re: Would you have gone to fight in Vietnam?

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Spineless politicians depend on well meaning people like you to get involved with idiotic wars like Vietnam and Iraq

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Indeed. And even more so back in the Vietnam days it was hard to get information to counter the ubiquitous USA as unerring righteous guardian of the world sentiment. Without the benefit of things like the internet it took a few years of bloody futility for people to start seeing the light.

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If you were drafted would you have followed orders and dealt with it?

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I WAS drafted. I did not get orders to go to Viet Nam. If I would have been given orders to go I most certainly would have done so.

In my second week they were teaching me how to sneak up behind someone and cut their throat. I knew it was for real at that moment. Not that I didn't know what war was or didn't know what was on the news every night. I simply realized it was no longer just on TV for me. I had some thinking to do. It didn't take long. I would go if ordered, kill if ordered and ... well, whatever. I didn't think much about death back then even though a classmate of mine had just come home in a flag covered box.

I'd do it again.

I did...

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Would you have gone to fight in Vietnam?
I am an only son. Wouldn't have been drafted.

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Me too, only son

drafted

then volunteered...

Does this mean you think the Vietnam War was a worthwhile endeavor?

The amount of dudes saying yes to this question is frightening.

The war was not fought for any justifiable reason.
Domino theory was complete bullshite, and it has been proven that the Gulf of Tonken incident was made up to drum up the support.

The politicians had no interest in winning the war, and the Vietnamese farmers did not care if they were Communist or Capitalist, they were still going to be poor rice farmers.

Why go and kill people that haven't harmed you and posed no threat to you or your country or family?

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Yes. And I stupidly would have gotten waxed in the process.

Oh to be eighteen and think you are never going to die.

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Probably the same. I don't know how my parents would have reacted if I were drafted, but I probably would have been ideological and impressionable enough to go along with at when I was 18-20. I am more likely to question it now that I'm a little older. You only get one life, and I'm not sure that war, and maybe any war, is worth throwing it away over. I'd be willing to bet that many of those veterans who we love to idolize who fought in WWII probably felt the same after experiencing those horrors. War is terrible, but young and immature people tend to romanticize it.

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The amount of dudes saying yes to this question is frightening.

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I said yes because I did join the Army and I did deploy to Iraq so I figure I probably would have done the same had I been born 30 years earlier. It's not an endorsement of the Vietnam War.

"theirs is not to reason why"

Depends. With the right connections you could have gotten deferments like Cheney, Mittens, Rove, and many other chicken Hawks. Or have an arse pimple like Limbaugh. Or a sweet National Guard gig like W. Plenty ways to dodge if you knew how.

Dad recognized that he would get sent, so stuck it out with ROTC at LSU to go in as an officer instead of cannon fodder. Spent 1969 in country. I bet it was fun.

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I'm a little older. You only get one life, and I'm not sure that war, and maybe any war, is worth throwing it away over. I'd be willing to bet that many of those veterans who we love to idolize who fought in WWII probably felt the same after experiencing those horrors. War is terrible, but young and immature people tend to romanticize it.

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Girl in my 3rd grade class was told her older brother had been KIA. Really had a profound affect on me