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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 2, 2024

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How much of that conscription is truly conscription, as opposed to a volunteer army with extra steps? I know the Mexican and Russian drafts are incredibly easy to dodge, or at least were before the war in the latter case. I’ve certainly heard that the draft in Brazil is basically a meeting with a recruiter who just checks ‘not suited for military service because of low motivation’ if you don’t want to enlist. My guess is that outside of Finland, the koreas, and Israel, the draft is avoidable for middle class males who simply don’t want to go.

I’ve certainly heard that the draft in Brazil is basically a meeting with a recruiter who just checks ‘not suited for military service because of low motivation’ if you don’t want to enlist. My guess is that outside of Finland, the koreas, and Israel, the draft is avoidable for middle class males who simply don’t want to go.

It was this way in Germany too, up until Conscription was cancelled.

IIRC in Turkey you can opt to spend your conscription period in the reserves. I'm quite confident that the vast majority of middle and upper income societies have some sort of loophole like that, and lower income countries are so crappy that A) the army is probably a better deal than whatever the alternative was and B) there probably isn't enough state capacity to actually do anything about it if you just ignore the draft officer 99% of the time.