KERRY HAS BEEN CLAIMING that we’ll see a draft under Bush. But in light of these strongly pro-Bush poll results from serving military folks, I wonder if we’re not more likely to see one under a Kerry Administration. Check this out:

The respondents were broken down into two groups: Active Duty (AD) troops and Reserve / National Guard (RN) troops. (Apologies for the formatting, I don’t have time to set up an html table for this right now.)

If the presidential elections were held today, for whom would you vote?

Bush: AD- 72%, RN-73%
Kerry: AD- 17%, RN-18%
Nader: AD- 1%, RN-1%
Other: AD- 1%, RN-1%
Declined to answer: AD- 2%, RN-1%

Among Active Duty who were deployed 2 or more months since 9/11, the percentage for Bush goes up to 74%. Among the Reserve / National Guard deployed for 2 or more months since 9/11 (whether in a combat zone or elsewhere), Bush gets 76% of the vote.

This makes me wonder if we’d have recruitment and retention problems under a President Kerry. That would lead to either a humiliating military retrenchment — especially for a guy who “reported for duty” and made a big deal of his veteran status — or to pressure to reinstate the draft. Either outcome would be bad. But hey, who knows: Maybe Kerry would win the confidence of the troops before this would matter.

UPDATE: Reader Marc Fleuette says I’m missing out on Kerry’s strategy here:

Prof. Reynolds:

Regarding the draft, I don’t think you are right. It may help to look at it in this way:

1) Troop morale will plunge
2) Enemy morale will soar
3) Retainment/reenlistment will decline dramatically

These are not “bugs” of the Kerry plan, they are “features”. The net result, if the Democrats play their cards right, would quite literally be a reprise of the aftermath of our failure of will in Vietnam:

1) Iraq will be overrun by insurgents
2) Iraquis that supported the US will be slaughtered
3) The US military will be hollowed out, with the soldiers leaving and the
single moms staying
4) US civilian morale will suffer
5) Kerry would grudgingly subordinate US action to the UN/French veto since
we would be too weak to act alone
6) The US will revisit the golden era of the Carter presidency.

I hope he’s joking.