19 yr old son and fear of being called up to fight in a war

[User287264]

This is not a thread about "will WW3 start tomorrow", there are plenty of those already

Ds is 19 and has been talking about lot about what would happen if the UK did enter a war and if young people his age would be called up to fight.

He's such a gentle soul, I think this would be his worst nightmare. (Not that many people would relish it I know)

I'm not sure what to say to him. It feels to me like a general call-up WW2 style would not happen nowadays but what do I know?

I guess we all have our different worries about world security right now but I guess his is quite a specific worry. I'm 52 with arthritis, I'm not ever likely to be called up to fight.

It's total speculation and I still dont feel it's very likely, but does anyone have any idea how a massive call-up might work nowadays? Or would the current armed forces and reserves be enough? I'd like to reassure him without just dismissing his fears.

He does have a tendency to anxiety which doesn't help, but he's generally good at handling it. We're having a news-free day (apart from me right now) and going out for a big walk in the rain

I think this thread is getting nasty because its hitting a raw nerve understandably so.
At the end of it all if things were to get very bad and we were invaded then we wouldn't have a choice in the matter, but there's lots of scenarios between that unlikely possibility and the other possibility of us getting involved in any wider conflicts. There's no point worrying about these things basically (or sniping at each other about it).

Well exactly but while we are being nasty and judgemental about these useless young men(not the ones I know by the way) obviously all spoilt and cuddled by their mummies I thought in the name of fairness and equality we should have a knock at the spoilt coddled girls while we're at it.

That's the trouble with sarcasm, not everyone will get it.

You said they would have to suck it up. Why would you say that and not expect some posters to be pissed off. They won't fight, they won't have to suck it up.

So you don't disaprove of conscription even though to you have children of that age?

I realise I have spelt disapprove incorrectly and the sentence is wrong.

So you don't disaprove of conscription even though to you have children of that age?

I didn't say anything about my approval or disapproval. I also stated that I think conscription is vanishingly unlikely.
However if you think that there are absolutely no circumstances under which conscription might be required then you are being naive.

I'm not naive. If so many refuse to fight, what would they do?

Girls would be conscripted too. Women can't just choose when they want equal rights. Most of the generation will not do it. It's all over social media. So the middle aged Mumsnetters would have to help out. It wouldn't just be down to the men like it was before.

Did you actually read my post?
My mother was conscripted in WW2.

Yes.

Mum had rather a cushy job in the RAF post office

Not fighting.

I don’t think this generation of youth are less worthy than any other ( in fact recent statistics if to be believed suggest that they are less
likely to drink or do drugs or indulge in risky sex and more likely to prioritise health, fitness and wellbeing than earlier generations. )

However, I think the key distinguishing factor from earlier generations is ( the lack of) a cohesive respect, admiration and loyalty to king and country such that people are prepared to fight for it and see it as so much better than the alternative that they’d be willing to die for it. Do young people love the UK and its values? And compared to what?

Why is it compulsory for young people to love their country, the royal family etc? This is a country which has completely shafted them economically. Ignorant and selfish older generatoins vote in idiotic governments that have caused them not resolved the housng crisis. The Royal Family are the very symbol of the British Empire which enslaved, and abused millions of citizens in countries around the world who didnt ask for them to go there. One of them was friends with a sex offender, another one hated it so much after being traumatised by years of press mistreatment, and ghoulish intrusion after his mothers death that he effectively resigned and now says how awful the institution is. There is no chance for modern young people without rich parents to get decent accommodation. Short term jobs if any for many of them, no or linited social lives as it costs too much, no prospects, no future. But they're expected to all line up as good little citizens and say they love the place which has no place for them, while middle aged Mirandas sit at their suburban computers and patronise and judge them. Disgusting.

Your original post said "they (the young people) will have to suck it up". In my experience that expression is usually used to mean "someone doing something unpleasant/difficult that presents an opportunity for me to judge them for vocalising as such, giving me the opportunity to present as morally superior as I imply I would do it without complaint, without any opportunity to test my theory". It was either bad wording or a betrayal of your actual feelings

Your assessment is incorrect.
I used 'suck it up' in the meaning that they may have to accept something they don't like.
Nothing to do with any judgement from me at all.

You're an older man, aren't you?

Why? Would that invalidate my views?

Not at all.

I can just tell with your comments.

A grumpy older man.

