Conv-The Draft

From: Steve Sevits

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I'm not so sure, MASH came from a book (1968) and the tv series dates from 1970 while Vietnam was still raging. No doubt some of the episodes may have come from Vietnam experiences, but I'm disinclined to believe the show was Vietnam based, it makes more sense that the basis was Korea.
Steve
M*A*S*H (an acronym for Mobile Army Surgical Hospital) is an American war comedy-drama television series that aired on CBS from 1972 to 1983. It was developed by Larry Gelbart, adapted from the 1970 feature film M*A*S*H, which, in turn, was based on Richard Hooker's 1968 novel MASH: A Novel About Three Army Doctors. The series, which was produced with 20th Century Fox Television for CBS, follows a team of doctors and support staff stationed at the "4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital" in Uijeongbu, South Korea, during the Korean War (1950–53). The show's title sequence features an instrumental-only version of "Suicide Is Painless", the original film's theme song. The show was created after an attempt to film the original book's sequel, M*A*S*H Goes to Maine, failed. The television series is the best-known of the M*A*S*H works, and one of the highest-rated shows in US television history..

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I remember that Dick. In fact, I remember that it was you who sent his pic around recently!

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: January 16, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Jerry,
Very smart of your initiative. Having served almost always in tri-service units, Marines had it toughest, Navy promoted on basis to test results and “needs of the service.” Air Force was slowest promotions. If you were in a unit with few personnel, you could never be included when an order came to promote a certain percent of personnel in the unit. Similar in the Army. One man with me in MI was transferred across the lot to another unit to be in a higher slot and promoted. The Army finally stopped requiring personnel to be serving in a higher slot to get promoted to that rank. You were promoted on a service wide basis and moved to a slot. And does anyone remember the “blood stripe"?
I served on a ship with a guy who was drafted in 1955. A man went down the line of draftees and picked him and some others to get out of line. He found out he was going into the Navy. He was a civilian electrician, so he was made an Electrician’s Mate (EM) and couldn't go to “A” school because he would only be in for 2 years. No way would he extend for school.
Another practice at the time for the Navy. If you didn’t make Third Class (E-4) within 2 years you could get an honorable discharge or change rate if you desired. One Third Class said if he had known that, he would have failed the EM test to get assigned another rate and go to another school. In those days the promotion percentage was 76 - 100% for EMs who passed promotion tests and all but one of them on my ship made First Class (E6) within the four year enlistment. I saw many Chiefs (E7) with one hash mark, meaning 4 years but less than 8 years.
Enough nostalgia.

Frank R

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Frank, I missed the previous comments about this subject so forgive me if I am repeating what has already been discussed. I have always been interested in Vietnam veterans who either were famous when they were in Vietnam or became famous afterwards. Of course, film maker/actor/writer Dale Dye, who is chapter one in my book "Vietnam Bao Chi" comes immediately to mind. As does Oliver Stone, who first taught English to Chinese/Vietnamese as a civilian and then served with the 25th ID. I'm also aware that Dallas Cowboy Roger Staubach served in-country in the Navy, as did soldier/Pittsburgh Steeler Rocky Bleier, who left part of his foot on the battlefield there. Actor Glenn Ford, then USNR, spent time in Vietnam and I read somewhere that actor Raymond Burr spent a degree of time with the troops. Whether that was as part of the USO or not, I'm not sure. John Steinbeck, of course, reported on the war as a favor to his friend LBJ, and, I believe two of his sons served in uniform there, John Steinbeck IV having served at AFVN as was recently brought up.

Marc

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft
Re Previous mention of being drafted or serving with draftees. I recently saw “What’s My Line” from the early 50s and the Korean War and saw Eddie Fisher and Vic Damon as guests in their Army uniforms. In the draft days many “celebrities” served in the military. Country Singer Faron Young was at Third Army HQ Ft McPherson, GA where he sang for the troops at morning muster. He also sang during recorded promotions to be mailed out and aired on radio stations. The SSG who relieved me at AFKN Pusan said Fisher told him he should have stayed in the Army. This was related to his marital situation later with Debbie Reynolds & Liz Taylor. The first question males were asked when applying for a job during the days of the draft was, “How do you stand with the draft?” I was, even though I was already a National Guard and Navy Veteran.

