There are mounting indications that NATO countries are gearing up for a military showdown with Russia. The latest one goes beyond the usual confrontational, Russophobic rhetoric coming from the European Union’s foreign affairs chief Kaja Kallas, the president of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, or NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. It even goes beyond the deepening support of NATO members for increased military spending and for Kiev’s missile strikes deep inside Russia.
As the journalist Eve Hartley noted last week in the Wall Street Journal, European powers are mulling longer terms of military conscription as well as drafting women, not just men, for warfare. Denmark has already implemented both changes, and Hartley contends that Copenhagen’s NATO allies are “seeking inspiration from the gender-equal program.” Both Norway and Sweden already subjected women to military conscription before Denmark joined its Scandinavian brethren.
If the trend really is gaining steam in response to the Russia–Ukraine War, it marks an especially perverse consequence of the otherwise worthy campaign for greater gender equality in Western societies. Instead of women gaining greater personal liberty, they will become equal victims with men of militarized government serfdom.
Although the drive to make the latest generation of young adults, including women, unwilling participants in ill-advised wars is further along among NATO’s European members, the danger appears to be rising in the United States too. Such an outcome would reverse one of the most significant victories for individual freedom attained in this country since the end of World War II. Responding to rising discontent among draftees and their families during the Vietnam War, President Richard Nixon’s administration ceased conscription in January 1973. However, the possibility of the draft being reinstituted has remained a bureaucratic Sword of Damocles over the necks of young, male Americans.
One sign of danger occurred in 1980 during President Jimmy Carter’s administration, when the federal government required all male citizens and legal residents to register with the Selective Service System (SSS) when they turned 18. In December 2025, a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act directed the SSS to adopt a mechanism for “automatic” registration. One prominent anti-draft activist warned that the development would be “the largest change in Selective Service law since 1980 and will move the U.S. closer to activation of a draft than at any time in the last half century.”
Notably, despite some controversy in Congress, women were not obligated by the 1980 measure to register. Opposition to such “gender discrimination” has come from across the political spectrum, but most prominently from so-called progressives. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) explicitly opposed the male-only system and has filed suit in federal court. The ACLU has argued that
Like many laws that appear to benefit women, men-only registration actually impedes women’s full participation in civic life. Limiting registration to men sends a message that women are unqualified to serve in the military, regardless of individual capabilities and preferences.
There is still considerable opposition in the United States to drafting young women into the military. However, sentiments sometimes appear to shift. In 2021, the House Armed Services Committee approved a bill that would have created a gender-neutral, comprehensive draft registration requirement.
A small but vocal contingent in the news media and think-tank community has been pushing that agenda for years. In late 2013, Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank was especially adamant about the “need” to restore conscription and expand it to include women. After bemoaning the country’s allegedly sorry state, Milbank declared that “one change, over time, could reverse the problems that have built up over the past few decades: We should mandate military service for all Americans, men and women alike, when they turn 18.”
Milbank noted that Congress at the time had “the lowest percentage of veterans in Congress [19 percent] since World War II, down from a high of 77 percent in 1977–1978, according to the American Legion.” Milbank concluded: “It’s no coincidence that this same period has seen the gradual collapse of our ability to govern ourselves: a loss of control over the nation’s debt, legislative stalemate, and a disabling partisanship.”
In March 2026, the actor Rob Schneider called for such a policy in terms that echoed Milbank’s reasoning. “Each and every American, at eighteen years of age, must serve two years of military service,” he opined. Schneider used the new U.S. war against Iran to justify his position, but he also expressed a broader justification. “Being a citizen of the United States gives us unparalleled Freedoms and opportunities that are the envy of the world. However, these Freedoms that we cherish do not come without a cost.”
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It might be tempting to casually dismiss the pro-draft views of a mere social media personality like Schneider or even more obscure activists. But individuals with substantive national security credentials are echoing such calls and gaining attention. Pro-draft views still constitute a minority sentiment, but the trend deserves attention.
Opponents of conscription correctly point out that compelling young Americans to serve in the military and wage war would violate the principle of individual liberty for which the United States supposedly stands. Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former assistant to President Ronald Reagan, has argued that creating a universally mandatory national service program would be even worse than such compulsion confined to the military arena. Other champions of individual liberty have also made similar cases.
With respect to gender equality in the military, it is imperative that the issue of discrimination not become the dominant concern in policy debates. The solution to discrimination is not to subject young women to involuntary government military servitude alongside their male colleagues. The correct approach is to establish and maintain an all-volunteer force populated on an equal footing by qualified men and women. Such a force should also be confined to missions that actually serve the nation’s genuine defensive needs, not aggressive imperialist ventures operating under the guise of defense. Recent NATO and U.S. actions have already blurred that important distinction, especially with respect to the confrontational policy toward Russia.
