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Building and Maintaining a Post-9/11 All-Volunteer Military Force

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The Impact of 9/11 on Politics and War

Abstract

The force structure of the American military has changed during and after every major war. After World War II and the Korean War, the United States maintained its first long-standing force not engaged in major combat operations, and did so on the basis of conscription. During the Vietnam War, the United States deployed a large number of conscripts without participation of the Reserve Component. After Vietnam, the American government replaced conscription with an All-Volunteer Force. The military campaigns initiated after September 11, 2001, similarly have seen changes in the way the United States raises forces for war, including the recruitment and retention of an increasingly diverse force as well as growing reliance on the Reserves and civilians.

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Notes

  1. The writing of this chapter was supported by the U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences under Contract W74V8H-05-K-0007. The views expressed in this chapter are those of the authors and not necessarily of the Army Research Institute, the Department of the Army, or the Department of Defense.

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© 2009 Matthew J. Morgan

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De Angelis, K.K., Segal, D.R. (2009). Building and Maintaining a Post-9/11 All-Volunteer Military Force. In: Morgan, M.J. (eds) The Impact of 9/11 on Politics and War. The Day that Changed Everything?. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230623712_5

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