# McNamara's Morons, aka Project 100,000 (recruiting mentally challenged people during Vietnam) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 2, 2018, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872 "2018-11-02T01:41:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2018, 1:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/1 "2018-11-02T01:41:37Z")
I had never heard of this until last night; in short, during the Vietnam era, and to a lesser extent in the Iraq/Afghanistan era, the military lowered their standards to a point where people with significantly subnormal IQs were admitted into the military, and usually given KP or other noncombat duties, if they made it through boot camp at all. > **[Project 100,000](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_100,000)** > > Project 100,000, also known as McNamara's 100,000, McNamara's Folly, McNamara's Morons, and McNamara's Misfits, was a controversial 1960s program by the United States Department of Defense (DoD) to recruit soldiers who would previously have been below military mental or medical standards. Project 100,000 was initiated by Defense Secretary Robert McNamara in October 1966 to meet the escalating manpower requirements of the American government's involvement in the Vietnam War. According to Ham At va... Here’s a 36-minute speech from someone who wrote a book about it. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/_J2VwFDV4-g/hqdefault.jpg "McNamara's Folly: The Use of Low-IQ Troops in the Vietnam War") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_J2VwFDV4-g) If you watch it, you’ll also see a lot of pop-ups from the controversial psychologist Jordan Peterson where he discusses this and similar issues. Back then, intelligence was thought to be a more fluid thing than it actually is, and in the presentation, it’s mentioned that military officers thought they could raise IQ as much as 20 points with proper training, etc. I do remember that in the “Unbroken” story, Louis Zamperini said that towards the end of the war, the Japanese soldiers he encountered became, as he put it, progressively stupider, so it wasn’t just the U.S. that has done this. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2018, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/2 "2018-11-02T01:46:23Z")
funny thing is I heard of a plan the other day to lower the physical requirements a bit so someone like me who is just "slightly to moderately " (I have cerebral palsy) disabled can be given non combat duties like desk jobs mechanics ect …… ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2018, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/3 "2018-11-02T23:50:03Z")
As OP points out, this is not that unusual. Practically every army throughout history has started off trying to recruit the most desirable and competent soldiers (at least for the jobs of any importance) and then moved down the scale to the less capable as the war dragged on. The first recorded instance I can think of was during the Peloponnesian War, when the Greeks realized they couldn’t fill their ranks with middle-class landowners. They had to start mass-producing state-sponsored equipment to issue to lower-class people. There was probably some Athenian shouting, “Oarsmen can’t be hoplites! This is madness!” And then Pericles was like, “Madness? This… is… ATHENS!” Anyway… Fast forward to 1944 and we see something similar. I had never heard of the Japanese getting ‘stupider.’ That’s both sad and funny. But part of the reason Japan did so poorly was that they had a hyper-stratified culture. Check out the Japanese requirements for their fighter pilots. They put their candidates through all kinds of physical hardship and torture to identify the ‘best’ (by whatever arbitrary standard they were looking for) and then wondered why they weren’t producing enough pilots to fill their seats. The Germans definitely had a manpower problem as well. Americans landing in Europe noticed that they consistently found units composed of old men and very young boys. The modern US Army totally does this, too. I know my MOS had a significant decrease in quality. I can only speak anecdotally, but around 2006-ish they dropped the standards for ASVAB scores and eliminated some other training requirements. When I went through the schoolhouse I saw soldiers dropped because they couldn’t write well (which was a major job requirement) but by 2007 we were pulling our hair out because some of our new recruits could barely write English. They also had periods where they increased the numbers of annual waivers. Each year the Army allows a certain number of ‘waivers,’ and then tracks those candidates through their careers. I needed a medical waiver when I joined for a childhood (mis)diagnosis. The Army knew that candidates with waivers - especially ‘moral’ (read: criminal) waivers - had a higher wash-out and UCMJ rate that other soldiers. But there were some years they increased the number of waivers and took the risk that came with recruiting less-desirable soldiers. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2018, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/4 "2018-11-03T00:02:17Z")
