# Question regarding how the draft-dodging system worked **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 19, 2015, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586 "2015-07-19T05:46:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![davidmich](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e56c9b/32.png) [@davidmich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidmich)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/1 "2015-07-19T05:46:21Z")
Hi, How was Donald Trump able to avoid serving in Vietnam? Was switching schools one way of continuing student deferments? The article refers to him going ti Fordham, Wharton ad UPenn. I look forward to your feedback. davidmich > **[Deferments Helped Trump Dodge Vietnam](http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/celebrity/deferments-helped-trump-dodge-vietnam)** > > 7/18/15 UPDATE: Now that Donald Trump has maligned Senator John McCain as a phony war hero who got himself captured in Vietnam, below you’ll find a reminder--which TSG published the last time the Rep However, Selective Service records reveal that Trump, the fortunate son of a multimillionaire real estate baron, took repeated steps to avoid serving in Vietnam. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/2 "2015-07-19T14:55:59Z")
Trump’s record of deferments is odd and remains unexplained. That article seems to draw on this [earlier one](http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/donald-trumps-vietnam-draft-records-secret-documents-deferments/story?id=13492639) but that just add more questions. I’m just four years younger than Trump so I was subject to more or less the same system. The demands of the draft were not that high until 1966, so normal student deferments meant that very few college students were drafted. That was considered to be unfair, putting the burden of the draft disproportionately on the poor and lower class from 1966-1969. That’s why the draft lottery was started in late 1969. Switching schools was not a dodge. Just being in college before 1969 was normally sufficient. Trump was declared medically unfit in October 1968, a year before the lottery but after he had graduated from Wharton, meaning he was no longer in college at all. That could have been a dodge to avoid the draft. The timing is suspicious. Without knowing more about the details, though, no meaningful statement can be made. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/3 "2015-07-19T15:25:45Z")
It was common for well educated students and those from well off families to understand the deferment system much better than less educated students and those from less well off families. Here’s a famous article about how one could do this. (Full disclosure: I know Jim Fallows a little bit.) Jim was fairly thin, so he starved himself down to the point that he was just under the minimum weight for his height.: [http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2009/0911.fallows.html](http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2009/0911.fallows.html) ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/4 "2015-07-19T15:30:38Z")
It was not necessary to get a deferment-you could join the ROTC program, and stay in school for 4 years-later, you could apply for a “hardship” deferment, or apply to join a unit that would never be mobilized (like the Army military police). Bill Clinton used the ROTC option to his advantage, and nobody questioned him. Or, you could join the Army and get a non-combat gig (like Al Gore, who was a reporter for the army newspaper). The closest Gore ever got to a fight was in a Saigon barroom…though he did say somebody shot at him once. There were many ways for the rich and connected to avoid the risk of combat. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/5 "2015-07-19T15:47:07Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > Or, you could join the Army and get a non-combat gig (like Al Gore, who was a reporter for the army newspaper). The closest Gore ever got to a fight was in a Saigon barroom…though he did say somebody shot at him once… Gore was never in combat in Vietnam, but he was sometimes in combat zones, and was exposed to risk there. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/6 "2015-07-19T15:49:07Z")
If you were enrolled as a student in an accredited college, you automatically got a 2S deferment, and you kept it as long as you were attending classes. Note a deferment just deferred your service; once you graduated, you were eligible to be drafted. I was attending college during Vietnam, and my lottery number was 86. My student deferment kept me out of Vietnam (I had a scare one term when there was a mixup and I was classified IA). I would have been drafted after graduation, only they had stopped drafting people by that point. Trump’s student deferments were perfectly legal and legitimate; the real question is how he got a medical deferment after graduation. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/7 "2015-07-19T15:57:21Z")
