A Spectator's Notebook
I SEE MR. DUNCAN SANDYS is offering ten to one that there will be enough voluntary recruits by 1962 to end conscription. Taken! Or, rather, I would take his offer if I thought that the Government would be foolish enough not to make drastic changes in his recruit- ing policy long before then. Mr. Sandys justifies his optimism by pointing to the encouraging response recently of volunteers for long-term engagements. But there was never any doubt that recruits would be tempted by the new terms offered; the only surprise is that so few men have been dazzled by the prospect of earning incomes far beyond the wildest dreams of the ordinary recruit. To make the improvement sound more impressive than it is, Mr. Sandys resorted to the dubious device of stressing the increased recruit- ment in terms of `man-years'—that is, number of recruits multiplied by length of service. But, as the Daily Mail sensibly pointed out, 'it is men, not man-years, who win battles': and this device of luring men into committing themselves to long- term service when they are young is not merely disreputable; it is also likely to be destructive of morale in a few years' time, when they begin to get restless. My own impression is that the Sandys plan has failed; that, after this initial boost, re- cruiting will fall off again.
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