Now I know why banzai charges were a thing in the Pacific. Marines with M1 Garand and M1903 Springfield rifles had deadly rapid fire. Not to mention the medium and heavy machine guns. Banzai charges weren’t going to work. ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2018, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/5 "2018-11-03T13:31:54Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Now I know why banzai charges were a thing in the Pacific. The Banzai has little to do with the quality of the recruits. It was mostly about reinforcing the ideology of fanatacism. The Japanese wanted their soldiers to be fanatics, so they promoted the idea of suicide being preferable to surrender. The Banzai charge was a method of demonstrating their loyalty and fervor, rather than a function of their intelligence. In the latter phase of the Pacific campaign, they actually stopped using the Banzai entirely because… > [@](#): > > Marines with M1 Garand and M1903 Springfield rifles had deadly rapid fire. Not to mention the medium and heavy machine guns. Banzai charges weren’t going to work. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2018, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/6 "2018-11-03T15:09:43Z")
> [@wiki article](#): > > Project 100,000 soldiers included those unable to speak English, who had low mental aptitude, minor physical impairments and those who were slightly over- or underweight. They also included a special category made up of a control group of “normal” soldiers. Each of the different categories was identified in their official personnel records by a large red letter stamped on the first page of their enlistment contract. Human resources offices had to prepare reports on them, to be submitted monthly to the Department of the Army. The monthly reports did not disclose the identity of the soldiers… > A 1995 review of McNamara’s book In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam in the Washington Monthly severely criticized the project, writing that “the program offered a one-way ticket to Vietnam, where these men fought and died in disproportionate numbers…the men of the ‘Moron Corps’ provided the necessary cannon fodder to help evade the political horror of dropping student deferments or calling up the reserves, which were sanctuaries for the lily-white.”[7] > > Project 100,000 was highlighted in a 2006 op-ed in The New York Times in which former Wesleyan assistant professor and then Tufts assistant professor Kelly M. Greenhill, writing in the context of a contemporary recruitment shortfall, concluded that “Project 100,000 was a failed experiment. It proved to be a distraction for the military and of little benefit to the men it was created to help.” For the reason that veterans from the project fared worse in civilian life than their nonveteran peers, Greenhill hypothesized it might be related to the psychological consequences of combat or unpreparedness for the post-military transition.[6] Who knew Pyle in “Full Metal Jacket” and Forrest Gump were based on real people? ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2018, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/7 "2018-11-03T15:16:12Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > If you watch it, you’ll also see a lot of pop-ups from the controversial psychologist Jordan Peterson where he discusses this and similar issues. Back then, intelligence was thought to be a more fluid thing than it actually is, and in the presentation, it’s mentioned that military officers thought they could raise IQ as much as 20 points with proper training, etc. I could see some nutritional problems leading to correctable performance deficits on tests. But how much this would have been a contributor to people during Vietnam as opposed to earlier days, I don’t know. ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2018, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/8 "2018-11-04T12:57:23Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Who knew Pyle in “Full Metal Jacket” and Forrest Gump were based on real people? Literally every basic training cycle has at least one Pyle. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2018, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/9 "2018-11-05T04:43:30Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > Who knew Pyle in “Full Metal Jacket” and Forrest Gump were based on real people? The You Tube link I posted in the OP has a reference to a soldier who died in Iraq whose fellow soldiers actually did nickname him “Forrest Gump”, and he didn’t get it. p.s. When that movie came out, some people thought it was a documentary, and some of them were surprisingly intelligent. One woman I knew was a retired high school teacher who would always have a special-ed class, and she said, “No way could that be true. I used to have to try and teach kids like that.” p.p.s. Don’t forget Zero in the “Beetle Bailey” comic strip. ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/10 "2018-11-13T15:00:30Z")