Clinton was never close to being drafted. His draft number was too high. (For those of you who don’t know how draft numbers work, look it up.) He at first considered joining the ROTC program, but then he decided that he was opposed to the war in Vietnam, so he couldn’t do that. He put himself into the draft system, but his number was high enough that he couldn’t be drafted. Neither Fallows nor Clinton came from rich families, so they can’t be considered to be “rich and connected.” Fallows’s father was a doctor, but he was a doctor who didn’t go to college but went through a program that was available just during World War II. You enlisted and then signed up for the program after high school and were put through five years of intense full-time training with no vacation in which you took all the pre-medical courses and all the medical courses that a doctor takes in eight years. You then had to do a certain number of years as a doctor in one of the military services. (Full disclosure: One of my aunts went through a similar program at the same time in which you became a nurse in just three years.) Clinton’s mother was a nurse. His father died before he was born and his stepfather ran the service department at a car dealership. His mother and stepfather had some hard times in their marriage and were barely scraping through financially. Both Fallows and Clinton went to top colleges as undergrads (Harvard and Georgetown, respectively), and that’s undoubtedly where they heard about deferment strategies. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/8 "2015-07-19T15:58:29Z")
Forgot to add this: > **[Bill Clinton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton)** > > William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. He previously served as governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and again from 1983 to 1992, and as attorney general of Arkansas from 1977 to 1979. A member of the Democratic Party, Clinton became known as a New Democrat, as many of his policies reflected a centrist "Third Way" political philosophy. He is the husband of Hillary Cli... ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/9 "2015-07-19T16:01:57Z")
And this: > **[James A. Fallows, 1925-2008](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2008/11/james-a-fallows-1925-2008/9060/)** > > The Atlantic covers news, politics, culture, technology, health, and more, through its articles, podcasts, videos, and flagship magazine. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/10 "2015-07-19T16:03:42Z")
Jim Fallows’s father did go to college for two years but quit to join this federal education program. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/11 "2015-07-19T16:13:54Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > It was not necessary to get a deferment-you could join the ROTC program, and stay in school for 4 years-later, you could apply for a “hardship” deferment, or apply to join a unit that would never be mobilized (like the Army military police). Bill Clinton used the ROTC option to his advantage, and nobody questioned him. Or, you could join the Army and get a non-combat gig (like Al Gore, who was a reporter for the army newspaper). The closest Gore ever got to a fight was in a Saigon barroom…though he did say somebody shot at him once. There were many ways for the rich and connected to avoid the risk of combat. GW Bush was from a very wealthy and well connected family and was able to get into a National Guard unit that would never be deployed. Dick Cheney used connections to get several deferments and never had to serve. Bill Clinton was never in the ROTC. Although he considered using deferments, he didn’t and lucked into a high draft number. Al Gore actually served in combat zones and was in some danger, much more so than Bush and Cheney certainly, but was in a non combat role. John Kerry was a combat Naval officer and served with distinction in very dangerous duty. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/12 "2015-07-19T16:41:35Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > Dick Cheney used connections to get several deferments and never had to serve. For Cheney, it wasn’t connections so much as college deferments, and then later a deferment because he was married, and then one because he was married with a child. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/13 "2015-07-19T17:11:37Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > GW Bush was from a very wealthy and well connected family and was able to get into a National Guard unit that would never be deployed. > > Dick Cheney used connections to get several deferments and never had to serve. > > Bill Clinton was never in the ROTC. Although he considered using deferments, he didn’t and lucked into a high draft number. > > Al Gore actually served in combat zones and was in some danger, much more so than Bush and Cheney certainly, but was in a non combat role. > . Bush the younger flew fighters. Thats a dangerous enough job even sans people taking pot shots at you, and especially then when jets were not as reliable as they are now. I dislike the man, yet I still suspect that his decision to joinup was motivated by a genuine desire to serve and play with some cool toys, as opposed to wanting to avoid service. Certainly his family was influential enough to get him to avoid service through safer means, and as Bush the elder had been a pilot himself in WW2, they would know about the inherent dangers of flying. Plus their was a family tradition of service, despite being well off, Bush the elder was as mentioned as a pilot and Bush the eldest served as an Artillery officer in France in 1918. I mean if he had really wanted to avoid danger, he could have taken a chance with the draft and use connection to serve as an Aide to a general or a staff officer, hell he would have been in less danger then as a pilot even if he was in Vietnam. ---
**Author:** ![usedtobe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ec9cab/32.png) [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/14 "2015-07-19T17:14:58Z")
W was in a National Guard unit in TX. Never came close to harm’s way. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/15 "2015-07-19T17:15:26Z")
GHW and Prescott were true heroes. My attempt there was to make a reply equally simple minded to the post that I quoted. There is, of course, nuance in all of those cases. ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/16 "2015-07-19T17:22:59Z")
