The Nixon Effect. Douglas E. Schoen
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he was actually the one who ended the draft. Nixon, with his fine-tuned political antennae, sensed that abolishing the draft was not only in the public interest but also smart politics. In 1968, he ran, in part, on a promise to bring an end to the draft and transition the US military to an all-volunteer service while also pledging to be the candidate who could conclude the war in Vietnam. “It is not so much the way they are selected that is wrong, it is the fact of selection,” he said.75 In his ever-agile mind, Nixon saw multiple rationales—and multiple benefits—to ending the draft.
One of his reasons was pragmatic. In 1967, during his run for the Republican nomination, Nixon hired as his research director Martin Anderson, a conservative thinker who made an economic case against the draft. Anderson argued that an all-volunteer service would be good for national security, as there were “a high number of trainees and inexperienced men who must constantly be replaced.” The research director told Nixon that the reason the draft had been necessary in the first place was “simply that we have not been willing to pay even reasonably fair wages to our men in the military.”76
Not long after being inaugurated, Nixon set up a commission to explore the idea of a volunteer army. The commission developed a number of compelling proposals, but it is best remembered today for the debate that broke out between two men who came to testify before it, resulting in an all-volunteer army in the United States. The debate was between Milton Friedman, the University of Chicago professor and founder of monetarist economics, and General William Westmoreland, the former commander of American forces in Vietnam. After listening to Friedman argue for the merits of an all-volunteer army—which Friedman believed would both advance personal freedom and national security, Westmoreland replied: “Professor, everything you say makes so much sense, but I’m not sure I’d like to command an army of mercenaries.”
“Would you rather command an army of slaves?” Friedman shot back.
When Westmoreland replied that he didn’t like hearing patriotic draftees being compared with slaves, Friedman said that he didn’t like hearing patriotic volunteers being compared with mercenaries.77 The exchange showed the strong feelings that existed on both sides of the issue. The commission eventually reported back that, in its view, the United States could maintain its military strength without conscription. The last draft call took place on December 7, 1972. Since then, the US military has been all volunteer.
Nixon’s decision to end conscription was hugely popular, and any move to bring back the draft—as some have suggested in the years since—never gets very far. Still, in its forty-plus years, the all-volunteer army has had its critics. Some, like New York congressman Charles Rangel, say that the draft should be reinstituted, because the burden of fighting America’s wars has fallen disproportionately on poor and working-class citizens who enlist in the military. Rangel’s criticism is not without merit, though it is also ironic: this same criticism—that the poor and working class were doing most of the nation’s fighting in Vietnam—contributed to the move to end the inequitable draft system in the early 1970s, on the basis that more privileged Americans could avoid service by obtaining college deferments.
Another criticism of the volunteer army is political. Some say that since only a small proportion of Americans fight the nation’s wars, the public can “check out of” foreign policy and pay less attention to our military engagements. Some generals believe that if the draft were still in force, America would never have invaded Iraq in 2003.
These are important considerations, yet there is no denying the success of America’s professional military, which remains the best in the world. In the generation since Nixon ended military conscription, the US military has become an unparalleled force, setting a new standard of effectiveness and professionalism. From the Gulf War in 1991—its first great test—to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the all-volunteer American military has proved essentially unbeatable. The wars in which it has engaged, however, have proved intractable, for political and cultural reasons. The military’s job is to fight and win, and the American military has never been better at doing that. How the politicians choose to use this power, of course, is another matter.
The American armed forces today are also the best trained and best educated that we have ever had. The mindset of a professionalized army is completely different from that of a fighting force filled with involuntary conscripts serving eighteen- to twenty-four-month tours. The casualty rates for American forces in armed conflicts since the institution of the all-volunteer army began have been dramatically lower than in previous wars.
“The record of the Nixon years,” wrote a member of the Gates Commission in a New York Times op-ed in 1994, “must include his role in ending compulsion and expanding freedom of choice. Thanks to his actions, the United States armed forces are stronger and more efficient.”78
Of course, it was not just on the draft that Nixon’s policies would prove surprising when it came to military and national-defense issues. For it was in the realm of foreign policy itself that he would pave the ground of his greatest achievements. And, just as with domestic policy, his achievements as a statesman often ran counter to the image he had fostered in the public mind.
Nixon’s visit to China is one of the few occasions where a state visit brought about a seminal change in international affairs. The reentry of China into the global diplomatic game, and the increased strategic options for the United States, gave a new vitality and flexibility to the international system. . . . Consultation between China and the United States reached a level of intensity rare even among former allies.
— HENRY KISSINGER1
Nixon and Kissinger’s overture forever changed the Cold War by reconfiguring the Communist bloc and bringing Washington and Beijing together to balance Moscow. . . . The process that Nixon set in motion—the former Red-baiter breaking the taboo on talks with the massive communist power—led to one of those rare times in history when daring leadership actually did redirect the course of events for the better.
— ORVILLE SCHELL2
By July of 1959, the American people already had a pretty good idea of Richard Nixon. He had entered Congress in 1947 and risen to fame rapidly as the chief accuser of Alger Hiss, the former high-level FDR aide who had hidden his ties to the Communist Party. Nixon had won a 1950 Senate election by branding his opponent Helen Gahagan Douglas the “pink lady” for her far-left views and sympathies. He had scratched and clawed to keep his place on the presidential ticket in 1952 with his famous televised “Checkers” speech. And now, a year away from the 1960 presidential election, it was common knowledge that Dwight Eisenhower’s number two would run for the top job.
By 1959 Vice President Nixon was known, but not necessarily understood. Then he went to Moscow to visit the American National Exhibition. The year before, the Soviets had put up an exhibit in New York; the Americans were reciprocating, as part of an effort by the superpowers to improve relations. On arriving in Moscow, Nixon had met with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev; when Khrushchev visited New York, Nixon took the Soviet leader on a tour of the exhibit. Khrushchev surprised Nixon with his aggressiveness and belligerence. As the American vice president stood with the Soviet leader at the exhibit showing him the wonders of color television—then a new innovation—Khrushchev scoffed, and then began challenging Nixon on the US sponsorship of Captive Nations Week, in which Americans were asked to pray for “peoples enslaved by the Soviet Union.”
Reaching out for a burly Russian worker, Khrushchev asked: “Does this man look like a slave laborer?”
Nixon did not back down, but, trying to be gracious, said: “There must be an exchange of ideas. After all, you don’t know everything.” And then he smiled, trying to defuse the tension. The two leaders moved across the gallery to a display model of what was