I took the time to actually watch the video this morning. Holy shit. I met some absolute idiots in my Basic training. I mean, some of these guys were the dumbest people I’d ever seen, but they were at least mostly-functional human beings. The author in the video describes people with severe impairments, probably lifelong nutritional deficits, who were not just illiterate and incompetent, but a threat to the people around them. And after hearing about all the different ways in which the wealthy and middle-class could win deferments, it becomes hard not to perceive it as deliberately exploiting the weakest and most vulnerable people in society. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/11 "2018-11-13T16:10:47Z")
There is no one standard to be lowered. The military constantly raises and lowers qualifications on a month by month or even week by week basis. When I first walked into a recruiting station the first thing they asked was if I had a high school diploma. At the time they were not taking GEDs or people who dropped out. When I got to Basic training a couple of guys got pulled out a few times a week in the evening to get their GED. The difference? A couple of weeks difference in enlistment dates. At the time I joined they weren’t desperate for troops and standards were pretty high. One guy did somehow get through. He had obvious mental defects and could do nothing for himself. Even though they did not appear to care on the surface, the Drill Sergeants were paying close attention. Before we got to a range with live ammunition he was pulled out of the platoon and chaptered out of the Army. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/12 "2018-11-13T17:17:04Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > I could see some nutritional problems leading to correctable performance deficits on tests. But how much this would have been a contributor to people during Vietnam as opposed to earlier days, I don’t know. [Maybe some](https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2333328079): > [@](#): > > One thing worth noting is that many of the short or unintelligent people came from very poor environments. In thinking about the past, it’s easy to forget how poor the USA was until recently; the USA during Vietnam (to say nothing of earlier: [“The life of American workers in 1915”](http://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2016/article/the-life-of-american-workers-in-1915.htm)) was what we would consider a Third World country. Gupton, for example, was very thin, ate ravenously during training, and had abscessed teeth because he had never seen a dentist in his part of Appalachia; one enlistee considered himself blessed to be in the Army rather than Mississippi, where he could eat meat every day (indeed, every meal! of which there were three!), got beautiful new clothes, free doctor & dentist visits, and was even paid money once a month; another enlistee was thrilled about how he could suddenly see people’s faces now that he had glasses, after an Army doctor gave him a vision test. (Nevertheless, the improved environment of the Army appears to have made little difference.) It is not surprising that McNamara’s morons could be spotted on sight because of their shortness, funny-looking faces, and general ugliness - to the point where Gregory goes into detail about the one exception, the handsome Freddie Hensley, who nevertheless was not the sharpest tool in the shed, to the surprise of everyone interacting with him and discovering things like his reflexes being far too slow to shoot a rifle or believing that there was no connection between thunder and lightning; Hensley was sent into combat and died: > > ‘I was not surprised to discover that he had been killed in combat. With his good looks, he probably was assumed to be “normal” and was moved along to Vietnam and sent out into the field…Before long, she was expressing grief and anger and bewilderment. She told me that when Freddie received his draft notice, she and other family members went to the induction center and explained that Freddie had been in EMR (educable mentally retarded) classes in school and had not been able to drive a car and that it would be a mistake to draft him. In response, a sergeant reassured the family that Freddie would not be put into danger - he would just do menial jobs such as sweeping floors and peeling potatoes. “He was a good boy,” she said. “When he was little, we used to go everywhere together. He was my Little Man.” She began to sob, and she lamented, “Why did they have to draft him? I want to know why.”’ That’s from a review of the book \* McNamara’s Folly: The Use of Low-IQ Troops in the Vietnam War\*, by Hamilton Gregory, which is the book companion to the video linked to, above. The review goes into a lot more detail. Here’s a longish quote from the book, which is in the review as well: > [@](#): > > To justify lowering test scores for entry into the military, Robert McNamara said that Project 100,000 men “were not brain-poor at birth, but only privilege-poor, advantage-poor, opportunity-poor.”151 His description was accurate, but only when applied to those men in Category IV who possessed “street smarts” - a sound native intelligence. They did poorly on the AFQT not because of mental deficiency but because of substandard education, learning disabilities, or weak testing skills. Some of them were successful in the military, as I will show