WI: No Vietnam War draft

BigBlueBox

Banned
Pretty much as the title says. America gets fully involved in the Vietnam war and sends combat troops just like OTL, but there is no draft. Would American public opinion on the war be significantly less negative? I would imagine so, because the negativity towards the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is much less. Could the military attempt to increase recruitment of volunteers through pay raises? Would the lack of manpower significantly hamper America?
 
Would American public opinion on the war be significantly less negative?

Certainly. Without a draft, LBJ experiences less of a backlash from the youth and he'd be facing far fewer protests. However, public opinion would still turn against the war once the media detects a "credibility gap" and the Tet Offensive demonstrates that Vietnam is not a war the US is winning. (In OTL, Tet was the breaking point that caused the majority of Americans to oppose the war).
 
With willing soldiers and not unwilling draftees you get higher quality performance, even factoring in idiocy like McNamara being a general instead of a rank he deserves -- there are ranks below private, right? Why would Tet even happen?
 
It takes longer for the War to become unpopular, but with less troops on the ground you might see a more successful Tet Offensive. Regardless the War is unwinnable and public opinion will eventually turn against it. The US might be there for a few more years, but the end result will be the same.
 
LBJ and McNamara didn't want to take the political hit of calling up Reserves or Guard units while most of the active forces were already busy with the Cold War. But there was the Draft

New Draftees got churned thru S.Vietnam, with half of their Tour in Country, and they back to the States for the remainder, where they did very little except mark time, Drills that sort of thing.
So by time the troops were no longer green, and knew what they were doing, were rotated out. This meant when the FNGs got dropped into an existing unit, they would be a hindrance to the rest of the guys thill they picked up skills, at which point, they would start feeling 'Short' with the end of their Tour in sight.

So obviously no wanting to get send home in a Bag or or shot up, would start being very risk-adverse. So a Draftee might be only combat effective for 4-5 months in Vietnam.

You may ask, 'what about the guys who volunteered'? Well, those guys had a longer tour, but in most cases, they would have a different MOS, and a choice of where to go, within limits.
Only the most Gung-Ho and crazy chose Vietnam.

Draftees, most ended up as MOS 11B, Rifleman, unless they tested well on the AFQT (Armed Forces Qualification Test) where they might go to another Branch and/or MOS
The lucky guys who had taken typing in high school, were very likely to be MOS 71B, Clerk-Typist, who would spend his tour in an air conditioned MACV office than an 11 Bulletstopper.

Or if you scored well on Electronics or knew anything about Ham Radio, you might get take care of Radars or similar in West Germany, South Korea, or the States, especially if you went for a regular 4 year tour
 
LBJ and McNamara didn't want to take the political hit of calling up Reserves or Guard units while most of the active forces were already busy with the Cold War. But there was the Draft
That seems backward, why didn't they think drafting people would have less negative impact than using the Guard?
 
It takes longer for the War to become unpopular, but with less troops on the ground you might see a more successful Tet Offensive. Regardless the War is unwinnable and public opinion will eventually turn against it. The US might be there for a few more years, but the end result will be the same.

I'd hesitate to call any war unwinnable, and I think you're underestimating one key factor; if the US isen't sending in massive number of untrained men to do the yeoman service of securing/managing the countryside, but having a higher quality/professionalization of their personel overall, than its likely adopting a completely different tactical and political approach. Some kind of "Vietnamization" of the war effort would have to take place much earlier than IOTL, with ARVN getting that much more time to both get trained, a greater proportion of shipped in American equipment (Which would have otherwise gone to outfit Americans) and integrate themselves with their countrymen. I'd argue this is far more likely to win the war for "Heart and Minds" over the years and put the Viet Kong on the back foot as well as serve as a limiter on Northern willingness to get involved in the conflict
 
The US Military didn't introduce consription for Vietnam like Australia did, they had continuous conscription since the 1948 Selective Service Act. For the Vietnam War to be fought without conscription the US would have to drop the 1948 SSA at some point, like Britain did from 1960. Of course this would dramatically reduce the size of the US Army and therefore drastically change the way the war was fought if it was fought at all.
 

