Bill Clinton Letter To Holmes

Many people in the 1960s and early 1970s did not understand why the United States was involved in the Vietnam War. Therefore, they had no desire to be a part of it. The Selective Service System, which was used to conduct the draft, had aspirations of directing people into areas where they were most needed during wartime. However, people took advantage of the draft system’s deferment policies to avoid going to war. Others refused induction or simply did not register. There were also people who left the country to escape the draft. The Vietnam War proved to be an event that many Americans did not agree with, and as a result, citizens took action to elude the draft entirely or to beat the draft system.

Tim O’Brien’s moral dilemma arose when the draft notice arrived. Upon the arrival of his draft notice, he believed that the government picked the wrong person, as he was not fit for the war. Through his details of his job

On August 7th 1964 the United States Congress passed into law the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution which, for all intents and purposes, officially brought the United States into the Vietnam War. Following this resolution, a draft was instated to increase the number of men that could be sent to war. Shortly after men started to be signed into conscription for the United States Military, a public outcry started over the use of a draft to increase military size. The draft was found to be unfair to American Citizens because certain groups of men were severely disadvantaged, the draft was illegal in many ways, and veteran’s future lives were harmed, among other reasons.

Few Americans that were drafted, however, did attend their injunction. Thomas Yager, Robert Laufer, Mark Gallops, PhD’s in psychiatry, confirmed that men who did attend, experienced several behavioral and emotional problems. Of these that attended, behavioral and emotional problems produced in the men who fought, usually went AWOL (absent without leave) and escaped to Canada through underground railroad tunnels whom were helped by anti-war supporters. Multitudinous amounts of young men attended college to avoid the draft; college students building their future were not permitted to be drafted in the war. Damien de Walque, a Senior Economist in the Development Research Group, believes that, “During the Vietnam War, college attendance provided a strategy to avoid the draft in the 1960’s.” As a result, families that could not afford college, were drafted into the war. College campuses became a crucible for anti-war protests. Students actualized protests against an unjust war at numerous college campuses, conceiving extreme amounts of tension across the nation. Kent State University is the most known anti-war protest college where students set fire to the ROTC building. Several students were killed, even those not involved in the protest. As protests increased, populous amounts of Americans had new judgement to evade the draft. Draft resistance became a day to day thing accumulating the struggle for war to be

Through the ideals escaping from a draft or deserting the war, then came the idea of injustice within the war. While at Fort Lewis, O’Brien

In 1969, about 1.75 million college students were deferred, more than 22 times the number in 1951, during the Korean War. During the Vietnam War, a high school graduate was twice as likely to be drafted and twice as likely to go to Vietnam as a contemporary who had finished college. (Bacevich

Tim O’Brien was born in Austin, Minnesota on October 1, 1946 (Glerean). He spent his childhood growing up in Worthington, Minnesota. Worthington is a small town in the southern part of Minnesota. Tim’s father was an insurance salesman and participated in World War II as a sailor (Glerean). Tim’s mother was an elementary school teacher. Tim had an all-American childhood. He loved learning magic tricks, playing baseball, and reading books. He attended Macalester College and graduated in 1968 with a degree in political science (Tim O’Brien). Around the same time he received his diploma, Tim also received an unexpected and unwanted piece of paper: a draft notice (Glerean). O’Brien was against war, but despite this fact he went overseas to fight for America. He felt pressure from both his family and his country to fight in the war. O’Brien went to Vietnam despite his negative attitude toward the conflict. O’Brien fought in the Vietnam War from, 1969 to 1970. “He served in the 3rd Platoon; Company A, 5th Battalion, 46th Infantry

In a nation with a rich history of racism and inequality projected towards minority groups, many minorities were opposed to serving in any capacity during the Civil War. There were a few, however, that maintained an openness to the idea of aiding the Northern Union’s cause. Their willingness to fight for a shared dream, though, was not enough to put them on the frontlines. In fact, many willing African Americans were not permitted to join the ranks solely due to the color of their skin. This in and of itself was a discouraging reality for many African Americans of the time. The common question rang out: If they could not be accepted even as a soldier, how could they possibly be accepted as anything more later on? Advocate Alfred M. Green, however, had a different outlook. In short, Green decided that it was too soon to be giving up on the future. In his speech delivered to African Americans in Philadelphia, he hopes to inspire many to maintain their passion and join the Union forces. Primarily through emotional and logical appeal, Green constructs a persuasive case enticing many African Americans to continue fighting for the opportunity to join the Union army.

