If last week is any indicator, this may be dumbest vice-presidential election campaign since the late, unlamented Spiro T. Agnew threw in the towel rather than face federal prosecutors. On the one hand, there were legions of instant-arm-chair warriors attacking the service record of Governor Tim Walz, little discouraged by the fact that his service record of 24 years was 24 years longer than most of his critics. Nevertheless, many charged the governor with “stolen valor” for having retired rather than serving in Iraq.  But the drivel got even worse when CNN’s Brianna Keilar defended Walz by charging that his Republican rival, Senator JD Vance, was an “imperfect messenger” of combat valor when Vance’s own service (in Iraq, no less) may have been titled as “combat correspondent, “but when you dig a little deeper into that, he was a public affairs specialist, someone who did not see combat.” https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/after-attack-from-jd-vance-cnn-s-brianna-keilar-argues-attacking-military-service-hurts-all-vets/ar-AA1oxxGQ W

Well, look who just showed up to judge the credentials of combat correspondents! Since Ms Keilar is married to a Green Beret officer, she probably knew about strategic retreats. Sure enough, within 24 hours she was piously calling on both Republicans and Democrats to refrain from attacking the service records of either vice-presidential candidate. As a debate coach. I taught that tactic as a “false comparison” or even a “pre-emptive capitulation;” camouflaging fatal vulnerabilities in one’s own case by arguing, “Well, since both sides do it let’s just move along?” And with media juggernauts like CNN deciding how best to shape campaign issues that favor Democrats, most people shrug and obligingly think as they’ve been told. thttps://www.mediaite.com/tv/after-attack-from-jd-vance-cnns-brianna-keilar-argues-attacking-military-service-hurts-all-vets

I have known Washington author and national security expert Chas Henry for more years than either of us are comfortable recalling. So I was gratified when he effectively zeroed in on the larger issue that had so badly eluded CNN and most other media outlets. Writing on Linked In, Mr. Henry observed,

Attacking honorable service for short-term political gain implicitly devalues respect for most who have dedicated a portion of their lifetime to military service. As military branches struggle to fill their ranks, this cynical tactic adds another reason young Americans might defer considering time in the military — and veterans who have worn the uniform may feel their service less valued.

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/activity-7228082040410177536-t4wZ/ 

In one succinct paragraph, Chas Henry captured precisely what had been bothering me ever since the Walz-Vance veepstakes was announced. The purpose of national elections can encompass issues great and small, but none more fundamental than this: How shall the Nation be defended? This time those choices may well be existential- just as they turned out to be for Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt. Fortunately for the Greatest Generation and American citizens ever since, FDR was able to mobilize the country before we went to war,  Lesson One in any primer on Grand Strategy.

Sadly, George W. Bush seems never to have read about that principle before making his biggest decisions on how best to fight the war on terror. Read his memoirs or those of Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld or Condoleezza Rice and there is little controversy about how to mobilize Americans to prevail in the only war most of them had ever seen. Instead of re-instituting conscription for the duration, Mr. Bush sent us back to our colleges and shopping malls. He effectively drafted the Reserves for what turned out to be endlessly repetitive and extremely dangerous deployments to some of the most forbidding terrain on earth.

Want to know how Governor Walz found himself caught between a rock and a hard spot after 24 years of honorable service? Like many other small-town Americans, his Reserve unit was now called upon to accept a fundamental change of mission: From its familiar duties of fighting wildfires, floods and tornadoes to providing artillery support for an occupying army sent thousands of miles from home. Had President Bush decided otherwise, those same Reserve forces would have been cadre, training the latest generation of young Americans drafted to fight for their country. Instead, we refused to augment our all-volunteer force with the kind of short-term heroes now defending Israel with such conspicuous gallantry.  

To the great traditions of the Minuteman and the citizen-soldier, we have now sounded the uncertain trumpet of a people fighting its wars using Other People’s Kids. So why not have the forthcoming vice-presidential debate focus on vital issues both candidates are superbly equipped to answer?

COL (Ret.) Kenneth Allard is a former draftee who became a West Point professor, Dean of the National War College and NBC News military analyst.