I think someone at the Pentagon needs to look up the word "volunteer". The US doesn't have an "all-volunteer" military, it has an army of official mercenaries as well as an army of unofficial mercenaries. The official mercenaries are those who are actually *in* the US military, and their unofficial brethren are those working for large and small companies supplying support personnel-- for even more money.
I do not here denigrate the many men and women who serve in the US military who serve their country out of a sense of duty or support. But they are as well paid as those they fight next to, who work for the paycheck, the many benefits available while in service, and the considerable benefits provided after retirement from the service.
I am not suggesting the military revisit the bankrupt idea of returning to a politically insupportable draft, but I think it would be more honest to call our military what it is: a professional, paid army.

Hint for ya there, Sparky: draftees got paid, too.

Mercenaries can quit any time they want. They don't get labels like "deserter" and RE-4 discharges that fuck you in the job market or get your ass arrested and sent back to the nearest military installation for punishment. We are paid for services, privelege, and the basic needs to eat, obtain housing, and maintain a family....just like you.

It is and remains an all volunteer force for one simple reason. Our pay and allowances is readily available and non-negotiable...and an E-1 doesn't make shit worth calling them a mercenary. For that reason, you have to really want to be in the military to be in the military....the money sucks and getting rich isn't near anyones reality. We don't do it for the killer pay checks...

Mercenary...please.

You called that pay? I don't think so. *This* is real pay....

You make my point for me again. It's a job. Not a force of volunteers. No different from someone who volunteers to be a cop or a firefighter or a teacher.

I didn't make your point, but you sure as shit missed mine. We are called volunteers, because we aren't conscripts. We join of our own free will. They pay us so they don't have to draft you....

So Bobby volunteers at McDonald's?

Volunteer does not equate to work without pay, nor does getting paid to be a solider equate to a being mercenary without specified conditions. It is well understood by everyone I've ever talked about volunteering that volunteering for the military means not drafted. The military is referred to as professional organization, and I've heard that term many-a-times.

Anyway, what is it that you hoped to gain by wholesale replacing of 'volunteer' with 'professional'?

I have to agree with PHB here. Its a volunteer force because the alternative to not having it, would be a draft. AND Then you would really know what a non-volunteer draft was all about.

You see, unlike McDonalds...the United States NEEDS a military. Should people stop working at McDonalds tommorow, they couldn't start sending out McDraft Notices in the mail. The US military on the other hand........

And by the way, I served as a US Marine from 92 to 96, and I can tell you that to say the military are as well paid as the merc to the left or right of him, is to use the term "well paid" loosely; actually, its just using that term incorrectly. Many of our men and women in uniform live below the poverty line. These bonuses you hear about, are usually spread out over the course of 5 to 6 years. So that 20K bonus you think of as so "Great" is actually around $300 a month extra BEFORE tax's.

Trust me, this is an all volunteer force.

I see your point, but continue to think the distinction is incorrect because, while we could perhaps get along quite well with the legions of McDonald's burger flippers, we also need police, firefighters, people who work in the intelligence community, clever people at the DCD-- the list goes on for quite a long time. We depend on all of these people> And the distinction isn't one of risk, either-- just ask the spouse of a cop or someone who works at a big city firehouse. They all signed up, they all get paid.

Except for the volunteers, who don't. The volunteer firefighters in hundreds, maybe thousands of of small towns in the country. The volunteers who work at soup kitchens and homeless shelters. Big Brothers, Big Sisters.

I said it before, I'm not sure anyone paid attention: I do not mean any disrespect to those who choose to work in the military. But they choose this line of work, and their work is paid. Being a soldier, these days, is to have a profession. Our military is a professional one, and to call it "volunteer" is misleading. If you think a GI is a volunteer, then so are the police and the other 911 responders and all the other people who we consider public servants. But they are, none of them, volunteers. They do important work, and they might not be paid well, but they are simply not volunteers.

Oops. "CDC" not "DCD" Apologies

So you are saying if you do something because it is something you feel you should do, and then receive a stipend for it, you didn't volunteer?

You have never been part of a military family have you?

A volunteer firefighter and a volunteer solider, what's the difference (other than the work)? The funny thing about our language is that the same word can have different meanings when used in different contexts. A volunteer, when referring to a solider, is one who decides to sign up of their own free will rather than being conscripted. That is the modern definition of "volunteer" when applied to our military. It is well understood, by those in and out of uniform, that military members are paid, and that it is a profession.

I originally thought you were going to take this somewhere, but it appears you are hung up on semantics...am I wrong?

I wouldn't call it "hung up" but yes, it's about the semantics. I don't think it's a little thing though. And sure, some words have more than one meaning, but if the basic meaning of volunteer is unpaid, with a common second use meaning to agree to perform a task, then this other use of volunteer is what? I think it is an attempt to raise and glorify the motives and tasks of those who serve. Saying "I joined the army" is a simple, plain statement. Saying "I have served in the military for six years" likewise. They are neutral statements of fact. Introducing the word "volunteer" is to displace that neutrality with something else.

They are neutral statements of fact. Introducing the word "volunteer" is to displace that neutrality with something else.

You should have put this in your first post, although I was pretty sure this is what you had in mind. I wonder how you arrived at the conclusion that the first meaning of volunteer means unpaid. I am not being facetious. Throughout my schooling I never had, or I guess never took, and opportunity to study such things, but a quick search of dictionaries on the internet sees them listing a volunteer as someone who takes a position out of free will, and secondly as someone who takes it without pay. Simple method, I do realize...