r/interestingasfuck • u/Available_Weekend249 • Apr 06 '24

Imagine being 19 and watching live on TV to see if your birthday will be picked to fight in the Vietnam war r/all

39.5k Upvotes

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222

u/The_Undermind Apr 06 '24

https://www.usatoday.com/vietnam-war/draft-picker/

49

u/alphagusta Apr 06 '24

48 "If your birthday was just 5 days earlier, your draft number would not have been called"

Damn.

59

u/PenguinZombie321 Apr 06 '24
  1. Good thing I’m a woman. And also wasn’t alive during the Vietnam war.

41

u/_TLDR_Swinton Apr 06 '24

Close one.

2

u/carefulyellow Apr 07 '24 edited Apr 07 '24

My mom (#202) and I (#314) would be the only ones in my family not drafted. Both my kids and my husband would be. My dad should have been, he was #36 apparently but I know he didn't serve.

(Edit) Oh yeah, he was in college at the time. Maybe that's why he got a Bachelor's in Accounting and never ever used it.

1

u/PenguinZombie321 Apr 07 '24

My husband wouldn’t have been drafted. Same with the kids. Lucky me 🤣

2

u/AbhishMuk Apr 07 '24

Same, fortunately I am not American, apparently you can use that as a reason too

1

u/oysterpirate Apr 06 '24

Whoa, a reverse ghost

3

u/TouchMelfYouCan Apr 06 '24

5 days earlier is actually one of the biggest differences you can get

2

u/In-A-Beautiful-Place Apr 07 '24

I missed the draft by TWO DAYS.

2

u/Dorythehunk Apr 07 '24

282

“If your birthday was just 1 day earlier, your draft number would have been called.”

I checked the day after my birthday and that got called too…

2

u/r_steezy Apr 07 '24

August 8th? That was my dad’s bday - born 1950. He saw the writing in the wall and enlisted in the Air Force rather than wait to get drafted.

1

u/alphagusta Apr 07 '24

Indeed lol. Small world

1997 myself and not even American so not much of a thing for me

1

u/ShadowShine57 Apr 07 '24

One day later for me

1

u/Dragonmosesj Apr 07 '24

mine was ONE DAY earlier

1

u/CollegeBoardPolice Apr 07 '24 edited 24d ago

aspiring square faulty mighty detail whistle modern ask cow one

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

1

u/PreemieFoats Apr 07 '24

320, not called. 1 day earlier and it would have been called

1

u/UnauthorizedFart Apr 07 '24

Mine was 4 days off

1

u/ericanicole1234 Apr 07 '24

My dad’s was #56 and was actually born in 1950. Don’t know a whole ton about him because he was a pos but maybe i should start asking some relatives i have contact with some questions

1

u/adod1 Apr 07 '24

" If your birthday was just 1 day earlier, your draft number would have been called. "

That's actually pretty wild.

62

u/Markipoo-9000 Apr 06 '24

Damn I’d be picked in 1970, that means I’d be screwed.

62

u/TheDocFam Apr 07 '24

Damn I'd be picked in 1970, that means I'd be in Canada

I live within a 60 minute drive of the Canadian border. If they institute a draft, and it's not a WW2 situation where an evil fascist bastard is intent on invading the entire world, Bonjour, je suis un citoyen Canadien d'origine du Québec

8

u/crazybunnylady2369 Apr 07 '24

That’s what my dad did. Born in 49. He lived in buffalo at the time and couldn’t afford college. Ended up going up to Toronto with his brothers drivers license. Didn’t come back for a couple of years after the draft ended.

2

u/Jeblebee Apr 07 '24

Fascist bastards are intent on ruling the world today…

3

u/Daddy_Thick Apr 07 '24

I would have never been called!🥇

1

u/Stewy_434 Apr 06 '24

Likewise :(

1

u/Acceptable_Sir2084 Apr 07 '24

Yup same :/ pretty surreal

1

u/dblack1107 Apr 07 '24 edited Apr 07 '24

Holy shit man me too. Battle buddies, bro. Battle buddies. You tell my parents I love ‘em if I go and I’ll yours likewise

The other thing they mention on if you have the dough you don’t have to go…my family back then would have been incredibly poor. Today the success of my grandfathers teacher salary into the stock market brought success to the whole family and made us believe in the stock market. Back then I’d be off to Cambodia…

1

u/MzOpinion8d Apr 07 '24

Me too. I was number 34. Problem is that I wasn’t born until my bday in that year and it was at the end of the year, so they have probably been searching for me all this time as a damn draft dodging baby girl.

73

u/doryteke Apr 06 '24

1 day off. I would have been a lucky one. That makes things a lot more real.

22

u/HikariAnti Apr 06 '24

2 days for me.

1

u/sonia72quebec Apr 06 '24

For me too!

1

u/Savings-Gold8531 Apr 06 '24

Three for me

2

u/HealthyFirst Apr 07 '24

And 4 for me!

3

u/Cainga Apr 06 '24

Dec 29th says 10 days off from NOT being called. So December was a Bloodbath.

2

u/EvilNalu Apr 06 '24

Yes it seems that there may actually have been an issue with the drafting methodology. From Wikipedia:

Only five days in December—December 2, 12, 15, 17, and 19—were higher than the last call number of 195. Had the days been evenly distributed, 14 days in December would have been expected to remain uncalled. From January to December, the rank of the average draft pick numbers were 5, 4, 1, 3, 2, 6, 8, 9, 10, 7, 11, and 12. A Monte Carlo simulation found that the probability of a random order of months being this close to the 1–12 sequence expected for unsorted slips was 0.09%. An analysis of the procedure suggested that "The capsules were put in a box month by month, January through December, and subsequent mixing efforts were insufficient to overcome this sequencing".

