David Segal, center, and his wife Mady Segal, discuss military issues involving recruitment and family life with community members at St. Mary’s College. Both are highly regarded scholars of military sociology.       The Bay Net photo by Sean Rice

 

U.S. military enlistment numbers will continue the stagnant trend if U.S. leadership continues to employ peacetime recruitment methods, according to a widely recognized scholar of military sociology.

With Operation Iraqi Freedom and the war on terror the United States committed its all-volunteer force, and recruitment incentives remained of a peacetime nature, observed David Segal, during a lecture on the changing “face of the U.S. military” at St. Mary’s College last week.

David and wife Mady Segal are among the most distinguished scholars of military organizations, both with doctorates in sociology and lists of accolades from institutions and universities across the Eastern U.S.

During the Vietnam War, the military used reservists, national guardsmen and used conscription to draft citizens into the military, David Segal points out, and this was standard procedure for modern American wars.

Since 2001, national guardsmen and reservists have been used again, but conscription was not applied. Also recruitment tactics have revolved around monetary incentives.

“Just like conscription was the casualty of Vietnam, the National Guard is going to be the casualty of Operation Iraqi Freedom,” David Segal said.

Utilizing large numbers of the states’ National Guard corps also raises other problems, he points out, including who has ultimate control of those state units.

During Hurricane Katrina, 40 percent of the Louisiana Nation Guard was in the Middle East, and those troops took the state supply of gasoline generators that would have been the last resort for back-up power.

There is a need for 200,000 to 250,000 new troops each year, and about 2,000,000 men turn 18 each year, but Segal doesn’t predict this administration will resort to the draft, despite the need.

“Most of our senior military leaders are believes in an all-volunteer force,” he said, later adding he would prefer some sort of universal service law that would require all 18-year-olds to volunteer somehow, including military and peace corps.

Right now the military is 85 percent men, points out Mady Segal, and of the crop of women, 52 percent are from minority groups. Of the 210,000 women in active duty now, most are in the Air Force, then Navy, Army and Marines respectively.

“We have an exclusion of women from our ground combat forces,” she said. “But this is a war with no front lines,” women are seeing the front from many posts.

Mady Segal also noted the rise in military activity is also putting a strain on marriages and military families. Divorces are up and extended tours with short stateside breaks are emotionally draining, she said.

“And there