Jimmy Cross, a college student, is carrying a great burden being the lieutenant of his group of soldiers. A chapter from The Things They Carried titled “In the Field” states, “Jimmy Cross did not want the responsibility of leading these men. He had never wanted it … he had signed up for the Reserve Officer Training Corps … because it seemed preferable to letting the draft take him” (160). The use of the word “never” to describe Cross’s want for being a lieutenant displays that at no point in his life had he ever desired to lead a band of men in the war. Even though Cross in no way wanted to direct this group of men, it seemed like a better option than being drafted in the war. To him, being drafted in the war sounded even less desirable than

In Burke Salsi’s personnel essay, “Bad News” he tells his story about how he was cheated out by the government in the draft. Burke had everything going for him, college and a football star and with these titles he should have been deferred but was not. The essay “Bad News” was made for a reason and it uses a large amount of pathos with a narrow eyed view on the subject of being drafted.

Not every man who 's fought in a war planned on doing so. In fact, not all of them even want to. It 's rare to find enough people voluntarily willing to lay down their lives for their country, so more often than not militaries used what we would call “citizen soldiers.” Citizen soldiers are exactly what they sound like, regular citizens taken from society and turned into people capable of serving in the military. Although it may seem obvious when plainly written out, citizen soldiers had vastly different experiences compared to career soldiers, and Stephen Ambrose attempted to pin down that specific experience in his book Citizen Soldier. Ambrose uses oral interviews from World War II veterans and other materials to explain the experiences of the common American soldier who served in WWII between D-Day and the eventual surrender of the German forces. However, when examining his book, it 's important to ask how successful Ambrose was in painting an accurate picture of this kind of soldier 's life during his service. Is the information he uses specific to the men who served in Europe, or can it also be linked back to the soldiers in the Pacific? This paper will evaluate his work by comparing it to oral interviews from WWII veterans both from the same areas that Ambrose 's veterans serve in and in locations not included in his work.

Page 120-121 “...the young man would not have wanted to be a soldier...try not to grow up too fast.”

Throughout human history, war has permeated the lives of billions of people. From early conflicts such as conquests to control vast swaths of land by Alexander the Great and Cyrus the Great to modern, global wars such as the World Wars, the concept of war has been at the forefront of humanity’s mind for centuries. However, in recent years, opposition to war and lack of participation in the military has become a common theme in many countries, including the United States. To help alleviate the troubles caused by lack of participation, the United States instituted a law allowing for the conscription of its citizens. Conscription, which can also be referred to as a draft, is defined as the compulsory drafting of citizens into military service (What). The Draft has been utilized throughout US History in a couple of prominent wars; however, opposition has manifested against the Vietnam War and the draft, rightfully stemming from ethical opposition to the war and hatred for what the war and the draft stood for.

Entry into the war would transform the problem of sexually transmitted disease into a national issue of the first magnitude, requiring a centrally conceived program”(Brandt 133). The progressives also worried about lewd behaviors projecting a negative American image on an international level. It became clear to the progressives that wartime efforts would be needed to ensure military efficiency and health. On April 17, 1917, eleven days after the declaration of war, the Commission on Training Camp Activities, or CTCA, was formed with Fosdick at the helm.

“Men joined the Marine Corps for many reasons . . . I’d joined up to dodge the draft and ended up being sent to war” (Brady 8-9). This brief yet poignant statement begins the story of how James Brady ended up serving in the Korean War. As a young adult the draft was being reinstated and Brady did not feel the desire to fight in a war. He and a few of his friends decided instead to join the Platoon Leaders Class with the Marines, which had students spend two summers at the marine Corps Schools in Quantico, Virginia. After these two summers, graduates would become Lieutenants, but they could not be drafted. Shortly after Brady graduated, the war began in Korea and his class learned they