Dodging the Draft
Eighty percent of the Americans that fought in the Vietnam War were volunteers, and the remaining 20 percent were drafted. The Draft was a system the government used that finds men who can be used in the military from the general public. In the Vietnam War, the average age of an American that was in combat was 19. In 1965, about 1,977,000 men were draft-eligible. For the people who didn’t want to be sent off to war, they had to fake sickness, or other bizarre things. People had to lie about health problems, some binged on sugar to fake diabetes, and others smoked ink-dipped cigarettes to fake tuberculosis. Some lied about psychological problems, and many times, some men tried to love each other, or pretend to. Most commonly, the people fled north to Canada. The Canadians were accepting, by opening “draft-dodger hostels”, and setting up a job board. Back in the US, if the people successfully protested against the draft, they either preformed non-combat military work, or public service jobs. A booklet was published that explains how to answer draft board questions, and how to survive federal prison if you answered wrong. To attract more people to the draft, the military allowed students with low GPAs eligible for service. The military also tried to convince famous songwriters to write patriotic songs, but they never received any songs. President Nixon stated that the few hundred that fled the United States because of the draft would be punished. The “few hundred” that fled the US was actually 68,000 people. The penalty for fleeing the draft were up to ten years in prison and a 10,000 dollar fine, but only 8,700 men were convicted.