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Korean Job Discussion Forums
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radcon
Joined: 23 May 2011
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 Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2012 6:28 pm Post subject: |
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| northway wrote: |
| comm wrote: |
| northway wrote: |
| Quote: |
| In Greece, Civilian Service is twice as long as the corresponding military service and in Switzerland, the Civilian Service is one and one-half times longer. In 2005, the Swiss parliament considered whether willingness to serve one and a half times longer than an army recruit was sufficient proof of sincerity, citing that the cost of judging the state of conscience of a few thousand men per year was too great. |
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscientious_objector |
Well there you have it. Be a war slave for X years or a domestic slave for 1.5X years. I wonder how often "Civilian Service" involves serving drinks to politicians and war leaders on "the home front". |
The people I know who have done it in the States served in national parks and national forests planting trees. |
When was this? |
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KimchiNinja
Joined: 01 May 2012
Location: Gangnam
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2012 6:02 pm Post subject: |
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| AsiaESLbound wrote: |
| Freedom is a state of mind for you can feel free anywhere. |
True indeed.
Although I certainly feel more free without over-active police, guns everywhere, drug dealers roaming the streets, corporations running every aspect of human life, lawyers just waiting to sue anyone for everything. |
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Privateer
Joined: 31 Aug 2005
Location: Easy Street.
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2012 8:00 pm Post subject: |
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| motiontodismiss wrote: |
Korea has conscription. This in and of itself makes it less free than the US. End of story.
Forcing someone to risk their lives for you for a pitiful "wage" against their will (slavery) is a greater infringement of freedom than some perverted TSA monkey seeing naked pictures of me at the airport.  And the stupid "reserve" nonsense? That's just gov't harassment.
I don't care if it's the government doing the enslaving and I don't care what purpose it's for. I'm a firm believer in capitalism and I believe that people have an absolute right to sell their services at the highest (or at least market) price (barring criminal conduct). The fact that the government does it makes it even worse. And think about it for a second; in a capitalist society, would you trust something as important as national defense to someone getting paid 30 cents an hour?  I sure as hell wouldn't (which is why I hate flying regional jets...the pilots qualify for food stamps) |
Frankly, I find it insulting that you would suggest people need money to be motivated to fight for their country. Such people exist, of course, but we don't think much of them. Really, "sell your services at the highest market price"?? Perhaps you don't realize it, but you're talking about selling out your country if the price is right.
The lesson is you cannot apply the capitalist paradigm to everything, certainly not to national defense. |
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fermentation
Joined: 22 Jun 2009
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| Posted: Sun Aug 05, 2012 8:43 pm Post subject: |
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| I personally find it more insulting that the government thinks people need to be forced to fight for their country. If your nation is attacked and people don't voluntarily take up arms, then I think you're screwed anyway. |
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spanky1off
Joined: 21 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2012 5:32 pm Post subject: |
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| fermentation wrote: |
| I personally find it more insulting that the government thinks people need to be forced to fight for their country. If your nation is attacked and people don't voluntarily take up arms, then I think you're screwed anyway. |
just to play devils advocate here, what about deterrent. dont forget this nation is officially still at war and across the dmz is one of the worlds biggest armies. an untrained civilian population would be useless if war broke out. youd be left with a ragtag collection of armed militias at best. |
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fermentation
Joined: 22 Jun 2009
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| Posted: Tue Aug 07, 2012 8:30 pm Post subject: |
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| spanky1off wrote: |
just to play devils advocate here, what about deterrent. dont forget this nation is officially still at war and across the dmz is one of the worlds biggest armies. an untrained civilian population would be useless if war broke out. youd be left with a ragtag collection of armed militias at best. |
I don't I'll ever be convinced that conscription is a justifiable means of defending freedom. If you're going to enslave people, be honest and say it's to protect your interests or to save money. Don't mock your citizens and claim it's freedom. Conscription means you're being taken away the very rights gauranteed to you by the constitution. It makes no sense to protect freedom by taking it away.
I assume you mean because of military training, most male civilians are capable soldiers? Check out the other thread on ROK military service. Korean military training is very poor overall and reservist training is pretty much non-existent. We already are a rag tag militia, and we aren't even armed properly. I mean, some guys I saw didn't even know how to field strip their K-2s. Some reserve units still use Korean War era M1 Carbines! I'd much rather be protected by highly trained professionals instead of glorified janitors that are ROK conscripts.