FrankR

From: Steve Sevits

Dated: January 12,2019

Subject: The Draft

At the risk of repeating myself, the Army never was aware of how much good three years in uniform did me – if they had been aware, I would have wound up paying them. Although not particularly willing, once drafted I opted for the third year which enabled me to travel to both Asia and Europe. Three years, starting at $78/month also taught me frugality, a lesson which has stayed with me as a lifelong lesson. Then there were many friends I made who I would never have met otherwise, and my first house which came with a 30 year GI mortgage, complete with two tenants who carried most of the expense of the mortgage, taxes and maintenance. That house is long in our past, but in the future a couple of six foot plots are guaranteed us in a well manicured national cemetery which yet await us in the future, real estate compliments of the Army. It seems the benefits just keep on coming although I parted with the Army over half a century ago. If asked I would have not so politely declined the invitation, but I was not asked, the “Greetings” letter was not an invitation but a summons, a summons which has yielded untold benefits lasting a lifetime. While the draft is not popular with many, it is a leveling agent, it offers an opportunity for personal growth, travel and in later years a source of personal pride in ones self. From my prospective, the draft is a positive experience. I say bring it back and provide the many positive aspects I’ve been given to others who may not realize the good aspects which came from a term in the military can provide. Steve

From: Jerry Nelson

Dated: January 16, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I was drafted in August of 1969. I was married with a pregnant wife which would have normally kept me out, however, I had taken a college deferment and then dropped out after a year. At that time if you had taken that deferment you were pretty much stuck with it.
Periodically in 1969 some draftees were taken into the Marine Corps which leads to my next story. I was drafted with about 50 others from my county and we were bused to Indianapolis to process into the military. The line of draftees were doing the station to station processing which was probably customary in all the processing centers.
At one of the stations I was told to sit down on a bench next to another guy. I watched apprehensively as everybody else that I had come with was directed to the next station. Finally the draftee sitting next to me on the bench asked me where I was going. "I don't know," I said, "Where are you going? With a somewhat frightened look in his eyes he replied, "Paris Island I guess." I immediately stood and headed for the next processing station.
As things turned out my son was born 12 days after I was assigned to AFVN. Things sometimes have a way of working themselves out. Although I didn't realize it at the time, that 14 month tour at AFVN was one of the greatest experiences of my life.

Jerry Nelson

From: Steve Sevits

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

At the risk of repeating myself, the Army never was aware of how much good three years in uniform did me – if they had been aware, I would have wound up paying them. Although not particularly willing, once drafted I opted for the third year which enabled me to travel to both Asia and Europe. Three years, starting at $78/month also taught me frugality, a lesson which has stayed with me as a lifelong lesson. Then there were many friends I made who I would never have met otherwise, and my first house which came with a 30 year GI mortgage, complete with two tenants who carried most of the expense of the mortgage, taxes and maintenance. That house is long in our past, but in the future a couple of six foot plots are guaranteed us in a well manicured national cemetery which yet await us in the future, real estate compliments of the Army. It seems the benefits just keep on coming although I parted with the Army over half a century ago. If asked I would have not so politely declined the invitation, but I was not asked, the “Greetings” letter was not an invitation but a summons, a summons which has yielded untold benefits lasting a lifetime. While the draft is not popular with many, it is a leveling agent, it offers an opportunity for personal growth, travel and in later years a source of personal pride in ones self. From my prospective, the draft is a positive experience. I say bring it back and provide the many positive aspects I’ve been given to others who may not realize the good aspects which came from a term in the military can provide.

Steve

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 13, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I don’t doubt it Steve. Though Remember, Vietnam was by then Unpopular back home and a tabu subject in Hollywood until The Deer Hunter, with all its faults (DeNiro as a Green Beret officer wearing enlisted man’s brass and sporting a goatee) came along.

From: Bob Wilford

Dated: February 6, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I enlisted in the Marines in 1967, going active in June. I met three guys who were Army draftees on the train to Des Moines for processing . We were together at all stations in t he induction center and became friends. They never failed do give me a hard time for picking the Corps and certain death in Viet Nam, while they had the safety of numbers and probably would not see actual combat. At the final station where we take the oath and step across the red line on the floor the officer who was swearing us in reminded all of us that we were in the Marine Corps the minute we took the oath. One of the draftees quickly spoke up that he was in the Army. Correction, said the Captain; the Marine Corps reinstituted the draft this morning and you’re not Army; you’ve just been drafted into the Marine Corps. It was a real quiet trip to San Diego for boot camp…

From: Ron Turner

Dated: January 13, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Steve, I didn't mean to imply that "Mash" was Vietnam War based, but that it was draft based - most of the characters were drafted. Regards,

Ron

From: Dick Ellis

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Frank,

Marc...Thom Steinbeck replaced me in September 1968....took over production of the weather girl and other stuff.

