All-Star Militia

KABUL -- Master Sgt. Brett Favre, leading a Special Forces platoon in a ground assault in the southwestern mountains of Afghanistan, said troops need to "go deep and long" in the search for Al Qaeda members.

JERUSALEM -- Approximately 1,000 troops surround historic Bethlehem awaiting orders from the U.S. command post in Jerusalem.

"I'd like us to roll in and take care of business as soon as possible," says tank commander Kobe Bryant. "Playoffs are supposed to begin in two weeks."

If the names sound familiar, it's because they belong to the elite corps of professional athletes that America loves but also often resents for their salaries, their behavior and their highly dubious status as role models. So wouldn't there be less of that resentment if these multi-millionaire jocks had to do double duty as America's first-strike military force?

I'm not talking about the occasional athlete-turned-soldier, or the way dozens of athletes were drafted during WWII. My suggestion is to draft all pro athletes into the armed services. Sign them up as soon as they're drafted by any team, and send them to basic before spring training. Then, when there's an uprising in Somalia, or intelligence about new terror training camps cropping up again in Afghanistan, let ESPN's rich and famous be the first reserves we send into battle.

Think of it: Would all of us be a little less angry if the sport stars that we pamper, spoil and often deify earned their stripes literally? If these same gifted men had to risk their lives for us (instead of just their anterior cruciate ligaments), wouldn't we be more likely to forgive them for charging money for autographs? For striking in order to protest their $3 million per year "slave" wages? For spitting at umpires? For not running out ground balls while making $126,000 -- a baseball player's average take per game?

A $40,000-a-year over-the-road driver might feel a heap better about Kurt Warner making $5 million if he knew the St. Louis Rams quarterback had to train eight weeks at Fort Bragg and then serve two years on call as a reservist. I, for one, would be less inclined to boo the Texas Rangers' Alex Rodriguez ($25 million a year) for striking out if I knew he slept in a tent in the desert in Yemen last week, safeguarding me at home. And when Philadelphia Eagles' Antonio Freeman runs on an opposing team's field signaling that he's number one, fans just might stand up and salute him in agreement.

But what's in it for the athletes? Everything they want, actually. They'd keep their salaries and their sport celebrity. But they'd also finally have a legitimate claim to the oft-debated moniker of "hero." And many of them, especially kids right out of high school like basketball players Tyson Chandler and Eddy Curry, would be able to get a normal education -- one consisting of skills and values that we currently watch them flaunt or struggle with in their daily travails, as they are splashed all over the front page of the sports section, like a World War II poster featuring boxer Joe Louis.

In the Army (or Navy or Marines), they'll cultivate maturity, teamwork, discipline (let Latrell Sprewell try choking a drill sergeant), manners, selflessness, loyalty and patriotism. They'll even acquire a skill or trade to fall back on if it turns out that in the big leagues they cannot hit the curve ball or catch a pass in traffic.

And those are just the known perquisites for the stars. Those pros who covet the limelight -- your Neon Deons and Reggie Millers -- can move up from the toy department (sports page) to world news in the off season, photographed alongside President Bush and Colin Powell and interviewed by Ashleigh Banfield.

Better yet, your Ray Lewises and Leroy Butlers, who confess that they "love to hit people," and hockey enforcers like Marty McSorley, who simply "love to fight," will finally get to be in an arena where their preoccupations are not only legal, but are rewarded with medals and ribbons.