The UK has not had conscription or selective service since 1939!
The US maintains a system and used a lottery (”the draft”) in the 60s and 70s.
Well before my time ...
I don’t think that’s true....IIRC they had it even into the 1950s.
“In the United Kingdom, military conscription has existed for two periods in modern times. The first was from 1916 to 1920, and the second from 1939 to 1960. The last conscripted soldiers left the service in 1963.”
Conscription in the United Kingdom
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_the_United_Kingdom#:~:text=After%201945,-National%20Service%20(1939&text=National%20Service%20as%20peacetime%20conscription,reserve%20list%20for%20four%20years.
The draft was a routine part of American life and was continuous from 1940 through 1973.
Enlisting for military service used to be a normal part of growing up for American males and there was also a certain percentage who put off enlisting and got chosen for the draft, or who couldn’t make up their minds about serving or not serving and just let the randomness of the draft make the decision for them.
Hardly. Conscription continued throughout WW2 and thereafter, as 2-year 'National Service' for 18-year-olds till 1961, the last conscript leaving in 1963. I missed it by a year, so that at University I had the curious experience of guys starting a year after me who were two years older than I was.
Many of the British troops killed in the Korean War were National Service conscripts.