Obama wasn’t old enough to be drafted … scary \ The Canadian constitution prohibits the draft, so “draft-dodging” isn’t a crime there; therefore the Canadians couldn’t legally extradite these folks back to the USA.\ ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/17 "2015-07-19T17:25:00Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Bush the younger flew fighters. Thats a dangerous enough job even sans people taking pot shots at you, and especially then when jets were not as reliable as they are now. > > I dislike the man, yet I still suspect that his decision to joinup was motivated by a genuine desire to serve and play with some cool toys, as opposed to wanting to avoid service. Certainly his family was influential enough to get him to avoid service through safer means, and as Bush the elder had been a pilot himself in WW2, they would know about the inherent dangers of flying. Plus their was a family tradition of service, despite being well off, Bush the elder was as mentioned as a pilot and Bush the eldest served as an Artillery officer in France in 1918. > > I mean if he had really wanted to avoid danger, he could have taken a chance with the draft and use connection to serve as an Aide to a general or a staff officer, hell he would have been in less danger then as a pilot even if he was in Vietnam. Flying a plane is dangerous? How many pilots in a National Guard unit that wasn’t assigned to a combat zone died? ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/18 "2015-07-19T17:35:04Z")
Getting a medical deferment was pretty easy if you had someone to coach you or knew a friendly doctor. There’s an article - I can’t find it - but it’s written by a former student at an Ivy League school. The students got together before the medical inspection by draft board doctors and they looked up all the possible disqualifying conditions. On the inspection day, they were all looking sickly and everyone had a story to complain about. As I understand it, all you needed was a letter from a doctor stating that he treated you for your whole life or something and that you had perpetual ulcers or some other disqualifier. Nothing but a paper letter was required - no lab tests, xrays, etc. A wealthy man like Trump would have had the connections to get something like that trivially. He might have bribed the doctor, or maybe a friend told him he knew a guy, etc. Trivial. The same story talked about how a bus showed up full of inner city blacks. All got off the bus looking as strong and hearty as 18 year old men tend to be. The author knew those were the people who were going to do the dying. No one told them to fake an illness, or that it would be a good idea to do so, or how to do it, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/19 "2015-07-19T17:37:16Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Flying a plane is dangerous? How many pilots in a National Guard unit that wasn’t assigned to a combat zone died? To be fair, it’s not totally safe - but yeah, it’s gotta be safer than infantry in the jungles or facing SAM alley. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2015, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586/20 "2015-07-19T17:49:17Z")
[QUOTE=usedtobe] W was in a National Guard unit in TX. Never came close to harm’s way. [/QUOTE] > [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Flying a plane is dangerous? How many pilots in a National Guard unit that wasn’t assigned to a combat zone died? Well according to [Aerospace Web](http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/history/q0185.shtml), which I doubt is biased one way or the other. 1. The unit that Bush flew for, the 147th Fighter Intercept Group actually did send pilots to Vietnam, when Bush joined up. According to some of his brother officers, he did ask to be assigned to Vietnam, but was told he did not have enough time in type…even if you disregard this, the fact is that he could have seen combat by joining up. 1. He flew the F102A Delta Dagger which was pretty notoriously dangerous. From the above link > [@](#): > > ANG members of the period who we’ve been able to locate indicate that only highly qualified pilot candidates were accepted for Delta Dagger training because it was such a challenging aircraft to fly and left little room for mistakes. According to the Air Force Safety Center, the lifetime Class A accident rate for the F-102 was 13.69 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours, and the rate was especially high during the early years of the plane’s service… > > Regardless, the F-102 was still far more dangerous to fly than today’s combat aircraft. Compared to the F-102’s lifetime accident rate of 13.69, today’s planes generally average around 4 mishaps per 100,000 hours. For example, compare the F-16 at 4.14, the F-15 at 2.47, the F-117 at 4.07, the S-3 at 2.6, and the F-18 at 4.9. Even the Marine Corps’ AV-8B, regarded as the most dangerous aircraft in US service today, has a lifetime accident rate of only 11.44 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours. T **he F-102 claimed the lives of many pilots, including a number stationed at Ellington during Bush’s tenur** e. Of the 875 F-102A production models that entered service, **259 were lost in accidents that killed 70 Air Force and ANG pilots.** I repeat, if he wanted to avoid risk, there were other ways, and his decision to joinup was on the basis of evidence, probably motivate by wanting to fly. And what he did was pretty dangerous, probably less dangerous than many posts inside Vietnam. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/question-regarding-how-the-draft-dodging-system-worked/725586.md?page=2)