Cross posted on Street Prophets
I begin my tale on December 1, 1969. I was a junior at the University of Maryland. On this day, I was one of 850,000 young men between the ages of 19 and 25 who would learn if they were fated for Vietnam, or would avoid the draft altogether. For on this date each day of the year was selected by lottery. Those who were lucky enough to have a birthday with a high lottery number would no longer have to worry about the draft, those not so lucky would.
I couldn't stand the suspense, and I was not going to miss the Maryland Terrepins basketball home opener for something over which I had no control. I don't remember who we played, my recollection is that we won, and as I was walking back from the arena to my dorm, I saw a large crowd of guys gathered around a paper posted on the wall of the main libarary. I knew what it was. It took me a few minutes to get close enough to read it: May 11: 37 - my heart sank!
Several days later, I telephoned the Baltimore office of the Maryland National Guard. President Nixon had continued the policy of President Johnson of not sending the National Guard to Vietnam, and the Guard had become known as a way to avoid going to Nam. But the lady who answered the phone was not very nice. She said many of "you kids" have called since the lottery drawing. There was a four year waiting list to get into the National Guard. If I did not go on the waiting list when I became a freshman, then I should forget it.
One of my fellow Baltimoreans, however, was a senior that December of 1969. I didn't know him, other than being from Baltimore, we had nothing in common. He went to fancy private schools, I went to public school. He went to Yale, and I went to Maryland. He was a senior that December, due to graduate in a few months, I was a junior. This is what his Wikipedia article says about John Bolton:
Though Bolton supported the Vietnam War, he enlisted in the Maryland Army National Guard, but did not serve in Vietnam. He wrote in his Yale 25th reunion book "I confess I had no desire to die in a Southeast Asian rice paddy. I considered the war in Vietnam already lost."[13] In an interview, Bolton discussed his comment in the reunion book, explaining that he decided to avoid service in Vietnam because "by the time I was about to graduate in 1970, it was clear to me that opponents of the Vietnam War had made it certain we could not prevail, and that I had no great interest in going there to have Teddy Kennedy give it back to the people I might die to take it away from."
Bolton was in that December 1, 1969 lottery. His November 20th birthday drew lottery number 185, border line between drafted and not being drafted. But somehow, when he made the same phone call that I did, he was given a different answer, and he enlisted in the Maryland National Guard in May of 1970. But I digress.
After my disappointing phone call to the National Guard, I decided to forget about it. Then, in my senior year, I received in the mail a notice to report for my draft physical at Fort Holabird, a now defunct Army post southeast of Baltimore.
My mother had served in the Army as a nurse during World War II, and for three years had experienced the killing in the jungles of New Guinea. The killing she saw on the news every night in the jungles of Vietnam brought back too many horrible memories. She insisted I see our family phyician, he would find something wrong with me. But he did not, and he told me that my mother and he had served in World War II, so I can serve too.
Then the day came for my draft physical. They filled the bus with middle class white boys, each one, except me clutching a letter. I soon learned that there were two doctors in the Baltimore area, and two doctors in the DC area, who provided letters to any and all kids going for their draft physical - stating that the young man was physically unfit to serve. And, incredibly, the Army accepted these letters! Every boy on that bus, except me, was declared 4-F, physically unfit to serve. I, and only I, was 1-A, facing the draft and Vietnam in just a few weeks. As we were filing into the bus, another bus pulled up filled with black kids from inner city Baltimore. Not one of those young men was holding a letter.
We I returned to campus, I visited the student draft counseling center, paid for with my student funds. The guy started yelling at me, "Why didn't you see me before the draft physical?! I would have given you a letter from a doctor!" Then he calmed down, wrote a name and phone number on a piece of paper, and handed it to me. "Who is this?" I asked. "She's a nurse at Georgetown University. Give her a call. You'll visit her several times a week until your induction physical. She'll poke needles into your arm, so by the time you're inducted the Army doctors will see track marks all over both your arms and they'll reject you for being an addict."
I admit I gave it some thought. But a friend asked me, "When your kids ask you what you did in the war, what are you going to tell them?" That made up my mind. I served four years in the Navy enlisted, then, thanks to the GI Bill, I was able to go to law school, and then I served an additional four years as a JAG officer in the Air Force.
But what does my story have to do with DADT? Wouldn't it have been easier to fake being gay [which in 1970 still meant happy] then having someone stick needles into your arms hundreds of times? But in 1970, it was more shameful to be gay then it was to be a heroin addict. Fake heroin addiction - OK, but try to get an erection in the communal shower, start hugging and kissing someone of your own gender - no way. But times have changed over 40 years. Not everyone accepts gays, but a large part of society does. 40 years ago most gays stayed in the closet, today many are openly gay.
I strongly believe in universal compulsory service for all but the most severely disabled. Many of you may disagree with me. But I would hope you would agree that the draft was just and proper in World War II, and I would hope you would agree with me that the draft should, at least theoretically, remain an option should our country face a military threat as extreme as that posed by Fascist Japan and Nazi Germany. With DADT, combined with increased acceptance in society of gays, a draft would not be an option. Anyone could evade the draft by claiming to be gay. DADT, in my opinion, harms our national security. In the name of national security, and for other reasons as well, this surviving remnant of a pre-1949 Armed Forces built on prejudice must go.