Quick Heads Up: Did I Hear Right? Hackworth Called Cheney a Draft Dodger?

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

My ears might have deceived me. Did I hear correctly on the Sean Hannity Show? Did Hackworth call Cheney a draft dodger?

[DietCoke]

>>>Maybe that guy ross perot had as his vice pres canidate, what was his name? General something... >>>

Oh gawd. That was painful to watch.

[constable tom]

"As the top Pentagon official, the SecDef is, practically speaking, in the military."

Woah, there, pardner. The Secretary of Defense is definitely a civilian position. I am not of the mindset that says our civilian leaders must personally have military service under their belts before they can make the political decision of whether or not to employ military force. I do, however, think those leaders need to at least not have a hostile attitude toward and low opinion of military personnel, which was one of many major beefs I had our former POTUS.

But this is a lot like pregnancy: there is no "practically speaking" about it. You either served in the military or you didn't. Period. (There is also a legitimate distinction to be made between those who saw action in combat and those who did not - I did not, BTW).

[TheErnFormerlyKnownAsBig]

What's the definition of a draft dodger? Someone who had a medical waiver, college deferrments (what a crock that was and it should never occur again), running off to another country?

I don't call those that had a medical or college deferrment dodgers in the true sense of the word unless they were taking meds to up their blood pressure or something.

I guess by some folks standards my dad joining the Air Force in hopes of not getting drafted and sent to Vietnam (the family story is his draft notice came the day he said "I swear/affirm) as an infantryman.

The plan worked as he was assigned to work on a Fighter/Interceptor which didn't have a mission in Vietnam. But that's just luck and hard work (his high marks at every school he went to got him the chance to pick his training and I pretty sure it was no chance that he didn't pick a radar used on a type of plane that saw service in Vietnam) in his schools.

[Dave S]

Maybe he has a book coming out and deep down, he has a fear of success.

He does have a new book out, "Steal My Soldiers Heart" or something like that. He did 60 minute interview with local radio program here in St. Louis this afternoon.

He's ticked off at those who favor war with Iraq. This afternoon he wanted to put Gingrich and Wolfowitz in hot room at CDC to test effectiveness of new germ warfare suits against Small Pox, Anthrax and other agents under combat conditions. He was ticked at them because they had never served. Imagine he's got the same gripe with Cheney.

[Republic of Texas]

Who would you rather have controlling our military TODAY?

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

Deferment and draft. In Vietnam, we had a noble goal, but it didn't have the dire urgency of WWII. Your father didn't have a deferment because our backs were to the wall.

That wasn't the case in Vietnam. In Vietnam, we were slowing down communist aggression. Every year you guys kept them down, God knows how many civiliain lives you saved all over the world. And God knows how much land they would have taken if you guys weren't there. Reagan might have faced a communist Mexico. It was important. But there wasn't the need to risk fathers there.

Further, in WWII, we weren't well prepared. Your father was flying in what could later be called an antique. We needed more warm bodies to make up for lack of preparation. In Vietnam, we had better quality weapons, and thus, we could allow the cry babies to run home. That is the cost of a high tech military, the cry babies aren't worth messing with. If you consider Cheney to be that, I certainly don't blame you.

I hope your father made it home safely. If he didn't, you can thank anti-military doves prior to WWII. It's generally the war hawks who keep the fathers home.

[constable tom]

had our = had with our

[Hot Tabasco]

That is your opinion. My opinion is that those who were patriots did serve. My father served in WWII. My grandfather served in WWI, and I served in my own time. That's what one does when the nation is at war. I have my opinion of those who do not, yet who claim the right to send young men to battle.

BFD! My grandfather also served in WWI, my dad served in WWII as a marine, graduated from MSU in 49 and entered re-entered the Army as a 2nd Lt and served in Germany in the MP. I in turn enlisted in the Army in 69, served until 72 then went my merry way!

So as far as I am concerned, I have just as much right to cast judgment on those who did not serve as you do and quite frankly, I don't have the moral justification to do it! Neither do you!

But if you think you do, then you have just called my mother, my aunt, my uncle, my father and my cousins cowards simply because they did not enlist for VN....

Anyone who so easily throws out the blanket of cowardice as you do is not my friend and never will be.......Pray our paths never meet

[Thud]

So Cheney was 24-25 when the draft calls began soaring. I.e., he was in no danger of being inducted unless he volunteered.

[twyn1]

I think Clinton did use "underhanded" methods to get out of service -- either his number was called and he joined the ROTC in order to not go -- or he pulled strings to get into the ROTC and then when he got a high number he stiffed the ROTC -- either way -- after he "refused" to go to the ROTC and went over to England on a "whangled" scholarship -- wrote a letter admitting what he did and stating that he "loathed" the military -- went to Russia during this time too....

[Thud]

Hack is one of the most decorated vets in history.

