Recently President Trump signed an Executive Order that will impact military readiness in the U.S. Beginning in December 2026 all able-bodied males in the country will be automatically registered for Selective Service (the military draft) upon turning 18. The late former President Jimmy Carter reinstituted the Selective Service system in 1980, requiring all males born in the U.S. since 1960 to register for the draft within 30 days of their 18th birthday. A number of lawsuits against the system in the following decades have failed to reverse the policy.
The penalties for failing to register are severe:
- Fines up to $250,000 and/or 5 years in prison.
- Ineligible for federal jobs and many state, local, and municipal positions.
- Ineligible for federal student financial aid (FAFSA), including Pell Grants and federal student loans.
- Non-citizens can be denied citizenship (naturalization).
- Roughly 40 states and Washington, D.C., deny driver’s licenses or renewal for non-registration.
- Ineligible for training under the federal Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.
Yes…a $250,000 fine and up to 5 years in prison…for failing to register to serve (unwillingly) in the military of a nation that still maintains an incredibly unequal justice system and wealth structure. (Understand that Casey Anthony and George Zimmerman each murdered someone and got away with it.)
Again, this system only applies to men.
Now Trump wants to make it more difficult to evade compulsory military service. Well…he should know. Like his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush, he did just about everything he could to avoid compulsory military service more than a half century ago.
One of my best friends, Preston*, has two 20-something sons and voted for Trump during all three of his presidential runs. As the 2024 elections approached, he expressed concern that a Kamala Harris presidency would result in military action in Ukraine; meaning Harris would enact the military draft, and his sons could be impacted. I was concerned about that, too, but I was more concerned that Trump would get back into office and take military action against Iran; the same way Bush invaded Iraq under the false pretense of protecting the world from an Iraqi-based nuclear war.
I was right.
Trump got into office and – under the guise of safeguarding the globe against an Iranian-inspired nuclear Armageddon, as well as defending Israel – attacked the Middle Eastern county. Now, Preston is even more worried.
So am I.
In August of 1990, Iraq unexpectedly invaded Kuwait. Fearful they were the next targets, the Saudi royal family fled their palaces and asked the U.S. for help. As that year came to an end, then-President George H.W. Bush sent troops into the Saudi desert. Ultimately Iraqi forces surrendered without much of a fight, but about 300 U.S. service personnel died in battle. Shortly before the conflict erupted, Saudi leadership – still safely ensconced abroad – demanded that our people in uniform remove emblems of the U.S. flag from their attire. They somehow found it offensive. Bush bowed to the Saudi sheiks and ordered the removals.
Pull our boys out, was the first response from most U.S. citizens, including me. It was an outrage. If it hadn’t been for American demand for oil, the Saudis would still be living in ornate tents in the desert, picking sand fleas out of their ass. The Bush family’s loyalty to the Saudi regime became apparent in the immediate aftermath of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, when the Bush Administration allowed several Saudi nationals to leave the U.S., while other travelers remained trapped at airports and hotels.
Shortly before the Persian Gulf War began, I visited my local gym and heard one young man ask another, “Ready to go?” in reference to the conflict.
I was 27 then and thought it was a real possibility knowing our political leaders’ penchant for war. My father – who had been drafted into the U.S. Army and sent to Korea nearly four decades earlier – was also concerned. He became especially incensed when the Saudi royal family demanded U.S. military personnel remove the American flag emblems from their uniforms; cursing the clan in both English and Spanish.
Throughout Bill Clinton’s presidency, his right-wing adversaries condemned his lack of military experience; labeling him with that dreaded “draft-dodger” moniker. From 1968 to 1970, he was a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford where he openly protested the Vietnam War. But a large number of American expatriates did. When he returned to his native Arkansas, he placed his name back into the draft lottery (to maintain his “political viability”) and drew a high enough number not to be sent into the conflict.
As the 2000 presidential election arose, conservatives were eager to prop up only one man: then-Texas Governor George W. Bush. The eldest son of the nation’s 41st President, George H.W. Bush, the younger Bush graduated from Harvard in 1968 – and found himself eligible for military conscription. He immediately managed to secure a position in the Texas Air National Guard (at a time when such spots were sparse and difficult to obtain). After his initial four year stint was over, he reenlisted and then somehow was able to switch to the Alabama National Guard; in part, he later said, to work on the presidential campaign of George Wallace. That second hitch should have been completed in 1976. But no real record exists of Bush completing his service. And then – as things tend to occur – misfortune arrived and Bush’s military records mysteriously disintegrated in a warehouse fire.
Bush’s Vice President, Dick Cheney, also came under scrutiny for his lack of military service. During the 2000 campaign, Cheney declared he had “other priorities” during the Vietnam fiasco; receiving a number of draft deferments – mostly educational and one because he was a new father.
The same band of right-wingers who excoriated Clinton for his lack of military service weren’t so quick to demand a full accounting from either Bush or Cheney. Also, in 2000, then Sen. John McCain sought the GOP nomination. Coming from a long line of U.S. Navy officers, McCain served in Vietnam and was a pilot shot down over Hanoi in 1968, captured by enemy forces and held hostage for five years. But the Bush political machine had the audacity to question not only McCain’s military service (which was there for all to see) but also his patriotism. The same flag and country crowd who had demonized Clinton suddenly had no qualms belittling a real American military hero.
Now we come to Trump. Donald “bone spurs” Trump.
No one has a desire to do something unpleasant – like pay taxes or wait in line at the grocery store. And certainly nobody wants to go to war. War is not just ugly; it’s stupid and pointless.
One Saturday evening in the late 1970s, my parents hosted a few friends over for a casual gathering. Among them was a longtime male friend who brought along a young woman we hadn’t met before. She seemed pleasant enough. At some point, during a discussion, the subject of the Vietnam War came up. The U.S. had just fled Vietnam in an ignominious defeat a few years earlier. All of the men in the group had served in the U.S. military. A few of them, including my father, had been drafted. The aforementioned young woman mentioned that a young man she had been dating about a decade earlier had failed to heed his conscription notice and – apparently feeling intensely patriotic – reported him to some authority. She said he got drafted anyway.
I remember the brief quiet that settled over our cavernous den.
“Wow,” my father finally muttered. “How brave of you.”
And the conversation ended.
Don’t ask someone to do something you’re not at least willing to try – which is one reason why men have no business demanding women get pregnant.
I’m genuinely worried about Preston’s sons, as well as for any other young man who may get swept up into this conflict-laden world. But I’m concerned for the greater population. Despite all the patriotic bravado, the 2003 Iraq War really was about gaining access to the region’s oil.
I see the same outcome with Iran.
*Name changed
Chief Writing Wolf 