I don't think I've been that Grumpy really - but I should live up to my user name 🤣

I suppose it depends on the alternative. I don't suppose my grandfather, father and uncle were that keen on the King and British government as Irish Catholics, particular coming from a county that suffered terribly in the Great Famine. Presumably they all signed up as soon as they could because they fancied Hitler and the German fascist even less. Of course some British people were sympathetic Hitler but the majority weren't so off they went to war. Thankfully they all came back although the psychological damage stayed with the.

@YokohamaSapphire you'll note if you reread my post that I expressed no view on whether young people should love king and country. I was merely posing the question - which you’ve answered from your perspective.

Personally, I like British people for the most part - I’ve found them to be kind, funny and to have lots of common sense and courage. I think they are still greatly respected by many other nationalities and many people want to
live here.

Unfortunately I think the political parties and calibre of leadership have let us down greatly and led to a huge decline in public engagement and respect. The same goes for the established churches and other institutions such as the legal system. This has filtered down to a general decline in standards of behaviour and a lack of respect and certainly loyalty to our institutions. Its worrying. If people don’t believe they have anything worth fighting for, they won’t fight.

But I believe that an invader or aggressor who clearly demonstrates a significant threat to our way of life - to women’s freedoms for example - , would be met with significant resistance - I’m not sure about others.

That's what the older generation want though, for the young peoole to save them.

If you go on social media you will see that many of them would not go to war.

It wasn't just the famine where the British government/rulers showed the contempt they had for Irish lines. Cromwell's murder of hundreds of thousands, throwing people off their land, racist abuse to them amd their descendants in Britain, Punch cartoons showing them as subhuman, thick Paddy jokes, the pricinple of collective guilt following Provisional IRA atrocities beihg used to justify the murder of innocent people by the British Army, none of whom have ever been prosecuted, and the racial abuse of ethnically Irish people who'd never had anything to do with the terrorists. IFurther afield there was the Amritsar massacre, the deaths in British concentration camps in the 2nd Boer War, the neglect leading to 4 million dead in Bengal, the rape, torture and murder of the Mau Mau in Kenya. When I was at school in the 1980s there was a CCF parade inspection of 13 to 15 year old cadets by regular British Army soldiers. I witnessed one of the latter shouting across at a young boy "don't you fucking smile at me, otherwise I'll think you're gay, and I'll rip your head off amd fucking skullfuck you".
But no, the British Empire was all roses and enlightenment and the British Armed Forces can do no wrong, ever, anywhere.

I think there's something else underlying some of these attitudes too. Many women are rightly angry at the rigid enforcement of beauty, youth and sexual attractiveness standards on them. A minority of those who feel this judgement, let's call them Sexual Attractiveness Wardens choose to respond by using the reality of male privilege as cover to sneer at the relative sexual unattractiveness, or perceived lack of traditional masculinity, of male peers or acquaintances. I remember hearing straight women in a former job sitting in a mixed group at post work drinks talking about say Fight Club era Brad Pitt's physique. Commonly one or more, usually a person with moderate self worth, would (apparently jokingly, you know that kind of belittle people in order to gain relative status then use humour as a cover type) make disparaging comments about some or all the men presents physiques, sometimes saying something like "if only there were more men like that at ...(insert company name)". Because of social pressures, men who were belittled like this were expected to laugh along, just take it. I've met more Sexual Attractiveness Wardens than I'd have liked. They are part of the problem with male-female relations, and they've largely escaped scrutiny so far.

So was mine. Haven't they ever heard of the Wrens or the ATS? If a woman was in a reserved occupation (right word?) she could carry on. e.g. nurse, but if not, she was called up to something.

So if you got your call-up papers in December 1939, did the words say, 'Dear Someone, would you like to come and be in one of the services?' I don't think my lot ran to the front of the queue to volunteer. I imagine they carried on in their jobs, knowing that it wouldn't be long until they got their 'call-up' papers, but I didn't ask them.
Armed services aside, lots of women worked in the Land Army, in Forestry, in ticket offices. Were they all just invited with sweetly written invitations? That hasn't been my impression. I've heard, "Well, I was training to do so-and-so but the war came (WW2) and it wasn't a reserved occupation so I had to go and do so-and-so else instead.

My two grandfathers, my dad and his brother all volunteered. My dad and his brother didn't do it in 1939 as they weren't old enough but they did as soon as they could. My mother worked in a factory making equipment for the forces but she wasn't called up, she signed up as it was well paid.

Not exactly, and they started calling up 20 & 21 year old men before the war had started.