Is Starmer Repeating A LETHAL Historical Mistake?

Right, so it is often the case that when politicians have some kind of brain wave, or in Keir Starmer’s case here, more of a brain fart, that there is some form of historical precedent we can refer to that shows why a great new government plan might well be doomed to failure, simply because its been tried before and didn’t work. Now and again however, you get something come up so depraved and sickening, that the historical precedent should be well enough known to never be repeated and the combination of a number of recent policy announcements from Starmer’s Labour have absolutely set some alarm bells ringing.
We have seen Starmer launch his assault on the long term sick and disabled, seen the plans that will make it much harder for those with mental health problems to claim disability benefits, the drive to get them back into work with more stick and less carrot being driven through a choice between earning your poverty, or be subjected to even worse, wages hardly keep up with the cost of living anymore after all. But when you combine that with Starmer’s lust for war, his increase in defence spending paid for by those attacks on the disabled, by the slashing of international aid and his war drum beating towards Vladimir Putin, well suddenly a very dark shadow from the past is cast across of this and some people have picked up on it. If you haven’t though, stay tuned.
Right, so in a move that has drawn sharp criticism as well as historical parallels, Keir Starmer’s Labour government has unveiled plans to tackle unemployment by pushing more people, or at the very least painting as rosy a picture of it as possible, to join the British Army. Whilst being aimed mainly at young unemployed Brits, the fact that there is this war on the long term sick and disabled, that mental health is rising as people find it increasingly more difficult to get out of poverty and that government policy is very driving this at the same time Starmer and Co and going around doing their Recruiting Serjeant routine has drawn a very unsettling comparison to something that was tried before and to utterly catastrophic conclusion. This recruitment campaign, framed as a solution to both joblessness and military recruitment shortfalls, the British military, for all of Starmer’s rhetoric is currently at the smallest it has been since Napoleon, bears an unsettling resemblance to Project 100,000, which, if you haven’t heard of it, was a disastrous Vietnam War-era initiative by US Defence Secretary Robert McNamara. It was so disastrous, it ended up earning the nickname "McNamara’s Folly," because the program lowered military entry standards to draft tens of thousands of underqualified men, leading to disproportionately high casualties and long-term trauma among those who never should have been sent to war in the first place. Here’s an explanatory excerpt from the Medic In The Green Time Blog, see if you can spot the parallels to what happened then and Starmer’s rhetoric now:
‘At various times in its history, the US military has recruited people who measured below specific mental and medical standards. During the Vietnam war, “McNamara’s Moron’s” as they were called, were barely literate, or could not read or write, or did not speak English. They were underweight, or obese, were too short, or semi-blind, or missing fingers. In basic training, they often could not tie their shoes, button their uniforms, march in drills. Many failed at physical exercise, at tossing hand grenades, could not quickly assemble weapons, or smartly shoot at moving targets.
These clearly unqualified men were deliberately sought by Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, who in 1966 required more troops but did not wish to alarm the middle class. Under Project 100,000, pitched as a way path out of poverty, service entry standards were drastically lowered. In addition to men of low intellect, tens of thousands of other inferior men were inducted, including criminals, misfits, even men physically disabled.’
This plan was called Project 100,000 for that is how many McNamara sought, but actually 354,000 men were sent to Vietnam who should have been there.
Facing recruitment shortages and public resistance to the Vietnam War, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara lowered enlistment standards to admit 100,000 additional soldiers per year, many of whom were functionally illiterate, had low IQs, or suffered from physical and mental health conditions that would have previously disqualified them.
The program was marketed as a "Great Society" initiative, supposedly offering disadvantaged men education and career opportunities. In reality, it was a cynical ploy to meet draft quotas and the results were catastrophic:
Project 100,000 recruits died at three times the rate of other soldiers and likely contributed to the deaths of many other soldiers as they proved to be more of a liability than an asset.
Many of the men sent there were completely unprepared for combat, leading to severe cases of PTSD and mental breakdowns at a much higher rate.
It was also a complete and utter exploitation of the most disadvantaged, deliberately sought out by McNamara, it also sought out those on low incomes and amongst minority communities leading to military service becoming a poverty draft.
