Personally I think 2 years is just the right time, or minimum
time needed to train a soldier, especially officers, and giving
them some experience in operation. Unless our guys are very
specialized, a tankee will need to know how to handle the 75 mm gun
and not the rifle, an engineer will need only to handle a bridge
and not the mines or explosive, .... then can we expect to shorten
NS. With shortage in manpower, this is not likely.
Or we should have all NSF trained as private soldiers only, all
officers are highly paid regulars.
or may be those with PSLE and below serve as private for 1 year and
those who got O level will got for higher ranks and serve 2
years,
or compulsory military basic training during secondary school,
those who fail BMT fail O level, .....
will 1 and a half year and 2 years make much difference to those
who are going to the U or further studies? with the changes made to
the calendar year in local U, dont' think it makes much diff.
If we spend only 1 year for NS, what kind of soldiers do we expect?
boy scouts equipped with rifles?
those who went through army as a private, either as storeman,
driver or the zor bo, will find 2 years too long. Those who don't
want to serve NS will find even 6 months a waste of time. How a
person went through NS give a good guage of what he think.
We either have a well trained armed forces or nothing at all, how
much we need to spend in defence is another different story. To cut
down, cut down the frigates, the F15, the new submarines, the
apaches...these are the expensive items. May be we should cut down
the number of tonners, but the soldiers have to walk. 
