I've never served in the military, but always wanted to.
I think the military offers great opportunities for education and travel you just can't get anywhere else. Not to mention the experiences and life long friendships you'd make during your enlistment.
As for the "Would you serve...?"
100% yes.
I think it should be mandatory fro every able citizen to serve their country or get out.
The United States of America is the, hands down, greatest country in the world, and the greatest place to live. I would step out on the battlefield to defend that any time.
Some may think the USA are bullies meddling in affairs they don't belong in, or getting involved in situations for personal interest/gain, etc... Well you are probably 100% right. But you know something, that's the way it has always been since the beginning of man. Nations have conquered nations for personal gain. Wars have been fought for territory, conflict of interests, religion, strategic position, you name it. The USA is in a position of being the big dog on the block. This leaves us in the position of having other, smaller/weaker, countries looking to us for assistance and protection, and depending on us to not allow them to be conquered by regimes and countries they fear.
Why don't we shut our borders and let the rest of the world work out its own problems? We can do that! We are one of a very few countries that can feasibly seal our borders and still survive having the internal resources to do so. What then? Think about it. We become an isolation state, oh kind of like what happened prior to D-Day, and a regime/dictator/country systematically takes over country after country gaining resources upon resources till they believe they have sufficient power and might to look towards conquering us. Isolationism is not a wise move when people hate your existence to begin with.
But why are we hated, we are such nice people? We are hated because we are free. The design of our nation is not based around any one religion. The design of our nation is of the people, by the people, and for the people. This is designed to make us free according to the majority. Nations built off of religion, dictatorship, communism, and any other non-free method of rule absolutely disagree with our way of life, and in turn, hate our existence. For this reason these nations have tried, and will continue to try, to stamp out our beautiful free way of life.
We are not perfect. We are not a perfect nation by any means. We have flaws, we have corruption, we have crime, but we are free. We are free to make our own living. And MORE SO, to decide our own living, and what to do with that which we earn. You wish to buy crack and sexually promiscuous persons with your earnings, go right ahead. It's your freedom of choice. In case you missed the note circulating around, they don't have those kinds of choices in ever country on earth, ya know! And to those countries that do have these kinds of choices, but once did not, yes, you can probably thank the USA for helping them to get there.
Remember world history my friends. There has always been war, there will always be war. War will never cease to exist. Those that really believe we can live globally without conflict are seriously dreaming. Research the history of mankind. As we are each individuals, that individualism will always bring about disagreement. And when these disagreements happen on a large scale we end up with world conflict, and sometimes this leads to wars. It happens, and is going to continue to happen. Sorry for the bad news.
To those US citizens that are not proud to be so. To those US citizens that would not lay down your life to fight for the freedoms we have, and preserve this freedom for future generations. To those US citizens that sit back in your lounge chairs, getting whatever education you desire, drinking your beer, making or not making the money you chose to make or not make, spending that money on whatever it is you so choose to spend it on. To those US citizens that feel embarrassed to be US citizen.
I have something to say to you...
Just Leave the country, get out of my face, you make me absolutely sick to my stomach.