OPINION: Students Must Serve in Coming Years

By Broadside Columnist Scott Mason

This past week we saw the history of America change. Whether it is good or bad, you all have your own opinions, so I will spare you mine. But, what does this change mean? For foreign policy, I think we are at an age where the famous quote of President Kennedy's inauguration “ask not what your country can do for you . . .” just might deserve a new deliverance. What we need to realize is that no matter how we voted last Tuesday, we are all going to be asked to do a lot for our country, and for some of us this will mean devoting our lives. This county is going to be involved in foreign conflicts for a long time, and what chose last Tuesday was exactly what we were going to be fighting for. President-Elect Obama stated in his address on Tuesday night that we would, in many more words, be helping the world.

Helping the world and humanity is something we need to do. People are still dying in Darfur, the Congo, Somalia, Iraq and so many other countries around the globe. We witness people dying for their families, their religion, their homes and their livelihood every day on cable news, and with Obama we my find ourselves aiming to help all of the people in need. There are so many problems in this world that our hearts go out towards, and now we may finally have our hearts heard.

However, are we as a nation, willing to do this voluntarily? I am almost sure that many of us, specifically students, did not expect to be serving our country in the military or to a lesser extent the civil service. Those of us who have, I greatly respect, and would like to thank for helping our great nation. But, many of us take for granted the military service of others, and now we are dawning on a new age that just might require all of us to consider it. We are already stretched militarily, and now we have been committed in a way to helping people around the globe with our military and other government services. This may mean following through with our second thoughts of supporting our nation. Hopefully, many of us will answer the call, because the alternative, the draft will more than likely affect us.

The draft, while only slightly mentioned during the campaign, may in all seriousness be called, and as students, we need to take this seriously. Before, students and women were exempt, as well as others for various reasons, but in our politically correct world, I am afraid that we must take the idea of conscription seriously. The chance that we all may be drafted if it is enacted is very real and serious. Will we answer the call? Will the day come? As I see it, we have a lot to accomplish across the globe for the good of humanity and serving your country just may be what is needed to accomplish our great, some may say lofty, goals of helping the disenfranchised around the globe.

Civil service will also undoubtedly be expanded with Obama's foreign and domestic policies. Base infrastructure, medics, base staff support, intelligence, Department of State work, USAID and so many other things will all require increased staffing on a global basis. Learning new languages, working with development aid organizations, securing our troops overseas and supporting them and their missions will all be asked of us. The things that accompany an expansion in foreign policy always have rippled through our society, all the way down to manufacturing plants. As students, we must realize that these new jobs will all need to be filled in one way or another, and serving our nation should be an option in these new policies that were just voted in. In the next years, our world will become a lot smaller and people are going to need to do a lot of work.
Agree or not, history shows that peace-keeping requires a lot from a country. During the Clinton administration, troops were deployed more often than during any other presidency. Many of those conflicts, while nothing like our commitment in Iraq or Afghanistan, demanded a lot from our country. We need to acknowledge this as a part of what is to come over the next four years. We all want to change the world, we all want to make it a safer and better place, but just how we do it is always up for debate. These years to come will surely be testing our nation in the world abroad as we hope to change.