sure I find misuse of the language to be a reason to "revile" anyone...or else I would be hating myself?
This is getting way off the point of this post, but I can't let you rewrite history to the point of crediting Nixon for "extracting us" from the disaster that was Vietnam.
First, he and Kissinger arguably committed treason by working behind the scenes during the 1968 campaign to convince the South Vietnamese government to not participate in LBJ's attempts to negotiate in Paris.
A peace pact would have helped HHH, and Nixon did his best to sabotage it. Fairly recently, documents have been published showing that LBJ was aware of what Nixon was doing, but did not go public with it.
Then he and K. cynically prolonged the war for 4 more years at the cost of tens of thousands of US and Vietnamese lives, only to accept the same terms he had rejected at the beginning. That war and how to end it took second place to domestic politics in his reasoning.
Finally, Jeez, can I mention Vietnam one time without you mentioning JFK, LBJ, and Eisenhower? My post was completely non-partisan.
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