Tovarich

Banned
That seems backward, why didn't they think drafting people would have less negative impact than using the Guard?

Because then the powerful fathers of people who'd joined the NG in order to avoid putting themselves at any kind of risk whatsoever or interrupting their planned career in the oil game too much (yes, of course I'm referencing Dubya) would be very pissed off.
 
That seems backward, why didn't they think drafting people would have less negative impact than using the Guard?

Draft was already ongoing, as pointed out by others, and McNamara justified it as the US would have had more men with combat experience for future conflicts.
Probably in his twisted brain, he thought that a big deterrent to the USSR, he believed that Vietnam war was unwinnable, so that 'strength' would be needed in the future. so

Recall, this was the same guy who came up with Project 100,000 so Draft standards for IQ and criminal records were lowered, to get more bodies in uniforms

Guys in Service called that crew 'McNamara's Moron Corp'
 
Of course this would dramatically reduce the size of the US Army and therefore drastically change the way the war was fought if it was fought at all.

With the Draft, except during Korea and Vietnam, was averaging around 800,000 in the Army. During Vietnam, Army got over 1.5M

Post Draft till the Wall came down, was 750,000 or so.

So average force levels didn't really drop for the end of the Cold War with an all volunteer force
 
With the Draft, except during Korea and Vietnam, was averaging around 800,000 in the Army. During Vietnam, Army got over 1.5M

Post Draft till the Wall came down, was 750,000 or so.

So average force levels didn't really drop for the end of the Cold War with an all volunteer force

So the US could sustain an army half the size of OTL with volunteers alone if the 1973-1990 numbers are anything to go by? I'm happy with that as a baseline.

If the US wants to deploy divisions to Vietnam from within this ceiling where would they come from?

Also the volunteer services benefitted from conscription for Vietnam because people joined the USN, USAF etc to avoid being drafted into the infantry for combat in Vietnam. So without the draft these services would struggle to expand for a war.
 
So the US could sustain an army half the size of OTL with volunteers alone if the 1973-1990 numbers are anything to go by? I'm happy with that as a baseline.

If the US wants to deploy divisions to Vietnam from within this ceiling where would they come from?

Also the volunteer services benefitted from conscription for Vietnam because people joined the USN, USAF etc to avoid being drafted into the infantry for combat in Vietnam. So without the draft these services would struggle to expand for a war.

USAF number started to drop as ICBMs replaced bomber wings, going from 8-900,000 of the '50s down to high 500,000 thru the end of the Cold War. Their numbers peaked in 1968.

Marines gained around 100,000 during the War years, then dropping to their post WWII normal of 200,000 while the Navy stayed constant around 600,000 during the 1st half of the Cold War, also gaining around 100k during the Vietnam War, then dropped to the 500,000 range as the old manpower intensive WWII ships were scrapped/mothballed. RR Naval expansion only increased USN by around 60,000 by time the Wall came down

Army always had the biggest swings in numbers

IIRC, around 2.25M guys were Drafted during the Vietnam War era, I think around 30% ending up in Vietnam, spending 12-13 months in country, with most of them being grunts.
With three or four year enlistments, you won't as much as that manpower churn going thru Vietnam.

But the above shows that 60-70% of the forces in Vietnam were not draftees, so a large force could still have been fielded.

So they could have made the call, that no draftees would goto Vietnam, only regulars.
But that didn't happen. Thanks McNamara & LBJ
 

DougM

Donor
I think you may be missing the obvious. If you eliminate the draft or just stop sending draftees to the war Zone then I think you will see a drastic decline in the number of volunteers. As It happened by volunteering you drastically decreased your likelihood of being (for lack of better terms) “on the front” You radically increased you chances to be in a support role or just not in country. This is why folks volunteered to begin with. It was a gamble. If you volunteer you are increasing you chance to avoid combat at the expense of the chance not to avoid the military by not being drafted.

