Overview
- Historian David Swift told The Express that any future draft would likely focus on jobless university graduates.
- Swift suggested workers in key defence-industrial roles could be exempt or directed into industrial service to rebuild capacity.
- Retired Army major Robert Lyman warned the armed forces are at their weakest since the Napoleonic era and argued small, tech-heavy forces cannot win wars.
- Reports link renewed discussion of compulsory service to global flashpoints including Ukraine, instability in Iran, and China’s posture toward Taiwan, with mentions of Donald Trump’s interest in Greenland.
- The UK has used conscription only twice in the past 126 years—1916–1920 and 1939–1960—and current articles relay expert opinion rather than any government policy move.