later in this book. > > What McNamara failed to see was that many Project 100,000 were incurably limited. They were indeed “brain-poor” for life, with no hope of making huge mental improvements. No amount of McNamara’s audiovisual gadgetry could transform them from slow learners into bright, or even average, citizens. But wait a minute: hadn’t psychologists discovered that even people with serious mental limitations were capable of absorbing much more training than society had previously thought possible? Yes, and it was a valuable insight: mentally limited persons were not hopeless - they were capable of growth and maturity. But here was the problem: they might be able to learn how to make change, but that didn’t mean that they could someday create a spreadsheet. They might be able to learn how to put together parts in a factory assembly line, but that didn’t mean they could someday operate a 105mm howitzer in battle. There was no hope of dramatically lifting the IQ of Project 100,000 men who missed a test question like this: “If a farmer had a bucket of 24 eggs and he stumbled and broke half of them, how many eggs would he have left?” > > The men who missed such questions were slow learners who were able to live happy, productive lives if they had a protective environment - a cozy haven with loving parents, helpful friends, and sympathetic bosses. Such was not the case for many Project 100,000 men. Some people can be lifted to average in the way McNamara hoped, but the military is not the place to do that, military training is not the way to do that, and wartime is not the time to do that, at least if you intend to do it in the military using military training. However, some people, one of my late relatives having been one of them, cannot be lifted that high, and we must be prepared to admit that. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/13 "2018-11-13T17:19:17Z")
Before I forget, this is also in the review: > [@](#): > > One of the most striking examples is that the My Lai massacre itself may have been directly due to lowered recruiting standards: > > He cited Lieutenant William Calley, convicted in the murder of more than 100 unarmed civilians in the My Lai Massacre in 1968. According to Arnold R. Isaacs, the Vietnam war correspondent for the Baltimore Sun, Calley “flunked out of Palm Beach Junior College with two C’s, a D, and four F’s in his first year and reportedly managed to get through officer candidate school without even learning to read a map or use a compass.”97 Marine Corps Colonel Robert D. Heinl said the Army had to take Calley “because no one else was available.”98 His own attorney used Calley’s low intelligence as a courtroom defense: the Army, he said, was to blame for My Lai because if it hadn’t lowered mental standards, men like Calley never would have been commissioned. Richard A. Gabriel, who spent 22 years as a U.S. Army officer, says, “Even the staunchest defenders of the Army agree that in normal times a man of Lieutenant Calley’s intelligence and predispositions would never have been allowed to hold a commission.”99 ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/14 "2018-11-13T17:22:26Z")
I would object to drafting those people against their will but, if they wish to serve their country in the military in some capacity, I see nothing wrong with accepting them and giving them a job that they can handle. I’m not sure what, exactly, you are objecting to. ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/15 "2018-11-13T19:39:11Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > I would object to drafting those people against their will but, if they wish to serve their country in the military in some capacity, I see nothing wrong with accepting them and giving them a job that they can handle. > > I’m not sure what, exactly, you are objecting to. Very few people volunteer to be drafted. In fact, being drafted is kind of the opposite of volunteering. And, seriously, “those people”? ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/16 "2018-11-13T20:16:31Z")
> [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](#): > > Very few people volunteer to be drafted. In fact, being drafted is kind of the opposite of volunteering. Which is what she said. No good drafting those people and putting them into the kinds of danger they can’t think their ways out of. But if they want to enlist (which she may or may not know involves picking your job–including mentally undemanding noncombat roles like cook, light wheel mechanic, G1 commander), then let them. ---
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [November 13, 2018, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/17 "2018-11-13T20:22:38Z")
> [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](#): > > Very few people volunteer to be drafted. In fact, being drafted is kind of the opposite of volunteering. > > And, seriously, “those people”? Way to misread my post. I said I would object to them being drafted (draft still existed during Vietnam), but I wouldn’t object to them volunteering (no longer a draft) because they want to serve in some capacity. In fact, the law states that the disabled are to be accommodated by employers if possible. So, I ask you again, since you pointedly avoided my question, what is it that you are objecting to in terms of the disabled serving in our draft free military? ---