By the war’s end, Project 100,000 was widely condemned as a moral and strategic failure and yet, as I’m sure you’ve twigged to by now, Starmer’s Labour seems intent on repeating these same mistakes with what they are actively doing now.
The 1987 Stanley Kubrick classic Full Metal Jacket, for those who have seen it, great film and I’m not a fan of war films particularly, you might recall Vincent D’Onofrio’s slow thinking, slow witted Private Pyle and how he was treated. A perfect rendition of a Project man as that was.
A way out of poverty, thrown off your benefits, especially sickness of disability benefits as they are made harder to claim, the parallels are there between McNamara’s Folly and Starmer’s cruelty and it certainly isn’t just me saying so. Starmer appears to be reviving this failed model, not only to address unemployment but also to bolster British military numbers, potentially leading to direct involvement in Ukraine. Starmer’s preparedness to do as much, desperate for a Falklands moment as he appears to be to save his plummeting polling and having proven how cruel he can be via the cuts he’s inflicting, who would right now put it past him to send people to Ukraine, who have no other options open to them, with Starmer shutting the doors to other avenues as fast as he seemingly can? This is a supposed human rights lawyer, formerly anyway and yet this all raises alarming moral and ethical concerns, how much more of a monster can this man actually be?
Labour’s new policy, urges young people on benefits to "consider military service" as an alternative to unemployment. This comes alongside harsh welfare reforms that will strip disability benefits from thousands—particularly those with mental health conditions—forcing them into work or, presumably, this option of military enlistment amidst a time of great military shortages and this should be of grave concern to us all.
What we have here is a concerted drive towards targeting the vulnerable by cutting disability and sickness benefits, pushing those people who lose their support towards making more extreme choices, between trying to find work as unemployment rises, due in no small part to the National Insurance hike on employers, increasingly resulting in a potential choice with no work available, between destitution, or the army. Already there have been surges in calls to suicide helplines off the back of Starmer’s disability reforms, indicative of the desperation already there.
Where this might be presented here as something of a choice, it isn’t really a choice at all, because it is coercion into the armed forces under economic duress. No work, no support, but hey, the army are recruiting, I’m sure Ukraine is lovely this time of year and all of that.
Ukraine is relevant to this picture too, because Zelensky has literal conscription squads now going around press ganging men into fighting Russia, people are literally in hiding there now and knowing how desperately Starmer would love to put boots on the ground in Ukraine, extending the war instead of suing for peace, is this economic coercion not just another way of forcing conscription too?
History shows that lowering military standards for recruitment leads to higher casualties and suffering. Project 100,000 recruits in Vietnam were more likely to die, desert, or suffer mental collapse—and Starmer’s plan – if this is his plan, as I say, the parallels are there though - risks the same outcome.
Keir Starmer’s plan to recruit the unemployed into the army is not just a potential revival of McNamara’s Folly—it is an even more cynical exploitation of the poor and vulnerable. By slashing disability benefits and pushing desperate people into military service, Labour is effectively reinstituting a poverty draft, all while potentially escalating Britain’s involvement in Ukraine and all for his own ends ultimately.
Lowering standards for war recruitment leads to death, trauma, and societal betrayal. If Starmer proceeds, he will not be solving unemployment—he will be sending Britain’s most vulnerable to die in a foreign war that we have no business being involved in.
The public must resist this dangerous policy, demand real employment solutions, and reject the militarisation of poverty as seems to be the case here. Is Starmer truly prepared to see people risk their lives in the thousands for the sake of his own polling? I know what I think.
Meanwhile, those cuts to disability benefits? They might not save much money at all, as Labour are claiming, since they’ve all forgotten something absolutely massive, even in the impact assessment it seems so, so much for that, incompetence and a sheer lack of understanding of the issue driving cuts that will be more harmful than anything the Tories did, so what have they missed? Find out more in this video recommendation here as your suggested next watch. Please do also hit like, share and subscribe so you don’t miss out on all new content dropping daily, as well as helping to support the channel at the same time which is enormously appreciated and I will hopefully catch you on the next vid., Cheers folks.