Would you have been drafted?
On December 1, 1969, the United States began a new method* of drafting young men to fight the war in Vietnam: It held a lottery.
It worked like this: Each day of the year was printed on a piece of paper. These pieces of paper, representing each potential draftee's birthday, were placed in blue plastic capsules. Then all 366 capsules (one for each day of the year, including leap years) were placed in a large glass jar.
As millions watched on TV or listened on radio, the capsules were drawn from the jar, one by one. The first date drawn was assigned a draft number of "one"; the next date drawn received draft number "two"; and so on, until each day of the year -- each potential birthday -- had been drawn from the jar and assigned a draft number.
After the lottery, draftees were called for duty in order of their draft number, beginning with number "one," proceeding to number "two," and so on, until the military's manpower needs were met. So if you drew a low number in the lottery, you were likely to be drafted; if you drew a high number, you probably wouldn't be. In this particular draft**, anyone who received a number lower than 196 was eventually called to report; anyone who received 196 or higher was not.
Being drafted was not an automatic ticket to Vietnam. In fact, of 307,276 men who reported for duty as a result of the December 1969 lottery, only 162,746 were actually inducted. The rest were rejected on physical, mental or legal grounds (convicted felons, for instance, were rejected). Those who were inducted still might not be sent to fight; over the course of the entire Vietnam War, draftees stood only a 38 percent chance of serving in Vietnam. Soldiers who belonged to that 38 percent, however, were statistically more likely to die in combat than soldiers who volunteered -- principally because the overwhelming majority of draftees sent to Vietnam were a part of the U.S. Army ground forces that did much of the fighting.
* Before the lottery was implemented, local Draft Boards determined who would serve. This system was criticized for inequities, and resulted in uncertainty for the potential draftees during the entire time they were within the draft-eligible age group.
** The "draft number" you received here would have been your actual draft number only if you were eligible for the December 1, 1969 lottery -- which was held for young men born between January 1, 1944 and December 31, 1950. Your birth date would have yielded a different draft number in subsequent lotteries held for anyone born after 1950. These were conducted yearly until 1973, when the draft ended and the United States converted to an all-volunteer military.