**Author:** ![excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e8c25b/32.png) [@excavating\_for\_a\_mind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/excavating_for_a_mind)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/18 "2018-11-14T02:56:36Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > Way to misread my post. I said I would object to them being drafted (draft still existed during Vietnam), but I wouldn’t object to them volunteering (no longer a draft) because they want to serve in some capacity. In fact, the law states that the disabled are to be accommodated by employers if possible. I apologize. When you said “I would object to drafting those people against their will …” I took that to imply that you would be all in favor of them being drafted with their consent. Otherwise, why would you say “…against their will…”. > [@](#): > > So, I ask you again, since you pointedly avoided my question, what is it that you are objecting to in terms of the disabled serving in our draft free military? I wasn’t aware your question was pointed at me, as you posed it before I even read the first post in this thread. But, to answer a question you never asked of me, I am not objecting to the disabled from serving in our draft free military. I have to wonder what gave you the impression that I did. Sheesh! ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/19 "2018-11-14T18:04:51Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > Way to misread my post. I said I would object to them being drafted (draft still existed during Vietnam), but I wouldn’t object to them volunteering (no longer a draft) because they want to serve in some capacity. In fact, the law states that the disabled are to be accommodated by employers if possible. It was not clear to whom you were speaking or what ‘objection’ you were referring to. > [@](#): > > So, I ask you again, since you pointedly avoided my question, what is it that you are objecting to in terms of the disabled serving in our draft free military? Two big reasons: 1. The law states that the disabled are to be accommodated by employers if possible. The military is a mentally and physically challenging job. It is often NOT possible to accommodate disabilities. The military needs people who can deploy to austere conditions, exercise initiative, demonstrate sound judgment, and perform demanding work. If they don’t, people die. The entire point of the video is that McNamara was putting soldiers into jobs they were NOT suited for. The result was great loss of life (both for the soldiers and the people around them). Even the modern (2018) military tracks less-qualified and waivered soldiers and finds a higher rate of attrition, worse performance, and more UCMJ action. So every time the military agrees to take a less-qualified soldier, they are accepting a certain degree of risk. So what if we take patriotic young Americans and find them low-risk, non-threatening jobs that are within their capabilities? That brings us to the second problem. 1. Congress authorizes a certain number of service members each year. If the military is already at it’s “end-strength,” they cannot add new soldiers. All soldiers need to be deployable, and if someone’s limitations make them permanently non-deployable they are discharged. In the modern 2018 military, there is just no room for a less-capable, non-deployable soldier because they take up a ‘slot’ that could be used on a soldier who is physically and mentally capable. If someone’s limitations make them unqualified for military service, they can seek employment as a civilian performing some kind of non-deployable administrative or support task. TLDR: In a full-strength military there is no room to add an unqualified or under-qualified recruit. In a military experiencing a manpower shortage, less-qualified recruits are sometimes accepted but this comes at a cost of worse performance and unnecessary fatalities. ---
**Author:** ![Alley\_Dweller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alley_dweller/32/430_2.png) [@Alley\_Dweller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alley_Dweller)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872/20 "2018-11-14T20:02:44Z")
> [@JB99](#): > > 1. The law states that the disabled are to be accommodated by employers if possible. [The Americans with Disabilities Act](https://www.ada.gov/pubs/adastatute08.htm#subchapterI) says: > [@](#): > > (B) Exceptions > > The term “employer” does not include > > (i) the United States, a corporation wholly owned by the government of the United States, or an Indian tribe; or > > (ii) a bona fide private membership club (other than a labor organization) that is exempt from taxation under section 501(c) of title 26. So the ADA, at least, does not require the military to hire those with disabilities. If someone knows of another law that does, please let us know. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mcnamaras-morons-aka-project-100-000-recruiting-mentally-challenged-people-during-vietnam/823872.md?page=2)