Obligatory Military Service to End

Recent reports out of Chile look promising:

President Michelle Bachelet announced a new plan to professionalize Chile’s Army and abolish obligatory military service within the next five to ten years. The program is part of a general trend to modernize Chile’s entire Armed Forces.

This is a great step in the right direction. The obligatory draft in Chile is rife with problems of favoritism and poor treatment of conscripts. All of the people I met in Chile that had gone through servicio militar had bad experiences.

There are ways around military service. As the news article reports:

Young men may postpone military service if they are enrolled in full-time education, and are exempt if they provide a medical certificate declaring them unfit. Additionally, many Chilean men are able to avoid conscription through personal contacts within the military. The end result is that most conscripts are poor, rural youth.

Those I knew that avoided military service often did so via connections or bribes. Considering how poorly paid conscripts are and their often horrible conditions and treatment, I’d want to get out of this obligation too.

I do hope that raising the pay and a new spotlight on a professional military will improve the quality of life for Chile’s military members.

Posted April 6th, 2006 in In the News.

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