Post Vietnam guilt trips

[predfan]

I'm almost exactly the same age as our friend Rush, and I had
a 2-S deferment (student) until I lost it after flunking out
of college. This was in 1969, and I spent the next several
months 1-A. 

I was number 185 in the first year of the lottery, just on the
edge of being drafted ( my friend who was 180 was drafted in
December 1970). I'm glad I wasn't drafted, but today I often
feel guilty because I was lucky and others weren't. 

Back to Rush. I'd like to know if he feels that same guilt.
Perhaps that would explain his over the top criticism of
anyone who questions our country's involvement in this war.
Ditto for the other neocons who are gung-ho for the money a
war generates, but found a way to cover their asses when it
was their time to go. 

[Warpy]

1. Survivor guilt

I've heard that before from guys who had high lottery numbers.

The guys who went over and made it out alive have even worse survivor guilt.

Some of them have even gone back over there, just to convince themselves that the war is really over and their buddies aren't still there in hell.

Anybody who could get out of that war did get out of that war. The only shameful part lies with the ones who cheered the fact that others were going in their places, supporting a war that they were too privileged to fight.

[emanymton]

2. Welcome To DU. Why Guilt?

.
I served in Republic Of Viet Nam from 1969-1972. Two tours with a 10 month break in between. I chose to go.

You chose not to go for reasons known to you. You have nothing to feel guilty about.

Trash Lumbraghski is a snake oil salesman whose shtick is past. He says what he is paid to say. I do not bother with him or his type.
.

[Lasher]

3. Don't feel guilty.

I flunked out and was drafted 5MAY69 just before they started the lottery. To this day I resent having had 2 years of my life taken for no good reason but that feeling is certainly not directed at potential fellow victims like you. I do not wish you had shared the experience then, just as I hope no one else is drafted now.

Then there's the chickenhawks of today like Rush, who are bravely eager to sacrifice other peoples' children and other peoples' money when so many of these warmongers found ways to cower behind deferments when it was time for them to answer the call. I can not summon the words to describe the disgust I feel toward those hypocrites.

Who served?

[Glorfindel]

4. Don't feel guilty, and welcome to DU!

I tried everything short of suicide to avoid the draft, but just couldn't. At the time, I believed that if I confessed to being gay or fled to Canada, my family would disown me. I found out different later. You have no reason to feel guilty. I was in Vietnam from December 1966 to December 1967, in Nha Trang, not exactly a hardship post. As for Rush and the other chickenhawk neocons, I wish I could think they had conscience enough to feel guilt, but I don't.