To respect service and sacrifice, keep politics out of it
What matters is that they served their country
By Tim Wilson
In today’s hyper-political times, exacerbated by a presidential race, we’re inundated with rhetoric on any topic you can imagine. Sadly, that means candidates, pundits and even voters try to politicize subjects that probably should be off limits.
One area I would like to see exempted from this mud-slinging political discourse is military service. I acknowledge that service and sacrifice for one’s country should be recognized and admired. What I have a problem with is arguments over whose service was better. Service and sacrifice should not be viewed as part of a competition. It shouldn’t matter when, where, how, how long, or even why someone served. What matters is that they served their country.
I say this as someone who did not serve in the military and was never even subject to a military draft due to a strange quirk of birth and history.
Nearly every American man born since 1876 has had to register for a military draft. This meant those born between then and March 28, 1957, faced the possibility of being called up to serve during World War 1, World War 2, the Cold War, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. Those combined drafts applied to more than 100 million men, some of whom were eligible to be drafted for multiple wars. According to the Selective Service, in that time, more than 17 million men were drafted into the military and another 4-million-plus volunteered to serve. No matter how they got there, that is a lot of lives put on the line.
The last induction call for the Vietnam War was issued in December 1972, resulting in 646 men being drafted in 1973. At that time, men ages 18-26 were required to register for the draft. Registration was suspended April 1, 1975, by presidential proclamation.
Here is where the quirk comes in.
The requirement to register with Selective Service was reinstated in 1980, but only for men born January 1, 1960, or later. As a result, men born between March 29, 1957, and December 31, 1959, including me, were never required to register for a draft. This bizarre exemption by birth date boggles my mind.
Why didn’t they just pick up where they left off with eligibility for the Vietnam draft? Shouldn’t I and my contemporaries in that 33-month no-draft bubble have been required to face the same obligation. We walked the same high school halls at the same time as guys who had to register and in some cases were drafted. There was nothing that made us special.
Was I eager to join the military? Quite honestly, no. I had plans to go to college and start a career in journalism that I felt served my country in a different way. But those other guys who had to register, had plans of their own that they knew could be put on hold. Some of them were drafted and served. Some of them never came home.
I have friends and family members who served in the military during war and peace. When I was a kid, one of a good friend’s brothers lost his leg in Vietnam. Thankfully, Johnny came home to a loving and supportive family and community and married his high school sweetheart. Not everyone was that lucky. About the same time Johnny returned minus a limb, the playground down the street from my childhood home was named in memory of another neighborhood kid killed in Vietnam.
Growing up, most of what I learned of war came from history classes and war movies. The real people who experienced war in person tended not to talk about it. War taught as history was pretty impersonal with a focus on why wars started and the national and global implications. Movies gave you a more personal view, but while films showed people fighting and dying, the stories were mostly about the heroics, not the suffering and sacrifice.
But it was a film that gave me what felt like a real look at war experienced at a personal level. The Omaha Beach scene in “Saving Private Ryan” spared movie audiences none of the violence, brutality, carnage and fear those soldiers faced on D-Day. It was the first of a series of films and TV miniseries including “Band of Brothers,” “The Pacific,” and most recently “Masters of the Air” that make me wonder how I would have responded in the horrific circumstances depicted.
Gen. George S. Patton, a guy who knew more than a little bit about real war, once said "All men are frightened. The more intelligent they are, the more they are frightened. The courageous man is the man who forces himself, in spite of his fear, to carry on." I have no doubt I would be frightened in combat. Thus far, I have lived with the luxury of not having to find out if I could carry on.
One thing I take from watching these depictions of war on the screen is that every person who experiences war in person is a casualty of it. Not every solider, Marine, sailor or airman suffered a gruesome death or excruciatingly painful wounds. But it seems they all must leave a part of themselves behind and are forever changed, some coming home with invisible wounds that never heal.
In his song “Goodnight Saigon,” about the experience of soldiers in Vietnam, Billy Joel captures that in his lyrics. He also touches on how on a battlefield, it’s not likely anyone is thinking deeply about military strategy, tactics or the reason they are there.
Remember Charlie, remember Baker
They left their childhood on every acre
And who was wrong? And who was right?
It didn't matter in the thick of the fight
While we may seek to understand from books, movies and music, those of us who never served can just imagine what war is like and what our veterans went through. Only they truly know.
On Veterans Day and every day, remember that it is not important whether they volunteered or were drafted. What matters is that they served. Whether or not they saw combat, they were in line to put their lives on the line. That doesn’t make them better than someone who didn’t. What it makes them is deserving of the respect and care they earned.
About the author: Tim Wilson is a lifelong resident of Massachusetts. He is passionate about his family, Marquette University, bicycling and all Boston sports.