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Britain's Conservatives planning to bring back compulsory national service.

Likely these policy positions earned him a few votes

Count Binface has promised to introduce national service for former prime ministers and invite European countries to join the UK in his newly released manifesto ahead of the General Election.

The self-described intergalactic space warrior released his 24-point manifesto in a bid to unseat Prime Minister Rishi Sunak in his North Yorkshire constituency.

Binface, the satirical political character created by comedian Jonathan David Harvey, is hoping to strike a chord with voters by promising that pensions will be double-locked but with a little extra chain on the side, Claudia Winkleman’s fringe will be Grade-1 listed, and he will represent the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest, if elected.

Count Binface told the PA news agency that his election manifesto is entitled “Bloody Loyal To Wherever I’m Standing For Election”.

 
I don't think we can afford to emulate that to the same extent. But I'd love to more generous education reimbursement program that is tied to training completion for reservists and time in for reg force. $5000 eligibility for finishing BMQ/BMOQ. $10 000 eligibility for becoming trade qualified. Then adjust the current VAC Education Benefit limits of $40k for 6 years and $80k for 12 years. We gotta give our reservists more than $8k total. I would also love to see something equivalent of a VA loan. Maybe the government pays CMHC fees for trade qualified members and veterans? And heck, given the enduring doctor shortage, even healthcare access might be an inducement to serve, these days.

The application of the Education and Training Benefit to reservists is fair. We qualify if we show up and out the work in. We shouldn’t be seeing a whole heap of money thrown at us just for periodically showing up when we feel like it and maybe doing class B for a couple summers. Don’t forget that we aren’t like the U.S.- we deploy if we volunteer to. MND isn’t signing an order mobilizing the Fort Frances Fusiliers to be called to active duty for nine months in wherever.

I did 14 and a bit years in the PRes; squeeze out the air bubbles and I have a bit over six years pensionable, so I qualify for the lower tier ETB. It’s indexed, so it started at $40/$80k but is quite a bit more now. I hope to start making us of that next year for my master’s. I think it’s more than generous for my pretty paltry service.

I’d be fine with something to help veterans access home ownership- a military career can make it hard to get into ownership, particularly if spousal career opportunities are limited. There are lessons to learn from the U.S. there.
 
The application of the Education and Training Benefit to reservists is fair. We qualify if we show up and out the work in. We shouldn’t be seeing a whole heap of money thrown at us just for periodically showing up when we feel like it and maybe doing class B for a couple summers. Don’t forget that we aren’t like the U.S.- we deploy if we volunteer to. MND isn’t signing an order mobilizing the Fort Frances Fusiliers to be called to active duty for nine months in wherever.

I did 14 and a bit years in the PRes; squeeze out the air bubbles and I have a bit over six years pensionable, so I qualify for the lower tier ETB. It’s indexed, so it started at $40/$80k but is quite a bit more now. I hope to start making us of that next year for my master’s. I think it’s more than generous for my pretty paltry service.

I’d be fine with something to help veterans access home ownership- a military career can make it hard to get into ownership, particularly if spousal career opportunities are limited. There are lessons to learn from the U.S. there.

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The more poorly led, boring, dumbed down, pointless and screwed up the training, the more benefits and perqs you'll have to dangle in front of reservists (UK and elsewhere) to keep them engaged.

<controversial opinion warning off>
 
<controversial opinion warning on>

The more poorly led, boring, dumbed down, pointless and screwed up the training, the more benefits and perqs you'll have to dangle in front of reservists (UK and elsewhere) to keep them engaged.

<controversial opinion warning off>
It’s not even that hard. Some demanding training, some decent shooting, some occasional tough patrolling that will make for good mess stories, and some sort of level 2 or 3 live fire late in each training year. Just rinse wash and repeat that with some cycling of the variables and you’ll be a solid core of troops happy to show up and feed force generation.
 
