National service!

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Norwayhornet

Norwayhornet

Well-Known Member
Jan 24, 2011
16,473
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Varhaug Norway
In Norway all kids have to do 1years national service ,even if they are in employment (there job has to be held for them by law!)
What with all the cutbacks , and action in afghanistan and Iraq , What forces we have left in the UK are prettythin on the ground!!! So we have rising unemployment and austere times ahead! So what about bringing National service back in the UK , teach kids self discipline and a trade if nothing else ,they could do some of the jobs back home to allow the professional service personnel to fight in other theatres!
What do guys think?
 
You've been in the forces and I've broached this with friends who still are and they're not happy to rely on non professional non career soldiers in battle. from my civi perspective yes its a good idea and I'd love to see the discipline.
 
Don't agree with the holding jobs, can't see that helping our economy much. Maybe we could just pressgang all the unemployed into the armed service! 0% unemployment, an example to all... :wink:
 
Believe it or not, I missed out on national service because I was too young. ;)

I think that if I had been called to do it I would have learnt a different trade to the one that followed and have no idea where that might have taken me.
 
Hock ,How could you suggest such a thing ?!!! Hope the decisionmakers dont go no forums such as these<laugh> What I can say is the Noggy apprentices etc that have worked with me , have done their time and come back a lot more disciplined , confident and willing to learn!!! Hence you get some of these kids getting into advanced positions very young !! I cant help but think it could help a lot of our kids !
Aberdeen no professional likes to trust "a muppet" Our service personnel have to put up with a lot anyway a few kids in the right places wouldnt be a problem!, Infact thinking about it the main problem our service peronnel have is the procurement department in the MoD!!
 
The day they re-introduced National Service to this country is the day i would emigrate.

If the best we can think of to "discipline" our youngsters is to give them guns and make them fight then we have already lost whatever wars are worth fighting.
 
Leo , I was thinking more along the line of admin stores, logistics ,drivers medics , ie non combatants! I learnt my trade in the mob , its not all about pusing a button or pulling a trigger you know , you learn other good things like teamwork , ability to work under pressure , self confidence, (even how to do your own washing and ironing,ask mrs leo about that one ;))
 
Strangely enough national service was suspended out here 10 years ago. As the law was written at the time it was not abolished, just suspended. The process to get to that stage took several years and to me looks like a classic French compromise.

It actually began in the time of Bonaparte and continued for all of that time. It was becoming very difficult to get men, women were not required to do it, to take part because of all the exemptions that were in place.

Today you will hear the older people putting the lack of discipline in the cities from the young men down to the change in the law, but I heard it before in the UK before I left.
 
Not a good idea IMO. What trade can really be learnt in 12 months? It maybe a good theory, but it would just throw a load of misfits into an environment that would cause more issues.
What we need is better schools and quality apprenticeships and vocational training to give kids a real start. 6 months day release at the local chav college to get a NVQ is not enough, it's just the typical dumbing down that successive governments have installed.
 
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Thanks to personal experience, I'm not sure about this. In non-combatant roles, yes, but politicians are an untrustworthy breed - they couldn't be trusted to retain the 'non' part of that. I agree wholeheartedly that it would benefit youngsters through skills training and instilling some sadly lacking self-discipline, but would hate to think of them being packed off as unwilling cannon fodder.

Before National Service was abolished in Australia, being selected was a bit of a lottery. All 20 year old males were required to register and were selected if they were unlucky enough for their birth date to be drawn out of a hat!

I still thank my old mum for hanging on an extra day - if she hadn't, I'd have been sent to Vietnam :emoticon-0141-whew:
 
I can not say anything. The idea of an army for Ísland army died in May 1940 when the British arrived to defend us even though there was not enough money to buy guns and unfiorms from years earlier. Now we only have the special trained unit in the lögreglan or police. There is the ICRU who are working in Afganistan and some other places.
 
For me it is an emphatic no. I should say that my father was a concientious objector so I think the sense of pacificism is so deeply engrained I simply can't help thinking that the country taking such a step would mean I also would have to emigrate.

However, if you want a more balanced view, do check out this debate
 
Exactly Aber wasnt that what I was saying ,life skills such as respect ,self discipline teamwork , trust , honesty, self confidence etc you get from the military!
 
No, we've moved on. Knocking the education system doesn't help either...there are many very good schools and many people who have worked their socks off to improve them and their teaching methods...very different now than when some of us were at school. You could argue parental responsibility for children's behaviour is not what it was but I think this kind of debate is always liable to assume that what's written in the Daily Mail is somehow a universal truth. It shouldn't be necessary to say it, but short cut journalism accounts for far too many popular beliefs which are in reality projections based on a tiny number of extreme examples.

I'm not even sure that the virtues of military training are all they're cracked up to be. Those who have experienced it often emerge quite as narrow-minded, intolerant and aggressive as the rest of us.
 
I'm sorry but as I suggested before I could not live in a society that believes that it would be an improvement for young people to go into the military. Whether they are taught to fight or even handle a gun is irrelevant - the armed forces are designed for conflict. Are we really so destitute as a society that we believe the only way of instilling discipline is to give kids a military training.

Our school system lasts for at least 11 years and during this period you would hope part of education would be to teach kids life skills, which include "do as you would be done by" so that they respect other people and their property.

If you really had to have some form of National Service the best I could think would be in Social Service helping others

However the real answer was posted above and included proper attempts and education through apprenticeships and the like to find what each individual is good at and can offer. The recent obsession with matching other countries statistics and sending everyone who can breath to University is crazy - not only is it unaffordable but it does not help anyone.
 
Aber - what is with the dude bit :) - Nice thought but two centuries too late. With 7 billion people in the world realistically there is never going to be a return to a global "tribal" society - even if for some that would be the ideal.

Now if some Alien bug wiped out 90% of the population it is an interesting thought that maybe we should try to build a better new society that would mix the better values of a peaceful rural way of life with the good parts of a technological civilisation. To try something like that is why I moved to deepest darkest Carmarthenshire Prynhawn da

But what am I talking about? Alien bugs??? !!! Next I will doubt the moon landings :)
 
some very good comments above ! Theo hope your not calling me narrow minded and aggressive and intolerant! Yes I am ex military and can see the benefits from both sides! If the world was a wonderful place (which it would be without humanity)!! Then there would be no war no need for military requirements1 However the human being at a base level is an aggressive,curious animal only have to refer to history all the way down the line since caveman times there has been conflict!
So in theory a beautiful utopian world with no conflict will never happen!
 
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