Mandatory Draft; Military cannot solve all problems

Hospitals under pressure: Riots due lockdown and curfew: Vaccinations and again people - and politicians - say Defense must help. (ironically, a political party wanted to introduce compulsory military service (1) in 2016 for re-education of 'rioters') But "Defense can not solve all problems". The police have also taken this position as personnel is overloaded with work. Our Police, Militarily and Royal Marechaussee are with about 100.000. In context of pandemics, on 17 million Dutch, the army has just a 100 doctors and 400 nurses (2) on 40.101 military personnel (3). With upcoming elections and military corona assistance as negotiation, everyone including Ministry of Defense is lobbying with sad stories how they have been disadvantaged for years, and years. Wait, what did those few soldiers do, with that.. € 11.035 billion, was it (4). Get in the back of the line, I'd say.

Ah. There, they said it. Syrup On the sleeves. A typical old Dutch tradition. Just as vaccinating. In Tilburg they opened "11 lines for vaccination, who each vaccinate 18 people per hour". I don't want to meow and certainly not about syrup but that went faster in the army.

What is this about ?. In 1990 we had 102.600 soldiers (5) including conscripts. In 1993 the transformation began of our armed forces into a 'volunteer army'. The accelerated reduction of number of conscripts; from 40.000 in 1992 to zero at the end of '96. There have been years when there were 200.000 to 350.000 conscripts. Professional soldiers went from 56.700 in 1990 to 41.000 in 2014. This fast reduction caused professional military personnel suddenly was send on missions, several times in a row - instead of once every two years. This led to work pressure, relation problems, divorce and suicide. The "obligation to perform draft service" has never been formally lifted, but there is a suspension of "obligation - attendance duty" since 1997. The letter about this from Ministry of Defense in 2020 reached over 212.000 boys and (for the first time) girls that turned 17. If all of these went on active duty we could have 240.000 military personnel, of which could be 600 doctors and 2400 nurses, or 1200 ambulance teams.. If.. If, over the past decades, we had used the Israeli system in which everyone has to do service draft, we would have estimated, with 7 million Dutch workers, about 70.000 doctors and 280.000 nurses, or 140.000 ambulance teams with military training. You get a country, that looks a bit as Poland and where vaccination will go fast.

I'm drifting. Due to corona and lockdowns society has moved in slow motion. In this year we could have already trained thousands of people. As medical soldier, we got 4 months military and medical basic training. A refined first aid adapted to war conditions. After this I worked as professional soldier in a mash unit at a base for almost 5 years. A conscript works at a base for 14 to 18 months. If we erase this bit, you can educate a lot more people.

Now imagine, in context of multi-employability, that over past decades all 7 million Dutch workers had received this military and medical basic training, without being 2 years on base as soldier, we could potentially have 3 to 3.5 million ambulance teams now. Trained for fire, violence, guns, police support duties, disasters, emergencies or vaccinations. Right. We still need 3 million ambulances.

No I will not stop. Only for blue lights.

source BD "WIllem II stadion becomes vaccination location"