[effie]

> Drafting allows for a more representative selection of the population, giving more conscientious and better troops.

Maybe that is correct, but it does nothing to get more conscientious government and military leadership. There are bad consequences as well - draft can increase duration of war, leading to more crimes and more deaths. Also, drafting strips many people of belief in personal responsibility.

> Drafting is democratic because it is equal. Drafting should also be an anti-war effort.

Do you know what democratic means? If you got drafted into Vietnam war, there was nothing democratic about it. Government lied to people from the start and was covering up evidence of how the war was going.

[mantas]

> Maybe that is correct, but it does nothing to get more conscientious government and military leadership.

It does. Then public knows that their elected leaders may send themselves and/or their family/relatives/friends. Warmongering suddenly is much more touchy-feely when you got skin in the game.

> There are bad consequences as well - draft can increase duration of war

Longer war is better than loosing. Especially if you're defending.

> leading to more crimes and more deaths

Loosing defence war to some sort of not-exactly-human-rights-loving regime is much worse.

> Also, drafting strips many people of belief in personal responsibility.

How so? It becomes everyone's personal responsibility if the country gets in war.

> Do you know what democratic means? If you got drafted into Vietnam war, there was nothing democratic about it. Government lied to people from the start and was covering up evidence of how the war was going.

And government was democratically elected, wasn't it?

As a non-american, IMO fully professional US military is the reason for war-happy government. For better or worse.

[effie]

> It does. Then public knows that their elected leaders may send themselves and/or their family/relatives/friends. Warmongering suddenly is much more touchy-feely when you got skin in the game.

Again, it didn't work that way during the Vietnam war. Maybe it will next time, we'll see.

> And government was democratically elected, wasn't it?

Technically it was. In practice, Johnson wasn't elected and the high-ranking officials including the president maintained the war on back burner, burning through American and Vietnamese lives, to keep up with their dubious agenda. The war effort was a lie and massively opposed by the public.