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Why do you think Dems are so hell-bent on adding women to the draft?
A new military bill has passed through the committee in a 23-3 vote and is now headed to the full Senate. That bill is the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, which sets policy for the Department of Defense in any given year.
While there are a number of things in it that would commend it to our readers — including defense spending and some wording that clarifies our role with respect to Taiwan — not all of it is good.
One thing that particularly stands out is the section calling for women to be included in the draft.
WOMEN AND THE DRAFT: One of the more controversial provisions would amend the Military Selective Service Act to require women to register for the draft. Republicans succeeded in striking the proposal in last year’s NDAA, but it made it through the committee over the objections of three members, Sens. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., Tom Cotton, R-Ark., and Roger Wicker, R-Miss.
Hawley was joined by fellow Senate Republicans Marco Rubio, Fla.; James Lankford, Okla.; Roger Marshall, Kan.; Cindy Hyde-Smith, Miss.; John Boozman, Ark.; Steve Daines, Mont.; Mike Lee, Utah; Ted Cruz, Texas; and Jim Risch, Idaho, in urging Chairman Jack Reed in “the strongest possible terms” not to “force America’s women to register for the military draft.”
In a letter to Reed before the vote, the senators wrote, “Reviving these efforts would be a grave mistake and would needlessly inject divisive social policies into important debates over our national security.”
“Women have served in and alongside the Armed Forces since our nation’s founding. Time and again, they have answered the call of duty and served honorably – often heroically – when our nation needed them. But they have done so of their own will. While American men are required to register for the military draft and fight if needed, these requirements have never been applied to American women. Where they have fought, they have done so freely.” —WashingtonExaminer
Ted Cruz has been warning us that this has been a high priority on the Democrat wish list for a very long time now. And shockingly, some Republicans have been playing ball. But others are holding the line.
In December, a small group of courageous Republicans managed to kill a bipartisan effort to make women eligible for the military draft. The maneuver, led by conservatives such as Chip Roy (R., Texas) in the House and Josh Hawley (R., Mo.) in the Senate, was a surprise victory; a provision expanding the language of the Selective Service System from “all men” to “all Americans,” included in last year’s National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), initially looked as if it would pass. But after a surge of last-minute opposition, Senator Hawley successfully inserted an amendment striking the language just before the legislation passed the Senate. Politico dubbed the move “a stunning turnaround.” Conservatives declared victory. “We have a calling to stand up for the people in this country,” Roy told National Review. “And that’s what I think we just showed you can do if you unite to do so.”
But this week, proponents of the provision are mounting another effort to draft America’s daughters. And shamefully, many Republicans are lending their support. On Wednesday, Politico’s Burgess Everett reported that an amendment to make women eligible for the draft in this year’s NDAA passed the Senate Armed Services Committee, with just six Republicans — Jim Inhofe, Mike Rounds, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Kevin Cramer, and Roger Wicker — voting “no.” That means that seven Republican senators — more than half of the 13 GOP members of the committee — voted yes:
Joni Ernst
Thom Tillis
Deb Fischer
Dan Sullivan
Rick Scott
Marsha Blackburn
Tommy Tuberville —NationalReview
Support for this policy is only marginally higher than support for Joe Biden himself these days — somewhere in the mid-30s — so why are DC politicians pushing it so hard?
National Review suggests it’s motivated by the Left’s Feminist instincts and (perhaps more importantly) the woke end-game of erasing all notions of gender. It suggests the right simply capitulated in the face of politically dangerous gender issues or that they have become trapped in that position as the natural result of having accepted the left’s framing of the issue.
That may be a big part of the rationale. But there could be other factors at play as well.
Could this be a 3-D chess way of trying to weaken our military? Every time we turn around we see the left stocking the military brass with more ‘woke warriors’ or showing more apolitical or traditional soldiers out the door.
That has an impact on the culture. We also see them spending training and resources on race and sensitivity issues at the expense of combat readiness.
We have been decommissioning ships faster than we have been building them and military spending hasn’t kept pace with inflation.
Could this be intended as one more way to undercut the American military exceptionalism that so many Democrats despise?
The objection is not that there is no place for women in our military — most of us have known one or more who have proudly served.
Nor is it that the presence of women in the military would weaken our military readiness (Although we should probably develop a far better system of to managing and resolving issues relating to sexual misconduct on base before we throw the floodgates open even wider to the recruitment of female veterans.)
The problem that comes to mind isn’t women in the military so much as the draft itself.
Up until now, every woman who has ever served has made the choice to do so. When the call went out to show up and defend the country, it has been men that step up to do so.
Historically, women have been known to pick up a rifle and fight when the fight comes to their door.
Hey, we see examples of that all the way back to Jael picking up her tent peg and getting to business in the book of Judges (4:21).
But sometimes the draft isn’t used for an existential threat on the level of what we’re seeing in Ukraine or when the Soviets and Nazis fought their way inch by inch as they reduced Stalingrad to rubble.
What about a situation where we are locked into a conflict on the scale of WWI or WWII?
Are we supposed to insist that women be called to join the fight whether they have a fighting temperament or not? As history has shown us, there are many ways to contribute at the home front even if you don’t put on a uniform and grab a rifle.
Is the real purpose of this tactic rooted in Democrat opposition to a powerful American military?
Are they counting on how the American public would be far less willing to invoke even the most defensible applications of the draft knowing our daughters were in danger of being called up as well as our sons?
Short of being a mind reader, we only have our best guess. But the math sure seems to check out, don’t you think?
As for that story about Jael and the Tent peg? That’s one of the inspiring biblical biographies mentioned in this spicy tome.
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