My wife and I began voting absentee ballots when we were in the military but continued after we retired as well. We live in a farm in rural area and the nearest polling station is almost 25 miles away. We are now in our mid-70s with physical problems that prevent us from standing in line at a polling station for very long.
Limiting absentee ballots for just the military would disenfranchise many older Americans who can't physically stand or wait in line at the polling places or even get to the polling place. Or the infirm and homebound folks. That's not fair to them.
Mail-in absentee ballots are not a risk if they have to be requested and are processed properly.
The problem with mail-in ballots is not ballot itself. It's the democRAT states than mass mailed ballots to everyone they could find in the universe and then some. And didn't process them properly. They sent multiple ballots to some people and to people who hadn't requested ballots and to dead people and to people not registered to vote, etc.
So I disagree that absentee mail-in ballots should be limited to just the military. You just assume everybody else can just "show up", which is not the case.
See comment 62 above. I think mail-in balloting needs to be severely restricted, perhaps not entirely eliminated, but we should start from a more restrictive standpoint and only make exceptions where it makes the most sense to do so. Convenience isn't really a valid reason to mail your vote in IMO. OTOH, some folks can't get out, and we'd have to deal with that.