In the above suggestions you increase your chance of seeing combat as the ONLY way you get in the military is if you volunteer. I think this will radically decrease the number of volunteers. As you turn volunteering from an incentive (less likely to see combat) to a negative (more likely to see combat).
I can’t prove anything with numbers but I would be surprised if in this model you get enough volunteers to keep the military going much less fight a war. And that only make the situation worse as it self reinforcing. As you get less volunteers because of the chance for combat you get a smaller number but you still need the same number of combat troops so a larger percentage see combat so that decreases volunteers thus increasing ther likely hood of volunteers seeing combat that decreases the number of volunteers and so on and so forth.

In the end taken to ludicrous levels you end up with a force that has every single volunteer seeing combat.
 
I think you may be missing the obvious. If you eliminate the draft or just stop sending draftees to the war Zone then I think you will see a drastic decline in the number of volunteers. As It happened by volunteering you drastically decreased your likelihood of being (for lack of better terms) “on the front” You radically increased you chances to be in a support role or just not in country. This is why folks volunteered to begin with. It was a gamble. If you volunteer you are increasing you chance to avoid combat at the expense of the chance not to avoid the military by not being drafted.

Yet OTL, that a majority did enlist, with a number wanting to goto Vietnam to fight Communists, while others tried to get every deferment possible, so not to go into the military at all, using health(real or exaggerated) or schooling excuses

Some research shows that even the ones most likely to see combat, MOS 11B, didn't exceed 40% draftees.

Those who enlisted, or even volunteered, would have been far more combat effective than the draftees.

Then there is a whole different Anti-War protest group, if there was a very low chance of being drafted for combat.

The war would unfold differently, even with the two idiots, LBJ and McNamara, micromanaging combat from the White House situation room
 
Side question: was there a margin of improvement in numbers and quality for the ARVN that could be done with more external financing?
 
It is not simply a matter of no draft meaning no draft resentment; that resentment being seeing or hearing of friends and family dying or being horribly injured and being at the mercy of being drafted into the war yourself. You would, from top to bottom, change the entire War. The US was fighting based on Westmoreland requesting and receiving more and more troops. A volunteer force means a limited fighting force. People like Colin Powell would later say the problem with the Vietnam War (as it was) is that the US did not completely go on a war footing as it had for World War 2. The War would need to be fought differently, and in a way which was how it should have been fought (if at all): limited forces focused on specific strategic assets and missions.
 
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It is not simply a matter of no draft meaning no draft resentment; that resentment being seeing or hearing of friends and family dying or being horribly injured and being at the mercy of being drafted into the war yourself. You would, from top to bottom, change the entire War. The US was fighting based on Westmoreland requesting and receiving more and more troops. A volunteer force means a limited fighting force. People like Colin Powell would later say the problem with the Vietnam War (as it was) is that the US did not completely go on a war footing as it had for World War 2. The War would need to be fought differently, and in a way which was how it should have been fought (if at all): limited forces focused on specific strategic assets and missions.

There's also the possability of taking the "military advisors" title a little bit more literally; leaning on ARVN more heavily for garrison duty, community outreach/basic anti-insurgency patrols, ect. while US forces focus more on strike operations against enemy bases (What the Green Berets did IOTL). This could be made up for by feeding the training and equipment that otherwise could have gone to the untrained mass of US boys to proffesionalize and modernize the ARVN forces early on, thus allowing them to integrate themselves in the hearts, minds, and governing structures/lives of their countrymen. Combined, these could very easily prevent the insurgency from "swimming through the population like fish" and the US being able to hunt them down in their lairs where the advantages of a regular army compared to an irregular one; firepower, tactical mobility, ect. can be brough to bare.
 
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