It’s not even that hard. Some demanding training, some decent shooting, some occasional tough patrolling that will make for good mess stories, and some sort of level 2 or 3 live fire late in each training year. Just rinse wash and repeat that with some cycling of the variables and you’ll be a solid core of troops happy to show up and feed force generation.

i know ross GIF
 
To be fair, the vast majority of the population went along with the mandates. Canada had some of the highest rates of vaccination in the world. The few that were troublesome were really so.

I think it also depends on how national service obligations are constructed. How long is it? Are there options beyond military service? Are skills taught transferable? What do they get in return? Etc.

I think it has more to do with why conscription is happening. The population has to see the existential threat.

Conscription without a bonafide reason why leads you to national cultural problems like during Vietnam War, which I am not sure the USA ever really overcame.
 
I think it has more to do with why conscription is happening. The population has to see the existential threat.

Conscription without a bonafide reason why leads you to national cultural problems like during Vietnam War, which I am not sure the USA ever really overcame.
I wonder if US conscription would have continued without Vietnam? Between the Cold War's looming threat, WWII "we whipped the Nazis" mythologizing, and the whole Minuteman colonial militia mythos, I could see it continuing in some form to today, either doing a great deal of good (even with all the exemptions, system-gaming, and whatnot, it was a forced societal mixer) or leading to a different sort of Fortress America mindset.
 
The US still had a peacetime draft after Korea. Even Elvis was drafted.
 
The British were vociferously opposed to conscription, especially post-WW2, hence the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 is a pretty high bar to jump to reintroduce conscription...


Conscription in the United Kingdom​


National Service as peacetime conscription was formulated by the National Service Act 1948 introduced by Clement Attlee's Labour government. From 1 January 1949, healthy males 17 to 21 years old were required to serve in the armed forces for 18 months, and remain on the reserve list for four years. They could be recalled to their units for up to 20 days for no more than three occasions during these four years. Men were exempt from National Service if they worked in one of the three "essential services": coal mining, farming, and the merchant navy for a period of eight years. If they quit early, they were subject to being called up. Exemption continued for conscientious objectors, with the same tribunal system and categories.

In October 1950, in response to the British involvement in the Korean War, the service period was extended to two years; in compensation, the reserve period was reduced by six months. National Servicemen who showed promise could be commissioned as officers. National Service personnel were used in combat operations, including the Malayan Emergency, the Cyprus Emergency, in Kenya against the Mau Mau Uprising, and the Korean War, where conscripts to the Gloucestershire Regiment took part in the last stand during the Battle of the Imjin River. In addition, National Servicemen served in the Suez Crisis in 1956.

During the 1950s there was a prohibition on serving members of the armed forces standing for election to Parliament. A few National Servicemen stood for election in the 1951 and 1955 general elections in order to be dismissed from service. National Service ended gradually from 1957.

Section 23(3) of the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 precludes the government from using that act to make emergency regulations that would "require a person, or enable a person to be required, to provide military service".
 
It’s not even that hard. Some demanding training, some decent shooting, some occasional tough patrolling that will make for good mess stories, and some sort of level 2 or 3 live fire late in each training year. Just rinse wash and repeat that with some cycling of the variables and you’ll be a solid core of troops happy to show up and feed force generation.
Generally people in the Reserves want to do something that feels useful, different and pushes them to be a bit tougher than a average civy street job would. Something they can feel proud of and some bragging points. personally I think we need the PAO's to start changing how the average Canadian sees the military and the Reserves. They also need to do it in other languages beyond French. Here in BC, the Farsi and Mandarin speakers generally have a dim view of military service, thanks to their home country issues and I suspect that attitude is not confined to those specific ethnic groups either. That is a wall that needs to be broken through.
 
