Problems in the Mandatory Military Service

Choi Mee-Yeon

Almost every young man, except those who are exempted, have to attend the military service in South Korea because we now have a mandatory system. However, they often figure out the problems the mandatory system has. Among many problems, the two problems we are likely to face are; the country is wasting its money on too many conscripts and these conscripts are wasting their time in the military.

The mandatory system makes the country waste its money since there are too many non-productive soldiers whom the country have to pay and provide the equipment with. According to the research, about 2% of the present population 40,000,600 are in the army and all of them are getting paid at least 10,000 won every month. As you know, there are 4 levels of the soldiers who get the compulsory training-sergeant, corporal, private first class, private- and they get paid even more as their position gets one level higher. However, as their position gets higher, they contribute less to the country than they did when they were a new recruit. Sometimes a senior comrade doesn't contribute to the country the equivalent that he is paid because they can just order the new recruit to do the thing. In the army there's a so called system which makes the new recruit to just follow the senior comrade's order without rejecting it. This kind of misbehavior of the senior comrade is likely to happen in the mandatory system because the number of the soldiers are oversupplied. If there were adequate number of the soldiers in the army, the senior comrade wouldn't be able to shuffle off his duty on the new recruit. Although the army doesn't need that many young men, it still takes in the young men, trains them and pays them every month. Not only is the country spending too much money due to too many soldiers, but also the government has to provide the army with too many equipments that match the number of the soldiers. Since there are many soldiers in the army, more weapons are needed to support them, although most of the weapons are used only in practice. Furthermore, the mandatory system needs more military uniforms, combat boots and helmets than the voluntary system. Indeed, oversupplied soldiers make the country waste its money.

In addition to waste of the country's money, the mandatory military service makes the young men miss their chance to deal with their skills and plan the future. The young men miss a chance to improve their skills because the men usually join the military service at the age between 20 and 24 and this is the time when people are attending the university. This means that most men must put behind the schoolwork, when joining the army. In fact, most of the schoolwork helps you to find your skills and improve them. Thus stop and leaving the school is a big loss to the young men in a way that you should delay a chance to improve your skills. This is why some of the young men who don't want to join the army are the university students. In other words, because they've been studying so hard to reach their aim and don't want to stop what they are doing, they are not willing to join the army. As they joined the army without a choice, the soldiers don't participate well when training. In short, they neither do the training efficiently nor do they develop their skills in the army. As well as delay of developing their skills, they are not usually provided with time to think and plan their schedule in the military service even though the youth is the best time to think and plan their future. The soldiers spend 26 months in the army without having to plan their own schedule as they only follow the daily routine they're given. Some of the young men are so accustomed to the fixed schedule that they sometimes find it difficult to organize their life after discharged from the military. About these two points mentioned- young men miss a chance to deal with their skills and plan the future- some people could say, "What's the big deal when all the young men are under the same situation?", but this is not really true. Some men can be exempted from the service by offering a bribe or giving money. This is only possible for the rich to do so that while the rich can avoid to go to the army, the others can't and they have to spend their youth in the army. In short, the mandatory system doesn't give the soldiers useful time efficiently and fairly.

In conclusion, present mandatory military system has two main problems in a way that it doesn't allow the country spend its money appropriately and that it doesn't provide the young men useful time. The Ministry of Defence should see these problems mentioned above and some other problems as well, and then do something about the mandatory system.