Dickie

From: Dick Ellis

Dated: April 26, 2018

Subject: This Breaks Your Heart

But over the past five years, leaders in operational units have said they want to see new soldiers arrive at their first unit assignment displaying more discipline. In surveys of thousands of leaders across the Army, trends emerged of soldiers arriving at first units with a sloppy appearance, poor work ethic and a sense of entitlement, Army Initial Entry Training officials maintain.

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 13, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Ron, That was my implication, but Steve showed me that was probably off on that. I was just going with what I'd been told by someone who worked in Hollywood and the fact that two friends who had been in Vietnam brought their stories to producers and their stories were used. One was from my former internist who recalls a CG at his base, because of a craving for pineapple-grapefruit juice, which was apparently unavailable, ordering a C-130 to fly all the way to Japan to pick some up for him! Marc

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

That’s right! I remember now Frank. They’ve split the 818 as well. Parts of the San Fernando Valley are now 747. I just had a flashback to 1990, when I was on assignment for the National Catholic Register doing a piece on the state of the Catholic faith in Laos. My hotel room in Vientiane had a French era phone and one could dial anywhere in the country with four numbers!!

AFVN Group Conversations

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Frank,

Where are you in SoCal? Forgive me if I asked you that when I interviewed you for your chapter in my still progressing book on AFVN. Burbank here.

Marc

From: Steve Pennington

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Another aspect from that era, is when I left active duty after Vietnam and joined the reserve (staying for 28 years) and went to college. My unit was about half draft dodgers and half Vietnam guys. Our Company Clerk was a PhD candidate, and our Personnel Clerk was an Ed D candidate. Our CO had a History degree Cum Laude. All of the Platoon Leaders were high school grads and OCS commissioned. None of the command staff had seen combat, but we had 2 E 5s with Silver Star Medals, a few with PHMs, CIBs and BSMs. At chow, when the combat guys talked everyone else listened. It really was an eclectic group, but a rich tapestry of citizen soldiers.

SLP

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I am in San Diego presently. "Back to Bataan” soon. I should have mentioned after "rainy weekend SouCal” that the sun would be shortly making its usual arrival, and it is here, although there has been snow in the mountain area, such as Mt Laguna. Big rig off one road.
I note your 818 area code. I am 858. When will clearer heads make phone numbers 8 digits after the area code so they don’t keep adding areas. SD already split and now has “overlay” where you have to dial USA “1” for next door.
FrankR

The Draft

(This conversation was proceeded by one on "The Army is Trying.")

April 2018 and January 2019

From: Ron Turner

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

As a career soldier spending half my time, more or less, in a draft Army I cannot help but have some thoughts and observations. As a generalization the draft was a substantial social good and made for an overall better Army. I'll start with "social good": yes, it had a leveling effect and it had a broadening effect. In the case of the latter, it took kids out of the barrio, greatly diminished their ties to social organizations which demand tight adherence and, in many cases, broke the ties so thoroughly that they only come back to the barrio (or other locations) occasionally to visit their parents with their newly acquired and often ethnically different families. To a substantial degree adverse stereotypes are often shattered by the draft experience. If you missed my point, the draft makes cohesive gangs less viable. Military good: leaders that wish to advance are de facto forced into following the rules by the draft in that they do not know if any of the draftees in their command have a family relationship with the highly placed in our government or society. Even if not, the draftee is not nearly as intimidated by military leadership as is the career soldier. Given the relatively small size of congressional districts, it is a rare command that does not have several "friends or relatives" of congressmen in its draftee repertoire. This keeps leaders "honest" and keeps the worst (i.e., the near terminally stupid) from rising too high. An all volunteer Army is to a fair degree mindlessly compliant. Draftees furnished needed and healthy dissent; they also furnished enlisted lawyers, enlisted engineers and other enlisted scientific and technical personnel. The military could not hope to employ so many highly skilled folks. More than once I had EEs working for me and it was great. Army regulations strongly prohibited wasteful use of these classified scientific and technical personnel. Overall, the incredibly broad base of the draft made available to the leadership a broad spectrum of skills and experience - in short a better Army. Perhaps most important in the skills area, the separate medical draft provided as many "docs" as needed and provided those "docs" with experiences not duplicable outside the military (e.g., traveling on a line between a cruiser and destroyer on rough seas to render medical care). From time to time pampered psychiatrists would be reminded they are in fact docs when they had to pull duty in an ER! And more lightly, without the draft we wouldn't have had God knows how many wonderful seasons of "MASH".