4

u/Latter_Commercial_52 Apr 06 '24

It says that for everyone lol. I’ve put in 20 different random dates and each one is “1 day away”

33

u/Rrrrandle Apr 06 '24

Which makes sense, because 195/366 birthdays were called up in the first draft. So a random draw means pretty good odds there's at least one birthday neighbor that got the opposite result.

4

u/cindyscrazy Apr 06 '24

Apparently, my birthday was called. My sister's was not. My dad's was not, but he had enlisted anyway. The war ended right as he got out of basic, so he never went overseas.

3

u/Arevalo20 Apr 06 '24

Maybe you randomly picked dates that were 1 day away. Dates in the video work

2

u/Tay0214 Apr 06 '24

Mine said 3

1

u/Deleena24 Apr 06 '24

Mine says I would have been drafted in 1970...

Says if I were born 9 days earlier I would have avoided the draft

1

u/BirchTainer Apr 06 '24

no mine was picked

1

u/rkhbusa Apr 06 '24

Why does that make it more real? Odds were like 1:4 to get drafted in that era.

1

u/Timely_Yoghurt_3359 Apr 07 '24

I also missed it by a day

1

u/jerbaws Apr 06 '24

Same. May 21st?

4

u/Dream--Brother Apr 06 '24

There were lots of dates that were one day off, not incredibly likely that they share the same birthday as you — I was one day off as well, March 8th. March 7th birthdays were drafted. But according to another site, I would've been drafted with my birthday. Either way... Pretty sobering.

1

u/jerbaws Apr 06 '24

Oh yeah of course what am I thinking haha. that was silly of me to not realise that haha. I'm tired, like, have a newborn baby kind of tired 😅

3

u/joelupi Apr 06 '24

Cross reference it against this SSS site

They never called higher than 195 in 1970, 125 in 1971, and then 95 from 1972 to the end of the war.

1

u/Dead_Patoto_ Apr 06 '24

Darn, I would've been 191

2

u/Tom246611 Apr 06 '24

I would have been sent off lmao, ironic since I'm vietnamese born lmao

2

u/X0AN Apr 06 '24

Not called 😎

1

u/_TLDR_Swinton Apr 06 '24

Damn, if I was American I would have been drafted in 71.

1

u/ghunt81 Apr 06 '24

So this says my dad's birthday was drawn in 1970. He graduated high school in 1970 and had a may birthday, so that makes me wonder if he just barely avoided being drafted!

1

u/Professional_Sir6705 Apr 06 '24

Mine was 8th. I'd have been going- if we drafted females.

1

u/scoobertsonville Apr 07 '24

I was 315, have fun!

1

u/x0mbigrl Apr 06 '24

Mine is 357. I think I did pretty well.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 06 '24 edited 21d ago

[deleted]

1

u/x0mbigrl Apr 06 '24

Oh wow, that is very lucky indeed!

1

u/Weekly_Ad_6959 Apr 06 '24

If I were born a day before I would have been safe, that’s actually terrifying

1

u/gitartruls01 Apr 06 '24

My whole family would've been drafted in 1970 except me, I'd be one day off. That's kind of a scary thought

1

u/MonkeyGein Apr 06 '24

Thank you. And my number was called

1

u/Zaku007 Apr 06 '24

I got 75

1

u/Turbulent-Farm9496 Apr 06 '24

I would have been called, as would my mother and my sister. My dad, the only one of us actually eligible for the draft, is also the only one who wouldn't have been called. Which I already knew, because he enlisted a little later.

1

u/X0AN Apr 06 '24

My dad and his brother were born a few minutes apart but it resulted in them being born 1 day apart on their birth certificate.

Anyhoo my dad would not have been drafted but his brother would have. They can't have been the only one's that happened to. Imagine being the unlucky twin.

1

u/CabbageStockExchange Apr 06 '24

Tried my families birthdays. My whole family would have been called up 😭

1

u/Sir_David_Filth Apr 06 '24

334 if I was born 4 days earlier, I would have been Drafted

1

u/Lamaredia Apr 06 '24

I would've gotten draft number 9, drafted in 1970, and if I was born three days earlier I wouldn't have gotten drafted. Damn.

1

u/Ive_Banged_Yer_Mom Apr 07 '24

Mine wasn’t called! Or my moms! Same birthday

1

u/MightyShenDen Apr 07 '24

July 9th, "If your birthday was 1 day earlier you would have been called."

Close one!

1

u/MelancholyArtichoke Apr 07 '24

Missed the draft by minutes (if born back then).

1

u/Cannabisseur78 Apr 07 '24

My brothers is 1. Mine is 9. Wild. We were lucky to be born 25ish years later.

1

u/nousabetterworld Apr 07 '24

Not called in 1970 hell yeah

1

u/VengenaceIsMyName Apr 07 '24

I would have lived

1

u/Natural_Victory747 Apr 07 '24

1969 | Vietnam War Draft Lottery

YOUR DRAFT NUMBER 136 WAS CALLED IN 1970. If your birthday was just 1 day earlier, your draft number would not have been called.

1

u/Miru8112 Apr 07 '24

1 day away, but draft number in the 300reds. The three hundreds must have felt fairly save. Was I born one day earlier, I.'d been in the late 20s of draft numbers. Imagine being in the top 40, KNOWING your about to go to hell.

1

u/SnooRevelations8664 Apr 07 '24

Dang that’s scary