General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsQuestion about draftees in Vietnam War. Would a man who had very poor vision be sent
out in the jungles to fight?
For that matter, how about the same disability, very poor vision, in WWII?
DemocratSinceBirth
(99,710 posts)Brother Buzz
(36,423 posts)and was classified for limited service only, which excluded him from serving overseas. He helped load the troops carrier ships in San Francisco before he landed the Hollywood propaganda gig.
pnwmom
(108,977 posts)So he wasn't allowed to join the Air Force during WW2, and died in the Army instead.
The services probably had different standards for different wars, depending on how many people they needed.
loyalsister
(13,390 posts)But many disabled civil war soldiers were part of the Invalid Corps.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veteran_Reserve_Corps
comradebillyboy
(10,144 posts)the draft. The Army did provide vision care and would get you prescription glasses.
lpbk2713
(42,757 posts)He told us when they needed troops badly they made the men with bad vision machine gunners. On the theory if they kept shooting in the general direction they were bound to hit something. I'm sure there must have been a line drawn where some test results were entirely unacceptable.
MFM008
(19,808 posts)For the American embassy in Saigon. He would have been there in Jan 1968 when the Vietcong attempted to take it over during the TET offensive .
His teeth got him out of that duty.
They were bad. Impacted. Gum problems.
He was raised in a poor family.
Same for my mom.
The both lost every tooth in their heads.
My mom when she was 17 in the Army.
So bad eyes might have kept you out
Of Vietnam.
marybourg
(12,631 posts)eyesight was accepted into the Army, but given admin jobs.
Kaleva
(36,298 posts)But served stateside as POW camp guard .
sinkingfeeling
(51,454 posts)left-of-center2012
(34,195 posts)GreenPartyVoter
(72,377 posts)that very reason.
Brother Buzz
(36,423 posts)GreenPartyVoter
(72,377 posts)get any further confirmation on that as he's gone now. : (
Lee-Lee
(6,324 posts)Is it correctable with glasses? If so how much is it corrected and how bad is it without.
Certain MOS's have tighter standards for vision than others as well, and being colorblind can limit your selection of MOS's or bar enlistenent depending on how bad it is.
So the answer is a big... it depends.
Do you have someone claiming to be a vet who you question or is this just a philosophical question?
raccoon
(31,110 posts)Hekate
(90,674 posts)But you'd have to ask the military directly.
My father was like that, and apparently it was a dominant gene, because 3 out of his 4 kids inherited severe myopia. To my surprise, I may have been the least affected, because my "good eye" was about 500/20 and my "bad eye" was nearly 1000/20. I don't remember the figures for the astigmatism, but it was also bad. I bought myself (hard) contacts at age 21 and had LASIK at about 60, when the technology advanced enough to handle eyes like mine.
Dad memorized the eye chart to get into the service after Pearl Harbor, but he was put to work as an aircraft mechanic, not sent to fight directly.
My brother got deferred from Vietnam because of a double hernia, so I guess the issue of his horrible eyesight never came up.
MyOwnPeace
(16,926 posts)was the numbers that each draft board from each district/county needed to provide per quota. If you were in a well-populated area you had a better chance of not serving based on just about any deferment. However, if you were from a small area/district that had to fill their quota you had a better chance of being selected.
Then, in 1969, the draft instituted a lottery and whatever number you drew determined how soon you needed to report.
This all relates to actually being drafted and the offer of a deferment - what happened regarding placement once in the system - sorry, don't have any information regarding any of that.
retread
(3,762 posts)steps to get here. You're in!"
KWR65
(1,098 posts)hunter
(38,311 posts)As kids me and my siblings knew they were not fashionable glasses. His students surely knew it too, but it was trademark by then.
My dad might have have been a Radar O'Reilly clerk had he been sent to Korea. He wasn't.
My dad was bouncing around like a little kid after his cataract surgeries, when his cloudy and nearsighted natural lenses were replaced with bionic plastic. He no longer had to fumble around for his glasses when he got out of bed, and he now drives without glasses.
My dad's dad was an Army Air Corps officer in World War II. My grandpa wanted to fly, to be the brave and handsome pilot who made women swoon, but he was older, experienced, and the Army in its wisdom decided to keep him safely on the ground, mostly. At times he even had an enlisted driver and a big black car at his call.
My grandpa was a first class airplane and rocket science nerd, a steely eyed missile man, but he was also a first class klutz who couldn't be relied upon to safely pilot a bicycle across campus, or carry a cup of hot coffee across the room, let alone fly an airplane.
I rode with my grandpa in cars, and saw him ride bicycles a few times, and he was clearly a danger to himself and others. Yet he was completely oblivious to his own klutziness. Me and my siblings were much more comfortable when my grandma was driving.
leftyladyfrommo
(18,868 posts)If he lost his glasses he couldn't see anything.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)(legally blind except for being correctable) I was rated 1Y (I think that's what it was at the time) for eyesight and slightly high blood pressure. It was later changed to 4F. Neither was bad enough to get me out by itself, but together it was enough to keep me from induction.
At least that's the way I recall it from almost 50 years ago.