Generally people in the Reserves want to do something that feels useful, different and pushes them to be a bit tougher than a average civy street job would. Something they can feel proud of and some bragging points. personally I think we need the PAO's to start changing how the average Canadian sees the military and the Reserves. They also need to do it in other languages beyond French. Here in BC, the Farsi and Mandarin speakers generally have a dim view of military service, thanks to their home country issues and I suspect that attitude is not confined to those specific ethnic groups either. That is a wall that needs to be broken through.
Not wishing to turn this into an ARes thread, but ...

We need a much stronger and healthier ARes and all those items that you point out are valid and necessary as part of a larger plan to make the ARes a viable force to augment and expand the RegF in the case of a greater emergency than the ongoing peacetime missions that are on the books.

Conscription, on the other hand, looks at expanding the force well beyond its current RegF and ARes structure in the event of a major and prolonged emergency. At some point the CAF and government need to address the reality of Stage 4 mobilization, even if only in the abstract in order to have a viable plan on how to mobilize both people and industry for such an eventuality. To continue to ignore the question, as has been done for decades, is pure professional negligence but, sadly, in keeping with Canadian bureaucracies' tendency to only think about today and to ad hoc the future. This is actually the reality as to the tension between the RegF and the ARes "honourary colonels" when it comes to transforming the ARes. The RegF concept is to achieve a better structure for "today's" missions while the "honouraries" wish to retain the framework of a force to expand on. The two concepts are not mutually exclusive but so far, over many decades, no realistic or viable compromise has been possible. IMHO, that is because the RegF simply ignores Stage 4 within the severe financial constraints that they have to maintain the force for today's day-to-day needs.

Any Stage 4 mobilization plan has to look seriously as to whether or not people will voluntarily rush to the colours when the nation is imperiled or whether some system of coercive conscription is necessary. In the past, Canadian volunteers have mostly stepped up. The question is whether or not they would still do that again in the numbers that may be required in the future. That also raises the question of how many troops will be needed and whether or not the country can produce or acquire the armaments needed for such a force.

The issue isn't merely as to whether conscription is required; the question that must first be examined is what does Canada hope to accomplish with respect to the various contingency plans that it should develop and which it doesn't give a fig about at the present. Do we currently need conscription? No, as we have no plans to do anything but the minimalist tasks set out in SSE. In order to require conscription we would need to have ambitions far beyond what we, as a nation, have. Do we currently have the ability to conscript? No. While s. 40 of the Emergency Act give broad regulatory powers in the event of a war, conscription itself is barred from being implemented by regulation by s. 40(2). It would need a new act of parliament to institute conscription.

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The US still had a peacetime draft after Korea. Even Elvis was drafted.

I read that Recuiters used to say to reluctant potential draftees, "We got Elvis."

One documentary film showed a Recuiter saying, "What do you want, Army or Navy?"

The draftee said, "Navy". They stamped his file ARMY. :)

Some tried for an "Easy Out" in the Elvis era.

 
In the Second World War, Cdn conscripted soldiers were not sent overseas (until near the end due to Infantry casualties in NW Europe) unless they volunteered to go "Active". Don't know about the Aleutian Campaign as it was still North America.
 
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In the Second World War, Cdn conscripted soldiers were not sent overseas (until near the end due to Infantry casualties in NW Europe) unless they volunteered to go "Active". Don't know about the Aleutian Campaign as it was still North America.
Conscription started long after the Aleutian Islands campaign.
 
Now that the UK has a new government are they going to drop this idea?
 
Now that the UK has a new government are they going to drop this idea?
They were disparaging the idea throughout the campaign. I don't think there is a chance that they will bring back national service.

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In the Second World War, Cdn conscripted soldiers were not sent overseas (until near the end due to Infantry casualties in NW Europe) unless they volunteered to go "Active". Don't know about the Aleutian Campaign as it was still North America.

Not sure if you will be able to open this link, but if you can see page 193. https://www.erudit.org/fr/revues/jcha/1996-v7-n1-jcha1003/031107ar.pdf

If you can't open it, there were NRMA troops in the Canadian battalions that participated in the Aleutians.
 
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