From: Vietnam Veterans Against the War Anti-Imperialist <vvawai@oz.net>
Subject: Beware The Recruiters
Photo by Mike Hastie
The U.S. military's Judas-goats!
We in VVAW AI have been hearing more and more about the efforts of the military to get its recruiters unrestricted access to schools and their students. With the patriotic hysteria that has been whipped up over September 11th, they stand a good chance at making some inroads. This means that if you are a student and have not yet been approached by a recruiter, you will be. We feel that it is very important that you understand some realities about the military and you have some questions to ask the recruiter. As veterans who have experienced all that the military has to offer, including recruiters, we want to be perfectly clear about two important points:#1-The U.S. military is not about the future, yours or anybody else's. It's about making war, pure and simple.
#2-Recruiters lie!
If you don't hear anything else we say, remember these two points. They may save your life.
The U.S. Military
The U.S. military is about war. Just listen to what the former Secretary of War Dick Cheney had to say: "The reason to have a military is to be prepared to fight and win wars...it's not a jobs program." Nor is it a education program, a benefits program or an Outward Bound program for troubled adolescents. Its purpose is to wage war. Being part of the system of capitalism, it is an institution which has nothing to do with defending freedom and democracy and everything to do with defending and expanding the interests of U.S. capital, which lives in the form of "the unfettered growth of capitalism." It goes wherever and whenever it is told, bringing misery, death and destruction to everyone it meets. It prides itself in not asking questions and in its macho ability to "do or die." To accomplish this, the U.S. military has a hierarchical structure divided into two broad groupings: officers and enlisted. The division is necessary because, in spite of the "no questions" mentality, somebody has to do the thinking. But, to ensure the blind loyality of the military, thinking needs to be restricted to a select few so the rest can uphold, and be held up to, the "no questions" standard. These select few are the officers, and only the highest echelons at that. The military has also developed and honed a set of rules of conduct that are codified into laws called the UCMJ-Uniform Code of Military Justice-which has nothing to do with justice and everything to do with maintaining the rule of officers.
Which means the enlisted are cannonfodder-the ones doing and the ones dying. Towards this end, the military puts all enlistees through what it calls "boot camp," a rigorous form of physical and mental indoctrination into the institution. Here the individual is stripped away and replaced with the drone "soldier." The recent ads proclaiming the new "Army of One" are true, however the one is not you the individual looking to join. The one is the "body-military" of all the drones obediently following orders without questioning. Be one, act as one, die as one.
But what does this have to do with recruiters? Better yet, what do recruiters have to do with this? Well, the recruiter's job is to get you to join by whatever means necessary, even if it means bending and breaking the truth. After all, once you are in, there is no one to complain to anyway, and even if you do, all you get is a laugh and the response: "Tell us something we don't already know." We know. We have already listened to the stories and believed the lies. We know why recruiters are called Judas-goats. It is because of the role they play. A Judas-goat is an animal who leads the rest of the herd to the slaughterhouse chutes. At the last minute, the Judas-goat is led away to do it again while the rest are taken inside and slaughtered.
Don't believe us? Listen to what a recruiter wrote in a letter to the Army Times, a newspaper about life in the army. He both complimented the newspaper for the good job it did reporting the "real" army but also moaned that it made his job of getting young people to enlist harder.
"I tell prospects about the great pay and benefits. Benefits such as free medical and dental care for themselves and Tricare for their families. They read in the Army Times about soldiers and former soldiers suffering from Gulf War illnesses and being denied treatment, about poor treatment, poor facilities and how Tricare is broken."
Reality
While it is important to go into the recruiter station prepared, it is also important to realize that it does no good to get anything promised in writing or to rely on the enlistment contract you sign to protect your interests. The recruiter won't give you anything that can be used against the army and the contract you sign is what's commonly known as an open-ended contract. This means that you are bound to what's in the contract now and to any changes made to it while you are enlisted. It is like buying a car for $20,000 over 5 years and then having the dealer change it to $60,000 in four years. No one would sign such a contract in the "real" world yet that is exactly the kind of contract you sign when entering the military.
Another important thing to know is the length of enlistment. Most people think they're enlisting for three or four years only to find out they are obligated for eight. They learn too late that after their "normal" enlistment is over they are in the "inactive reserves" for the remaining time, subject to immediate recall in times of war. Since the military has been involved in quite a few wars in the last decade, chances for one in the next decade are pretty good-the current war against "terrorism" notwithstanding.
We want you to be armed with the knowledge and understanding about the military no matter what decision you ultimately make. We and many others would rejoice if you decide not to join the military. However if you do, we will also rejoice on that day in the future when, faced with having to make a choice between conscience or orders, you choose humanity as others before you have done.
Resources
The decision to join the military is a serious one that should not be made in haste or based solely on the recruiter's words. We encourage you to involve your family and friends as well as people and/or organizations who specialize in such counseling. Here are a few to help you get started:
- Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors
630 20th Street #302, Oakland, CA 94612
or 1515 Cherry St., Philadelphia, PA 19102
girights@objector.org - Quaker House of Fayetteville, NC
223 Hillside Ave, Fayetteville, NC 28301
910-323-3912 - Seattle Draft and Military Counseling
PO Box 20604, Seattle, WA 98102
206-789-2751
sdmcc@scn.org - Center on Conscience & War (NISBCO)
1830 Connecticut Ave. NW
Washington, DC 20009
202-483-2220 or 800-379-2679
nisbco@nisbco.org - War Resisters League
339 Lafayette Street
New York, NY 10012 - GI Rights Hotline 800-394-9544