Quote Originally Posted by AmericanPride View Post
I don't see how having a medicore conscript force is any worse than an unquestioning loyal professional force barely capable of fulfilling its missions and at the hands of nearly unaccountable policy elites.
On balance, there's probably little difference. However, when those unaccountable policy elites take a once competent semi-professional force and misuse it then the barely capable force is the result. It takes little thought to see that taking a mediocre conscript force and subjecting it to the same conditions would result in even worse performance.

Appropriate is the apocryphal tale of the very drunk Sailor and Mrs F.D.Roosevelt during WW II. Said she, "You're the drunkest sailor I've ever seen." He replied, "Yeah but tomorrow I'll be sober and you'll still be ugly." That barely competent batch of volunteers can be raised to sober heights -- that mediocre crop of Conscripts cannot be -- not in a Democracy; the Legislatures won't tolerate it...
That's Ricks' point.
Is it? I wonder. Didn't happen during either Korea or Viet Nam...
How would you know if you didn't serve during the Civil War (or did you?)?
His quoting of history is at least as good as thine...

Can't speak for the Civil war but for the last draft, those that were drafted mostly did their jobs to the best of their ability. Their biggest shortfall was that training had to be short and marginal to save their limited time to serve (in an existential war, that problem still exists). Today's volunteers (most are not really professionals...) suffer from the same truncated training syllabi because the Personnel and Training systems have not been adapted for the volunteer force -- nor has selection criteria but that's another thread.
To what effect?
In my observation to better effect by far than achieved by most of the drafted predecessors or the families of those draftees. Among many other things, the good effects achieved are shown by the fact that today's infantryman carries about $25K worth of gear about -- his Viet Nam era counterpart had about 10% of that amount -- and that's adjusted for inflation. The Army would never spend that much money equipping easily replaceable conscripts, they cost less to obtain and train so no need to waste money on trying to keep them alive with good, effective gear...