Is it time to start talking about bringing back the military draft in United States?

WASHINGTON (TND) — The training of the world’s largest military has never stopped.

But what that entails, along with the challenges it faces, have changed dramatically.

Lawmakers in Washington are sounding alarm bells about the worst recruiting crisis in U.S. history, with recent hearings on the matter on Capitol Hill.

Sen. Roger Wicker, a Republican who represents Mississippi, is a ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Without sufficient numbers of high-quality recruits, the modern American military cannot maintain its high readiness standards critical to our national security," Wicker said.

A national security also potentially threatened by Russia’s war in Ukraine and an emboldened China appearing to be mulling possibly invading Taiwan.

At a March 29 House Armed Services Committee hearing, Rep. Rob Wittman, a Republican who represents Virginia, pointed to military maps he used as visual aids.

This is where the CCP will be in 2025 just down the road, and they have said if reunification doesn’t happen, they will take military action," he said.

That reality has already factored in to President Joe Biden asking for a major increase to the Pentagon’s budget, despite no longer being engaged in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It’s also brought back new calls to resurrect an old debate over having a military draft in the United States.

In a March 20 interview with NPR News, Admiral Mike Mullen (Ret.), who is the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, talked about lessons learned 20 years after the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, suggesting more discussion about the consequences of war.

That debate about a draft need to take place at the dinner table of every family that's got a young son or daughter that's 18 or 19 years old that could get drafted to go fight the war. That's what's got to be fed up to our Congressional leadership and voted on in terms of a decision to go or not," he said.

The last time there was draft, a war was being fought in Vietnam.

And while selective service registration is still required for American men once they turn 18, questions are emerging about if that changes with updated gender definitions and with transgender people now allowed to serve, as well as whether women, who currently represent one in five military troops, should also be required to sign up.