The best deterrent against an NK invasion is the US alliance. The Norks cannot realistically hope to conquer the South while we have international back up from much more powerful military forces. |
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spanky1off
Joined: 21 Aug 2006
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 2:30 am Post subject: |
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| fermentation wrote: |
| spanky1off wrote: |
just to play devils advocate here, what about deterrent. dont forget this nation is officially still at war and across the dmz is one of the worlds biggest armies. an untrained civilian population would be useless if war broke out. youd be left with a ragtag collection of armed militias at best. |
I don't I'll ever be convinced that conscription is a justifiable means of defending freedom. If you're going to enslave people, be honest and say it's to protect your interests or to save money. Don't mock your citizens and claim it's freedom. Conscription means you're being taken away the very rights gauranteed to you by the constitution. It makes no sense to protect freedom by taking it away.
I assume you mean because of military training, most male civilians are capable soldiers? Check out the other thread on ROK military service. Korean military training is very poor overall and reservist training is pretty much non-existent. We already are a rag tag militia, and we aren't even armed properly. I mean, some guys I saw didn't even know how to field strip their K-2s. Some reserve units still use Korean War era M1 Carbines! I'd much rather be protected by highly trained professionals instead of glorified janitors that are ROK conscripts.
The best deterrent against an NK invasion is the US alliance. The Norks cannot realistically hope to conquer the South while we have international back up from much more powerful military forces. |
i understand what your saying and i actually agree and hate the idea behind conscription. im just saying isnt it a special case here as they are effectively still at war and with a million or so armed norks a stones throw away. the day you rely solely on international protection for your security will be the day u get caught with your pants down when america becomes heavily involved in an other theatre of war, lets say iran, and cant commit resources to a 2nd front. i do agree a well trained and well funded army serves as a better protection but would they actually get enough through hiring? i dont think its enslavement if the danger to your country is very real and present.
on the other hand why the hell do the swiss have conscription. all they do is yodel whilst making great chocolate and watches. perhaps they have a surplus of army knives to use up. |
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fermentation
Joined: 22 Jun 2009
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| Posted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 4:13 pm Post subject: |
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| spanky1off wrote: |
i understand what your saying and i actually agree and hate the idea behind conscription. im just saying isnt it a special case here as they are effectively still at war and with a million or so armed norks a stones throw away. the day you rely solely on international protection for your security will be the day u get caught with your pants down when america becomes heavily involved in an other theatre of war, lets say iran, and cant commit resources to a 2nd front. i do agree a well trained and well funded army serves as a better protection but would they actually get enough through hiring? i dont think its enslavement if the danger to your country is very real and present.
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To me it makes no logical sense. It's like saying, "There are these bad guys who want to take away our freedom and enslave us so to prevent that from happening, we'll enslave you and take away your freedom." Kinda goes against the principles this country is supposed stand for. It is enslavement when so many don't want to go but do because of government coercion.
And conscription in itself isn't a deterrent or an effective means of defense. Korea had conscription before the Korean war and look what happened then. They didn't have the technological advances or the large presence of American troops. If people don't want to join the military, its on the military to create incentives. And the numbers of people who join the officer and NCO corps tell me that wouldn't really be a problem although it obviously won't be as high as it currently is. Plenty of people will flock to an easily acquired secure job with benefits. And if a war breaks out, I'm pretty sure there will be plenty of people who will voluntarily take up arms as they did during the Japanese occupation and even the Korean war in some cases.
And developing a professional all volunteer force is a step torward not relying on international support. As of right now, however, the US-ROK alliance is the biggest deterrent and I see no problem with using alliances as a strategic alternative as long as Korea doesn't get lazy and neglect its military development. My point was that, conscription or no conscription, the norks won't attack us largely due to our international support. Actually the issue probably goes deeper than that but that's all I can say on the matter right now.
The best argument for conscription I've heard was the incredible financial burdern an all-volunteer force will create. Korea simply doesn't have the money to maintain a sizable volunteer force. So I realize realities aren't that simple, but I do think we should look to phase out conscription eventually like most countries are doing. |
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