[VMI70]

"Personally, I dropped out of college in my sophomore year to join, then finished up when I finished my term."

That is exactly what I did. I was commissioned a 2nd Lt. on 10/3/69, and I was the 7th generation in my family to serve as such. I had to use pull to get to go to Viet Nam. Many find that intriguing, but it's another story.

Based on that body of background and experience and in reading the articles about Vice President Cheney associated with this, in my judgment, he is no draft dodger.

[cyncooper]

Is "deception" illegal?

Oh dear, did I use a word above your vocabulary level? I do apologize.

To deceive means to lie.

[WhatNot]

I wonder how ticked he is at billy bub for not only not serving, but for also being responsible for getting us into this mess. That is where he should direct his anger.

[nicko]

sometimes I find these threads amazing...I've spent the better part of three decades in the military and did a stint in Mogadishu fall of '93, so I guess I could play the "been there, done that" card...the real money is in looking at the track record- the VP has a proven record of supporting the armed forces and doesn't deserve the draft dodging sabot round-

[El Gato]

Cheney had multiple deferements, mostly student, but also a fatherhood deferment. He may have worked the system, but I don't think so. Unlike Clinton who activelly avoided being drafted by fraudulently pretending to sign up for ROTC. Now that is draft dodging. AFAIK, Cheney never got a draft notice. There is spectrum of draft dodging/avoidance. At one end is the person who joins voluntarily, so as not to be drafted, into a specialty that pretty much guarantteed they wouldn't get into combat, like Navy cook for instance to the person who got a draft notice and ran to Canada. The first is difficult, if not impossible, to tell from the true volunteer who just always wanted to be in the Navy. The other end is criminal. The person who took advantage of legitimate deferments, due to activities he would have undertaken anyway, and never volunteered for service is close to the "good" end of the scale, the person who ran off to England after (probably) postponing being drafted by pretending to join ROTC is pretty close to the criminal end.

In any event, Cheney, born in 1941 was slightly on the old end of the prime Vietnam era draft population. He graduated from college in 1965 at the age of 24, a bit older than normal and past prime draft age. So if he "avoided" the draft, it was before the larger draft cohorts anyway. A lot of folks had other priorities than military service in the 60s (A quote that comes from a Washington comPost reporter FWIW), but if they got a draft notice they went. Cheney never got one.

Clinton OTOH was right in the middle of the prime draft age population, born in 1946, he did get a notice and used his political contacts with Senator Fulbright to be allowed to enroll in ROTC, at least long enough for the required change of status to be sent to selective service, but not long enough to have taken the enlistment oath. (ROTC cadets, at least those in the last two years of the program, or with scholarships are enlisted into the reserve, if they fail to complete the program, fail out or drop out of school, they can, and were activated) Instead Billy Jeff went to England...and to Moscow. If he had taken the enlistment oath, he'd have been AWOL. Too bad, with that on his record, he'd never have become the White House SinkMeister.

[fogarty]

And here we are bordering on a point where the separation between those in power who have never served in the military and those who serve is growing at every year. The cultural gap was enormous before Clinton. Now the cultural gap is even bigger. It has to cause some concern that the most avid supporters of foreign wars in the past decade has come from those who have never served at all (democrat or Republican).

We are at a dangerous point in our history. The volunteer forces risk becoming isolated and alienated from the rest of society so much that they could turn into a mercenary army, one which answers only to the call of money. When the civilian leaders have no vested interest (ie their own family in the military), then they have significantly less restraining emotions on engaging in any manner of foreign wars and entanglements.

As it is now (and I've heard it on FreeRepublic often enough) - people respond to military casualties with "They volunteered for it - who cares?"

One only needs to look at the Roman Republic and see the progression we are now facing. A volunteer army eventually becomes a mercenary army - which eventually leads to the collapse of the republic altogether.

[Thud]

Yeah, Clinton played games to avoid service and lied about it afterwards. The games were not to avoid service, because there was little chance of him being called up, but to avoid looking bad when he later ran for public office.

[twyn1]

We had this same argument yesterday -- except it was over Rush Limbaugh -- I guess it depends on what each person's definition of a draft dodger is -- to some here it seems to be any male who was between 17 and 50 during the Vietnam Era, who did not immmediately run down and sign up to serve on the front lines in the Army (or maybe Marines)

To me -- a draft dodger was someone who had his number called but ran off to Canada, someone who burned his draft card and ran off, refused to register, used deceit to gain deferment (Clinton) or who faked a medical condition in order to be disqualified. Legitimate means of not serving include medical disqualifications, ROTC, college, family or hardship deferments -- not serving for these reasons was not draft dodging

[clintonh8r]

Well, as someone who served in combat, I don't consider Cheney a draft dodger. (And as someone who has a father, mother, sister, uncle, cousin, and three brothers-in-law who also served.)