As the Senate embarked Aug. 2 on its monthlong August recess, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., left a significant piece of legislation unaddressed: the annual National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA.
Included in this year’s Senate NDAA bill is a controversial provision to amend the Military Selective Service Act and mandate that women between the ages of 18 and 26 register for a military draft.
This measure, sometimes known as “Draft Our Daughters,” not only is misguided but ignores the underlying issues facing military recruitment and readiness.
“The Senate defense bill’s provision for mandatory registration of all young women for conscription puts ‘fairness’ over military necessity,” notes Victoria Coates, The Heritage Foundation’s vice president for national security. “It would waste time and resources during a war in order to evaluate and train thousands of draft-age women to find the subset qualified for the requirements of military service. Including women in the selective service is pointless virtue-signaling from those who believe the military should be a social experiment and not a lethal fighting force.”
“Draft Our Daughters” is just the beginning. The provision alters the language of the Selective Service Act by replacing the word “man” with “person,” equating gender equality with sameness while ignoring the diverse and different ways in which men and women may contribute to national security.
Intentionally ambiguous language like this expands woke ideology, which undermines military readiness and distracts the military from its core mission: Defend America and its interests by deterring or killing its enemies.
The U.S. hasn’t had a military draft since 1973, when the armed forces became entirely made up of volunteers. Congress and the president, however, may authorize a draft in the event of a national emergency or war.
The U.S. military has faced substantial recruitment challenges in recent years, with the Army, Navy, and Air Force missing goals by a staggering 41,000 recruits in 2023 alone. In this context and amid a more dangerous security landscape globally, some argue that expanding the draft to include women is a necessary step to address these shortfalls.
However, including women in the draft wouldn’t resolve the fundamental problems leading to today’s low recruitment numbers, nor would it improve the existing system of voluntary recruitment.
This provision overlooks deeper, systemic issues that deter young Americans from enlisting in the first place. Some of these issues include fewer young men who qualify, more opportunities in civilian careers, and fewer instances of families with a history of military service.
Rather than addressing the root causes of recruitment struggles, this provision opts for a superficial solution that raises both ethical and practical concerns.
The argument for “Drafting Our Daughters” typically is framed around the principle of equity. Proponents claim that if men and women are truly equal, then women should be subject to the same draft requirements as men.
This logic is fundamentally flawed. Women and men are innately different.
Divisive, politicized initiatives, such as including women in the draft, do nothing to enhance the military’s core mission of creating a capable and lethal force or to rebuild trust with the American people the military defends.
Registering all women for the draft is a misguided idea. Congress should instead focus on enacting measures that support military recruitment, such as quality-of-life improvements for service members, and not resort to drafting our daughters.
