Hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee - ICYMI: Inhofe Questions Witnesses at SASC Hearing on the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service

Hearing

U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC), today questioned witnesses at a SASC hearing on the final recommendations and report of the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service.

Witnesses included: the Honorable Joseph J. Heck, Chairman; the Honorable Debra S. Wada, Vice Chair, Military Service; and Mr. Alan Khazei, Commissioner.

Inhofe: Thank you, Chairman. The commission's report urges us to create a widespread culture of service for Americans of all backgrounds can expect and aspire to serve the nation, and all that now. Dr. Heck, in light of that, what was the thinking behind the Commission's decision not to recommend that Americans be required to serve the nation? You know, in my opening statement, I made it really clear that it's something I wouldn't have done it, but I did. I had a happy ending. What went into that decision?

Heck: Thank you. Senator Inhofe. So, while the commission believes in the value of service to individuals and the nation, it ultimately concluded that policymakers should make every effort to promote voluntary approaches to service. And this is primarily looking at the intangible benefits that come with the spirit of volunteerism. In addition, when you look at trying to make service in whatever form mandatory, certainly for military service -- there is a constitutional requirement under Article I, Section 8 to raise and support armies, provide and maintain navies -- there was concern about constitutionality of forcing individuals into other forms of service against their will. Perhaps a bigger issue, however, is the incumbent costs if you were to make mandatory service something that was a universal requirement. Roughly 210 million adults in the US population today -- we could not afford 210 million service opportunities. And we, again, go back to the importance of the volunteer spirit in providing service, whether it's at the local, state or federal level.

Inhofe: I understand that in your deliberation on that, did you study but Israel has been doing for so many years, and how successful, in my opinion, that has been?

Heck: Yes, sir, we actually studied several foreign nations and their systems that have some form of mandatory service -- in fact met with representatives from their respective embassies. Israel is a much smaller country in population. In addition, if you talk to the Department of Defense, they will echo the fact that at no point in time have we had such a professional force, as we have now with an all-volunteer force, and there are concerns about rotating people in for a one-year conscription and putting them through boot camp and then having to leave the service.

Inhofe: So you did consider that. Ms. Wada, I'd say one of the things that was most controversial in your efforts was the decision that young women should be required to register in the system alongside men. Was that difficult? Did you have a lot of opposition to that position?

Wada: Thank you, Senator. The Commission did hear from a number of organizations and individuals about the different perspectives they brought. Ultimately, the commission decided that it was based on standards, and that men and women are equally qualified, to meet --

Inhofe: Was there opposition to that?

Wada: There was some.

Inhofe: I'd think there would be, and frankly, I am glad you did. Now the most important thing in my opinion is, the problem that we've got right now with the fact that it's such a small percentage of our young people are qualified. We have a Personnel Subcommittee with this committee that you're before right now. And this has probably been the thing that has been studied for a long period of time, and even our military has a difficult time coming up with -- one of the choices would be to lower the standard. There's a lot of little obvious things that can be done, but do you have anything that you have done that is going to address the problem that we just don't have enough kids out there?

Wada: The commission looked at the number of individuals who were qualified to meet the current accession standards, and the commission found that both men and women were equally qualified to meet it, and that percentage was 29%. In actuality, it was 29% for males, and it was 29.3% for females. So to statistically both men and women, if were called to register and sent to potentially considered for a draft, both men and women would be equally qualified to meet the current accession standards.

Inhofe: Still, that's fine, but that is the problem that we're going to be facing, and we have China and we have Russia. We know the capacities they have. Mr. Khazei, do you have any comments to make on that.

Khazei: Yes. One of our big recommendations is that we need a new call to service overall, and the brilliance of this commission was that it links all three branches of service -- military, national and public -- and I think if we had a new almost like updated "Uncle Sam needs you" campaign and gave young people the option and educated them about the different choices, and if we linked recruiting efforts, I think more young people would sign up to serve in public service, military service and national service. If I could just make one point quickly, Senator, about your mandatory point. You know, we had a robust debate on this. If you look at the development of high school in America, it took about three decades. At first, high school was voluntary, and then it got to a critical mass, and people said, "You know what? Everybody should go to high school." We have a robust recommendation, which is to get to a million young people in national service within 10 years. At that point, it would be across the country enough that, I think, we could have the debate that you want to have. Now, should we make this mandatory? There's also the practical issue that if you went from where we are now, which is less than 100,000 people to four million, would the service opportunities be quality service opportunities? We don't want people in service where they're not having an impact. So I think if the recommendation to get to a million is adopted, then the country really could have the kind of debate that that you are pushing for.

Inhofe: Thank you very much.

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