During the war in Vietnam, were draftees treated differently from enlisted personnel?


 When I was drafted in 1969 and went to Basic, draftees (US) and Regular Army (RA) enlisted were treated completely the same. But the DIs knew exactly who we were. When the draft lottery came out late in Basic, I and some others had really high numbers.


The DIs called us out in front of the Platoon. Y’all got super high lottery numbers. That means if you could have stuck it out for one more month as a civilian, YOU WOULDN’T EVEN BE HERE. NOW GET ON DOWN AND KNOCK OUT 50. AND YOU BETTER SOUND OFF!!


After that moment of fun in the sun, they went right back to treating RAs and USs exactly the same until the end of Basic

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