Very true. Two of my daughters were in the IDF, and the fact that they were native English speakers got them both into very good jobs that they loved.
Because they’d already gone commando?
There is a book called “Mcnamara’s Folly” by Hamilton Gregory that goes into great detail on the programme to drastically lower mental standards in order to fill the ranks during the Vietnam War. These young men numbered over 300,000 it is estimated, and their stories are truly tragic.
My grandfather joined voluntarily and after 9 months was Section 8ed because he couldn’t read. This was at the beginning of the war–later standards may have been loosened.
It worked out pretty good for Forrest Gump.
in the US in the past if people wanted to avoid service they could just say they were gay (prior to don’t ask, don’t tell) I don’t think you had to prove you were gay.
IIRC famously during WW2 Canada started drafting people but wasn’t too gung-ho about it. Apparently an easy out was to simply reply to your mailed draft notice “(So-and-so) doesn’t live here anymore” in so-and-so’s hand writing and return address and the government never bothered to follow up.
I read somewhere, re World War I – admittedly, a time when things were different – about a US general who preferred illiterate soldiers as his message-runners. This was on the grounds that when you can’t read or write, you need to develop a good memory. The illiterate guys got the general’s messages off, word-perfect, and delivered them thus. The general claimed that he’d much rather have this, than clever-clever college-educated so-and-so’s bearing written messages by him; with their tendency to find fault with his writing style, and thus to alter his wording to something they liked better. An interestingly paradoxical take on this issue, anyway.
Again, it depended on just how far behiund its quota your draft board was. Someplaces and times its was an immidiate DQ. Other places you would be placed in, with a note in your file to keep an eye on you.
Apparently the best way to avoid frontline service was to know how to type. That was a good way to get sent to the clerk pool.
Pls see (https://www.amazon.com/Chance-Circumstance-Draft-Vietnam-Generation/dp/0394412753)
OKay, I have to ask - was that a joke or is tree-painting a real military thing?
Point accepted, although it was meant as a “generic politician joke” rather than a commentary on any actual politicians.
But there were social consequences to that, and potentially legal ones depending on the time period involved.
That’s actually something of a fascinating story and a tragic one. Apparently the thinking was that these men were mostly poor and judged unsuitable for military service due to their background and lack of education. So McNamara and Daniel Patrick Moynihan started an experiment to induct a bunch of them, train them up, teach them what they didn’t know, and make soldiers out of them. Seems like a noble idea on its face.
Problem was, they really were mentally deficient, not just under-educated poor men. About the only job they could hack was trigger-pulling, so they got shunted to the infantry, but they weren’t sharp enough to be competent infantrymen either, so they got killed in disproportionate numbers.
To be fair, I recall reading that WWI exposed the fact that many “mentally deficient” draftees were in fact simply suffering from malnutrition (vitamin deficits? Pellagra?) due to improper diet, especially southern farm boys - and being in an environment with a good diet noticably reduced their problems. Perhaps McNamara thought this was applicable to the current generation.
I knew a grad student from Finland who was grossly overweight*. Before he went back to Finland, after finishing up his degree, he went on a crash diet and lost an astonishing amount of weight, so he could serve. Either he was driven by patriotism, or there’s some advantage to doing your service in the regular way.
*He went on a trip where there were several pregnant wives of faculty members and married grad students. At one point they lined them all up, along with him, bellies prominent. He looked the most pregnant of them all.
I cannot say for korea…
In South africa, in the 1980’s…
Fat: They will fix that. Pronto. reference: Gomer Pyle from Full Metal Jacket.
Too Stupid: wot? Too stupid? This is the military we are talking about!! You would need to approach SINGLE-digit IQ before that becomes a problem. You would literally need to be retarded enough to not comprehend a simple verbal order of “come”“go"sit”, to be exempt. This means most trained Dogs were smart enough for Service.
Too criminal: No problem, you just spent your 2 years of duty time in the DB (army jail)
Conscientious objector: DB-jail, for longer time. Scary stories abound…
Genuine medical problem preventing you for something as strenuous as sitting behind a desk doing admin: Rejected for service, which carried an enormous social stigma that while not exactly legal was nonetheless embraced by the system. Employment by any government department or agency impossible. Travel visa very problematic. Political career, even local dogcatcher, zero chance.
They did not make it easy to disagree with the system.
Or maybe some dire disadvantage to NOT doing your service.
It depends on the country and the time:
I heard that South Korea has a real problem with too many young people being severely overweight for the army. Some start actively binge eating just to avoid conscription.
I was in West-Berlin during the time there was no conscription there and heard many tales of how young men tried to avoid military service in the FRG, were there was. Some tried to fake conditions, for many it did not work, so they had to “flee” to Berlin in a haste. Some joked everyone was deemed fit to serve, they could always be used as hostages in case of conflict. They really wanted you back then.
I read that in the USA it would have been impossible for you to serve during the Vietnam War even if you really wanted to if you had heel spurs. The consequences were dire in the long term, though.
I laughed out loud, Pardel. 
j
[Moderating]
True or not, funny or not, that’s still a political jab, which is not allowed in the General Questions forum.