Does the U.S. Need the Draft?

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The Bush Administration has resisted calls for expanding the Army and instead has focused on its goal of "transforming" the military into a more mobile, lethal force. Rumsfeld and his handpicked-from-retirement Army chief of staff, General Peter Schoomaker, have made clear they want no permanent increase in troops for the U.S. Army (although they have okayed a temporary 30,000 hike). They're pushing a four-pronged offensive designed to give the Army 30% more combat punch without permanently adding soldiers. They are breaking the Army into smaller, more potent units, pulling calcified forces out of cold-war strongholds like Western Europe and South Korea, and shifting military policing and other nation-building skills from the reserves to the active-duty force. They're hiring contractors to perform many of the noncombat missions now being done by soldiers, so that those troops can put their fingers on triggers instead of keyboards. The goal is to streamline the military's cumbersome, costly bureaucracy. In Friday's debate, Bush summed up the rationale for his reform push: "We don't need mass armies anymore."

But even if the Administration succeeds in remaking the military, the failure to bolster troop levels carries grave short-term risks. In August, a classified study requested by Rumsfeld concluded that there are "inadequate total numbers" of U.S. troops to maintain the current pace of operations around the world. Some military experts fear that if a crisis erupted with Iran and North Korea, the U.S. would be unable to credibly threaten the use of force because of its obligations in Iraq and Afghanistan. "We can't respond to another major crisis right now," says retired Army General Barry McCaffrey. "We have shot our wad."

The Pentagon believes that in a crunch it can bring in more soldier volunteers by offering new recruits higher salaries and benefits and dangling bonuses as high as $40,000 for highly trained and specialized troops to re-enlist. (The average soldier receives $7,500.) All four active-duty services met their recruiting goals for the fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30. "They see their country under attack," says Army Lieut. General Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard. "They're willing to step forward and answer the call to colors." But given the scale of the U.S. commitment in Iraq and the range of potential conflicts beyond it, a few military experts are beginning to say the U.S. may someday reach a point where — no matter who is elected in November — it will have no choice but to reconsider the draft. General John Keane, who retired last year as the Army's No. 2 officer, says the continued success of the all-volunteer military is not guaranteed. "The volunteer force was the most significant military event of the 20th century," he told TIME. "But it's not preordained that it will always be there or that it is always going to be successful." Keane has told Congress that adding more than 50,000 troops to the Army would require thinking about a return to the draft. "If you have worldwide military requirements that demand more people but you don't have enough volunteers," Keane says, "then you don't have a choice."