I am all for universal service - including my children - but military service should be something only for the select among them and infantry combat strictly for the young men capable of its rigors. In other words, any draftees who volunteer for infantry military service should have to pass a rigorous selection process. Combat doesn’t favor randomness.
In Vietnam, the average time for a Marine to be wounded or killed was a month and a half. Very few frontline grunts made it all the way to thirteen months and every grunt I knew had at least one Purple Heart. We were well-selected and in majority, talented. It was a true meat grinder.
Not a place for the untalented or unwilling.
Probably a pretty close average for Army also. I was in country 7 months and joined a line unit just over 3 months in. Got my WIA just a little over 3 months Feb to May 68 chasing Tet remnants around the country. But averages can be skewed at times, had a new Platoon Sgt. join mid April and he was KIA first week of May so he lasted all of about 3 weeks. I know the Marine field retention average during Tet was horrible, but look at the meatgrinder they ended up getting fed to and the lengthy battles involved.
Down South, after the first 4-5 days of Feb 68 Tet we pretty well ended up in continuous air mobile insertions to interdict the enemy units trying to withdraw back over to Cambodia and not in a protracted urban fight like Marines at Hue.