Vietnam Era Selective Service

**canuck** · March-22-23, 11:34 AM

Originally Posted by Henry Whalley

In those days, I used to say "I regret that I only have one draft to dodge for my country."

Among the things that young men obsessed over in those days were dodging the draft and dragging the Dodge!

**Danny** · March-22-23, 11:56 AM

My dad was drafted into U.S. Army in 1966. Served in Vietnam. Came back a mess. But he recovered.

Our U.S. Armed Forces is supposed to served OUR COUNTRY Not theirs just to kill commies!

**Henry Whalley** · March-22-23, 03:58 PM

Originally Posted by Danny

...Came back a mess. But he recovered.

Danny, I'm glad to hear that your dad recovered. Most Nam era vets whom I met were disturbed but never recovered. After high school, I viewed my classmates who volunteered as bat shit crazy. Many came back drug-addicted or slowly dying from Agent Orange poisoning.

Footnote: IMHO we were there for the opium -- it was an Opium War waged by Americans against Americans.

Lastly, the Generation Gap was one of the saddest things about the 1960s. Kids couldn't understand why their parents supported the war -- which alienated them from their parents. Family trust was fractured. The stupidest saying was "don't trust anyone over thirty."

In the present day, the fracture has matured into simply "don't trust anyone." So, IMHO the Nam era broke our trust beyond repair.