WI National service- the draft- kept in Britain

I am very glad that this did not happen. I would have been a very bad very sad soldier.

But I was wondering about people's reactions to events in Aden and Northern Ireland.

I cannot myself think of a POD which would cause this unpopular policy to carry on but who knows?

By the way would women have started getting drafted after 1975 equality laws.
 
The British draft was ended as a result of the 1957 defence white paper which itslef was a result of the loss in the Suez war. It was decided that Britain was no longer an extra European power and therefore would scrap its big army and air force and defend itself with nuclear missiles.

So your PoDs are victory at Suez and/or some brains in the 1957 white paper. I still think Britain would ditch the draft, but perhaps a decade later on.
 
Well conscripts are cheaper than a professional army, but on the other hand they make worse soldiers for 'real' conflicts. I mean the central European countries with conscription (Austria, Germany, Swizerland) haven't really gotten involved in anything near the fighting that the UK did during that time. I guess it would fall pretty quick, especially since the UK is willing to invest the money into a professional military at that time.

Concerning woman, well as far as I know there is no country that still has conscripts that forces woman to serve as well...
 
Well conscripts are cheaper than a professional army, but on the other hand they make worse soldiers for 'real' conflicts. I mean the central European countries with conscription (Austria, Germany, Swizerland) haven't really gotten involved in anything near the fighting that the UK did during that time. I guess it would fall pretty quick, especially since the UK is willing to invest the money into a professional military at that time.

They are cheaper per person, but conscription is (apart from a human rights violation) terrible value for money compared to a professional army. You wind up with a bunch of people who have better things to do than be shipped off to whatever war, or sitting there doing nothing (apart from having their time wasted when they could be actually in the economy) in peacetime. There isn't any real justification for them in this day and age.

Concerning woman, well as far as I know there is no country that still has conscripts that forces woman to serve as well...

I think Israel does, apart from that, yes, it is institutionally sexist.

I can't think of a PoD that would cause it to carry on, conscription was abolished because it was unpopular and a waste of money. Unless you have a government that's keen on wasting money on a paranoid defence policy.
 
The British draft was ended as a result of the 1957 defence white paper which itslef was a result of the loss in the Suez war. It was decided that Britain was no longer an extra European power and therefore would scrap its big army and air force and defend itself with nuclear missiles.

So your PoDs are victory at Suez and/or some brains in the 1957 white paper. I still think Britain would ditch the draft, but perhaps a decade later on.

Actually no the were three simple reasons why National Service went when it did.

1. Too many people. The whole point of National Service was that it was universal, everyone did it unlike the draft. However if you look at demographics by 1964 you are beginning to get the massive baby boomer generation. The Armed forces didn't want all these people, they couldn't afford to be expanding the army and didn't need to.
2. Sufficient volunteers. Apart from a few backbenchers no one supported National Service out of principle, it was a solution to a problem, in 1946 Britain had a needed a lot of soldiers to do a lot of jobs and could not afford to hire them on the job market. By the 1960's you could, the Army could meet its manpower needs purely through volunteers.
3. Technical Sophistication. In the early years of National Service there were NS pilots, which was possible when it took 6 months to learn to fly a Typhoon. By the '60's it took two years and half to train a Lightning pilot the new aircraft were so complicated. While the Army didn't have the same degree of problem as the RAF or RN it had similar issues.

National Service was very much a short term solution to a short term problem and if any government had been elected on a platform of bringing it back they would have faced the stringent opposition of the entire Military hierarchy who didn't want it back.
 
No Beatles or Stones then? John Lennon or Mick Jagger doing time in Singapore, Aden, or Borneo??

I think the Baron Knight answered that one back in 1964 with call up the groups! However assuming it wasn't abolished in the Duncan Sands white paper. Aden would probably have little impact but Northern Ireland would have had a major impact. Somehow I doubt the conflict would have developed as it did. Was Northern Ireland exempt from national service as it was from conscription in World War 11. We would certainly not have been bogged down in Iraq and there may have been in some limited conflicts a policy of not sending national servicemen to combat zones.

With the decline in the size of the Ryoal Navy and RAF those two services would probably be able to fill their ranks with volunteers leaving the Army with people the other services didn't want and the conscript with the worst option

I would be surprised if the Thatcher era would have been as bad as it was as national service was an equaliser and there would have been less lack of social responsibility by top level managers although more recently rich kids may have gone abroad to evade it. Scandinvian countries still have national service, so does Switzerland which has not only avoided wars but isn't a member of the UN and doesn't contribute to peace keeping forces like Sweden or Finland.

More recently there may have been a lot of problem with Moslems being conscripted and sent to Afganistan.
 
I think the Baron Knight answered that one back in 1964 with call up the groups! However assuming it wasn't abolished in the Duncan Sands white paper. Aden would probably have little impact but Northern Ireland would have had a major impact. Somehow I doubt the conflict would have developed as it did.

I agree - if anything, it probably would have been worse. You'd be throwing in to the mix troops that don't even want to be there. This could have 747 sized butterflies, then again the whole thing could.


Was Northern Ireland exempt from national service as it was from conscription in World War 11. We would certainly not have been bogged down in Iraq and there may have been in some limited conflicts a policy of not sending national servicemen to combat zones.

I don't know, probably not. If it wasn't, that could lead to utter mayhem in Northern Ireland.

With the decline in the size of the Ryoal Navy and RAF those two services would probably be able to fill their ranks with volunteers leaving the Army with people the other services didn't want and the conscript with the worst option

Of course, the RAF needed quality rather than quantity. Presumably the same with The Navy. Perhaps they just recruited people at Village People gigs :p

I would be surprised if the Thatcher era would have been as bad as it was as national service was an equaliser and there would have been less lack of social responsibility by top level managers although more recently rich kids may have gone abroad to evade it. Scandinvian countries still have national service, so does Switzerland which has not only avoided wars but isn't a member of the UN and doesn't contribute to peace keeping forces like Sweden or Finland.

The thing with the Milk Snatcher is that she was looking to be comprehensively toasted in 1983, but then a certain Mr Galtieri's little adventure in the South Atlantic then saved her jacksie, leading up to her second term. While not much was made of the Argentinians being conscripts (I mean, look at The Sun's distasteful headline), I don't think the public would support sending over non-volunteers over.

More recently there may have been a lot of problem with Moslems being conscripted and sent to Afganistan.

Bearing in mind what happened the US went on an equally fruitless campaign in Vietnam with (more or less) slave labour, expect a similar reaction.
 
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