The Pentagon has plans on file for all sorts of contingencies. That allows them to react quickly when something happens. Instead of having to face the problem from scratch, they open an existing plan, update it as necessary, then press on. That's why when they say that the Bush Administration was planning to invade Iraq in 2001, it was nothing unusual. Since Congress had made regime change in Iraq US law back around 1998 (and it was signed by Clinton), it was the reasonable thing to do. At the same time, there are existing contingency plans to act against any number of other countries including North Korea and Iran. Planning is what they do.

So, it's probable that there are contingency plans for reactivating the draft should it be necessary, even though virtually no one in the military wants to go back to conscription. The draft, though questionable on 13th Amendment grounds, mades some sense when you need a military several million strong and you're unable to meet that force level through normal recruitment. However, today's military only has about 1.2 million people on active duty plus several hundred thousand more in the Guard and Reserves. There's no need for a draft to meet those force levels - recruitment and retention goals are being met.

There may well be a need to increase the size of the Army by a division or two. Back in 1991 following the collapse of the Warsaw Pact and end of the Cold War, the Bush 41 administration called for a 25% drawdown on active duty force levels, down from roughly 2 million to 1.6 million. The process began in 1992 and continued for several years. I was one of several hundred thousand military personnel "peace dividended" out of uniform in 1992. Unfortunately, they didn't stop at 1.6 million and went down to roughly 1.2 million, a reduction of some 40%. It does appear that we cut too far in the 1990s.

Even increasing the military back to 1.4 million probably wouldn't mean we'd need the draft. After all, we had no trouble maintaining a force level of 2 million through most of the 1980s without conscription.