Our society is not militarized.
In response to William Hartung, as published in the War is Boring blog.
Our society is not militarized.
In fact, the civil-military divide has never been wider and it continues to grow. About 1% of the United States serves in the Armed Forces, including National Guard and Reserve units. Less than 10% of Americans have ever served. Millennials are disproportionately few among that group, meaning that as the country ages the ratio will shrink. Culturally, this is evident in the unquestioning awe many civilians have for the military and veterans, as it is in the mild disdain many service members have for civilians.
This has given rise to a military class within American society. That class is militarized, and for good reason. These are people and families who have spent the past 16 years at war.
16 years.
This isn’t everyone in the military today, and it certainly isn’t the junior enlisted service members who bear the brunt of military danger and drudgery. Many of them barely (or don’t) remember the 9/11 attacks that pulled us into the war, let alone have combat experience in Iraq or Afghanistan.
But the military as a whole has taken on enormous challenge, while the home front has been virtually unaffected. A militarized society would include systematic economic regulation to support the war effort; indoctrination for school children on the justness of the war, the need for warriors on the front line, and the glorification of military service; and minimal tolerance of opposition to the war effort, policies, or practitioners.
Some of these things arguably happen already. But none systematically.
There is a danger, though.
The disconnect between American society and the military makes it easier to commit to small-scale, long duration conflicts. The costs are relatively small to the nation as a whole and borne almost exclusively by a tiny proportion of Americans. This makes it easy to commit troops, particularly deniable and highly capable Special Operations units, without considering the moral and strategic consequences.
Lives and money should only be spent as resources when essential for a clear, worthwhile objective as defined by some form of political consensus (i.e. a Congressional declaration of war). Moreover, the decision to use violence to achieve American policy objectives, to kill people and break things in order to make the world how we want it, demands serious moral consideration.
This is the militarized America we should be worried about. It has been here for a long time. And it can only be fixed by bridging the gap, not trying to torch what few bridges remain.
