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August 22, 2023 / Blake Stilwell / Military.com / Book Review - In August 2023, the U.S. Army released its latest attempt to reach potential recruits from the generational cohort known as 'Generation Z.' Called​​ "First Steps," it's a series of brief "documentaries" that attempts to capture the spirit and emotions associated with life as a young recruit. A drill sergeant is never seen, but we can hear marching cadence in one of the videos, a siren song that quickly morphs into a sick beat.

Will these spots resonate with Gen Z, the generation of Americans born after 1997? The Army certainly hopes so: In 2018, it invested $4 billion in marketing over the next 10 years to reach them. But so far, that effort has come up short, with the Army expecting to fall 15,000 recruits short of its goal in 2023 -- the largest shortfall of all branches of the U.S. military. The Navy expects to be 10,000 recruits short while the Air Force will miss its goal by 3,000; only the Marine Corps believes it will meet its own needs.

Gen Z interest in military service is low and only dropping lower. The Wall Street Journal reports that only 9% of American youth ages 16-21 said they would consider enlisting in 2022, which is down from the 13% recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic. It appears no one wants to join the military, and the military can't seem to figure out what to do about it.

There is one Gen Z officer who believes he has the answer to the military's recruiting woes. Second Lt. Matthew Weiss is a 25-year-old Marine Corps intelligence officer whose new book, "'We Don't Want You, Uncle Sam: Examining the Military Recruiting Crisis with Generation Z" lays out what he believes are some of the major problems his generation has with military service -- and what the military can do about it.

Across the U.S., anti-war veterans and their allies are working together in an effort to stop the U.S. military from reaching its recruitment goals, writes Ruben Abrahams Brosbe.

July 27, 2023 / Ruben Abrahams Brosbe / Consortium News - March 20 marked the 20th anniversary of the United States’ invasion of Iraq. The war took hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, with some estimates of Iraqi casualties putting the number at over 1 million. More than 4,600 U.S. soldiers died in Iraq during and after the invasion, and thousands more have died by suicide.

Meanwhile, and not coincidentally, the U.S. military is facing its worst recruitment crisis since the end of the Vietnam War. The Defense Department’s budget proposal for 2024 outlines a plan for the military to slightly cut back on its ranks, but to reach its projected numbers, it will still need to embark on a heavy recruitment push.

Across the country, anti-war veterans and their allies are working together in an effort to stop the U.S. military from reaching its goal.

We Are Not Your Soldiers is a project of New York City-based nonprofit World Can’t Wait. The organization sends military veterans into schools to share honest stories of the harm they have caused and suffered. In doing so, they hope to prevent young people from signing up.

“I wish I had somebody who told me when I was young,” says Miles Megaciph, who was stationed in Cuba and Okinawa with the U.S. Marine Corps from 1992 to 1996. “The experiences I’ve lived, as painful as they are, and as much as I don’t like to relive them, are valuable to help future adults not live those experiences,” Megaciph told me.

“We wanted to get to the people who were going to be the next recruits,” says Debra Sweet, the executive director of World Can’t Wait. When We Are Not Your Soldiers launched in 2008, the experience was often intense for veterans.

NNOMY office invited Annette Gunderson to tell her story for our website and newsletter. She was referred by Tori Batemen of the Military Recruiter Abuse Hotline of the American Friends Service Committee who was contacted by Annette to seek some support. Tori then recommended that Annette contact NNOMY to tell her story which she did. https://afsc.org/hotline

April 22, 2023 / Jeff McDonald / San Diego Union Tribune / Barrio Logan - In the shadow of the San Diego-Coronado Bridge, on the same patch of ground where a community of poor families and immigrants was cleaved by the government in the name of progress, Maria Elena Gomez listened to the music and spoke of the struggle Chicanos have faced for generations.

The retired educator from Fallbrook, wearing a T-shirt bearing the United Farm Workers motto Si Se Puede, was among thousands of people attending the 53rd annual Chicano Park Day festival on Saturday.

“We are still trying to get fair representation for the under-served and the undocumented,” said Gomez, whose own education started later than most, at 31, due to detours of her own making and those imposed by others. “But it doesn’t negate the fact that we have a lot of young people learning about what’s going on.”

What was going on — for the first time in person since 2019 due to the pandemic — was vintage lowriders and food and music and booths, lots of booths.

More important: the celebration of Chicano culture, which has not always been celebrated, and organizing.

The branches of the U.S. military have long seen high schools as optimal recruiting grounds. Some veterans are beginning to fight the propaganda and tell students the truth about military service.

April 3, 2023 / Ruben Abrahams Brosbe / Yes! Magazine - March 20 marked the 20th anniversary of the United States’ invasion of Iraq. The war took hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives, with some estimates of Iraqi casualties putting the number at over 1 million. More than 4,600 U.S. soldiers died in Iraq during and after the invasion, and thousands more have died by suicide. 

Meanwhile, and not coincidentally, the U.S. military is facing its worst recruitment crisis since the end of the Vietnam War. The Defense Department’s budget proposal for 2024 outlines a plan for the military to slightly cut back on its ranks, but to reach its projected numbers, it will still need to embark on a heavy recruitment push. Across the country, anti-war veterans and their allies are working together in an effort to stop the U.S. military from reaching its goal.

We Are Not Your Soldiers is a project of New York City-based nonprofit World Can’t Wait. The organization sends military veterans into schools to share honest stories of the harm they have caused and suffered. In doing so, they hope to prevent young people from signing up. 

“I wish I had somebody who told me when I was young,” says Miles Megaciph, who was stationed in Cuba and Okinawa with the U.S. Marine Corps from 1992 to 1996. “The experiences I’ve lived, as painful as they are, and as much as I don’t like to relive them, are valuable to help future adults not live those experiences,” Megaciph told me.

“We wanted to get to the people who were going to be the next recruits,” says Debra Sweet, the executive director of World Can’t Wait. When We Are Not Your Soldiers launched in 2008, the experience was often intense for veterans. “They were all fresh out of Afghanistan and Iraq,” Sweet remembers. “It was very raw, it was very hard. [It was] really hard for them to go talk to people in public about what had happened. And we learned a lot about PTSD, up close and personal, and how it was affecting people.”