RPI Chairman and Founder Ron Paul, speaking with Charles Goyette during their most recent weekly podcast, addresses the military draft, which Paul refers to as “slavery,” and the psychological manipulation involved in requiring 18-year-old American men to register in the Selective Service System. The discussion complements Paul’s Sunday column analyzing the anti-liberty nature of conscription as well as other forms of mandatory “national service.”
Paul begins his analysis of the draft by recounting how he in 1979, as a United States House of Representatives member from Texas, helped hold off for a while the reinstatement of draft registration. Ultimately, however, mandatory draft registration was reinstated, justified by an argument that it was needed to respond to the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.
While some people would assert that the presence of Selective Service is not a problem considering the US has not had a draft for decades, Paul explains that requiring Selective Service registration communicates to Americans that the government is their master. Paul elaborates:
But, I always thought, “Why are they putting us through this registration, because, if you don’t register, they know you haven’t registered?” They know everything about everybody, and in the age of NSA, why make kids march off and fill out a piece of paper? My theory on that is — just to make sure they know who owns them, you know, “In case we need you we are going to call you up.”
Paul notes in the podcast that he is delighted to see Ukrainian troops opposing mandatory extensions of their mobilization. RPI Executive Director Daniel McAdams provides an introduction to the growing war resistance in Ukraine in his August 4 article “Ukraine Antiwar Movement Grows.”
The basic story of war is the same in the US, Ukraine, and around the world. As Paul comments, “old people start the wars, and they make the young people fight the wars.”
Listen to the complete podcast discussion here.