Regards, Ron

Low Recruit Discipline Prompts Army to Redesign Basic Training

From Military.com

[Received from Jim White]

From: Jim White

Dated: January 15, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Hi,
Might as well add my draft experiences as well as those of some past friends.
To be honest, I don't remember if I registered for the draft or not--but it is possible that I didn't. One had to register for the draft a age 17 or so? That is something else I don't remember. I joined the Army Reserves on my 17th birthday and went on active duty two days after my 19th birthday so I could well have thought "I don't need to register." While stationed in Japan sometime during my 9th or 10th year of active duty, my command got a letter from my hometown draft board asking about my status. This is another reason I think I might not have registered properly. Either way, the Personnel Section got a big laugh out of the letter and then replied that I had been on active duty for "X number of years." I guess that satisfied the draft board because I haven't heard anything since.
The two friends:
One of them was born in 1932 in Japan of Missionary parents. They returned to the US when he was in junior high school. After finishing high school he was fully eligible for the Korean War draft, but before "they got him," he was back in Kyoto as a missionary. He said that during that time, he was only young American male around who wasn't in
uniform. He returned to the US four years later and his draft board called him in for an interview regarding his status. While he had never been in the US military in any way, shape or form, when he told them that he had spent four years as a missionary in Japan, the reply "Well, you served your time, so we hereby make your status 'draft exempt.'"
The other was born in 1922 and was fully eligible for the draft at the beginning of World War II. However, while in high school he had been nominated by one of his state's senators for admission to the Naval Academy. That made him exempt from the draft He didn't actually get into the academy until perhaps 1944. He said that made him about the only single young man around in his home town! He went through a shortened, 3-year program at the Academy and graduated in 1947. (He was a classmate with and knew Jimmy Carter.) However, the war was over and the Navy didn't need so many new graduates so he was given the choice of either going on active duty or getting out. He decided to get out, went back to college to get a degree in education and taught at the Hollywood High School and then the Santa Catalina High School until around 1970 when he decided to come to Japan and teach English as a Foreign Language. He was a lucky man, got a good education from the Navy but never served--and in addition, was famous for being the best dancer in his class.
Just a couple of possibly interesting stories.
Jim W
PS: Another lucky friend.... He had gone into the Army in 1938 or 1939 and was stationed in Honolulu when the Japanese attacked December 7th, 1941. He played football for his company or battalion or whatever team or and had broken a leg during a game about a week earlier. He spent the attack in the Army Hospital with his leg in a sling. He couldn't even try to crawl under the bed. But, after the attack, he was returned to the US as a noncombatant and spent the rest of World War Two manning an antiaircraft gun in the LA area.

From: Marc Yablonka

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

RE: M*A*S*H: It’s been said out here in L.A. that the M*A*S*H series had a Korean War back drop, but it was really Vietnam. I’m told that producers, in fact, sought out Vietnam vets for stories. I personally know two Vietnam vets whose stories made it to the screen.

From: Frank Rogers

Dated: January 12, 2019

Subject: The Draft

Steve, Marc, others; I would like to see the draft as not just for the military, but a broader form of “national service” for men and women. Have people serve in whatever field they desire .. teaching, maintenance, engineering, road building, highway maintenance, forestry, child or elder care .. anything to meet the needs of the nation. The only problem would be backlash from unions that their jobs were being taken and given to low-wagers. And I note today’s report that “blue flu” call in sick means more closures. Government employees should be barred from striking. Remember Reagan and PATCO?

FrankR in rainy weekend SouCal.

From: Ron Turner

Dated: January 13, 2019

Subject: The Draft

I probably should have mentioned: a very important aspect of the draft was that it created an electorate that was reasonably well-informed about arguably the most important part of our government: the military. A former draftee is likely to have a realistic view of the military services or at least the one he was a member of. For example: a non-Vietnam veteran is likely to have a overly high impression of a Vietnam veteran who has the BSM; a Vietnam veteran being aware that most were given for service, not valor, might be able to make a more realistic assessment of the award.

Regards, Ron

From: Ken Kalish

Dated: February 9, 2019

Subject: Go Army.......Well not so much

I don’t know if they still have the DPPO/DPO program in the Navy, but I’ll bet the Army could do better with its goals by offering something similar. The DPPO program accepted applicants with skills the Navy needed, much as the Army is looking for computer people, and after completing boot camp the applicants were moved up to pay grades of E-4 and above. The DPO program puts applicants through OCS, then moves them into officer billets. The most common of these is nurses and doctors, but legal folks were also often solicited.
Sure, enlisted bonuses are a great draw, but the stumbling block there has always been that “needs of the service” gotcha. Yes, we know you signed up to be a professional ant hunter, but we don’t need any of those right now so you can go infantry, and there’s no infantry bonus today.
Ken Kalish