When I was a teenager here in south Africa, we white bodied males had to do military service upon leaving school at 18. That was the old apartheid government in 1980s, before liberation by Mandela. I however chose to escape this by entering the Vaishnava yoga ashram as a brahmachari, where I stayed for 10 years. I did far greater service to humanity as a whole, uplifting consciousness, than I would have in the army. I suggest that there should be compulsory service but there signs be a choice- either army or monastery.