@ SwamP_ThinG:

Your English is fine. Really. I understand what you're saying 99.99% of the time, I think. Don't worry about that. If I spoke your native language as well as you speak mine I'd be bragging about it. You're doing just fine.

In the US the draft has never been for less than 2 full years, so far as I know. During WWI, WWII and Korea you got drafted for the duration of the conflict. During the Vietnam war it was for 2 years. You spent 18 months of that time in the combat zone. The rest was prep time.

Likewise, we have never had a "peacetime draft" here in the US, not that I've ever heard of. Certainly not in the past century, anyway.

The draftees here don't do any weekend drills or two weeks of annual training. They do a full two years of regular active duty -- all in one shot.

Only the Guards and Reservists do monthly drills and annual training. And 70%-80% of them are former active duty "volunteer" soldiers who have already spent several years in the service.

I will use myself as an example here, to illustrate to you what I'm talking about.

I volunteered for military service (and combat duty in Vietnam) right after I graduated from High School. My draft number was 8 (out of 365) so I would have been drafted if I had not volunteered anyway.

I went through Basic Training (8 weeks) and Advanced Individual Training (16 weeks) and then Airborne School (5 weeks) and the Ranger School (16 weeks at that time). Counting transition times that added up to a full year of nothing but highly specialized military training right from the start.

Then I got posted to Vietnam for 18 months. The first couple of months of that time in Vietnam were devoted to additional "in-country" Ranger training. After my first tour I extended for another 18 months. In my first four years of military service I spent 3 years of that time in actual combat.

During the following years I went to just about every military school you can name. I was always scheduled for some school or another, all the time. I also got a BA degree during that time, and later a Masters degree, all compliments of the military.

I retired from the military after 20 years of active duty and went back into civilian life. I also joined a local National Guard unit in my home town a short time later. We have several Guard and Reserve units in the city where I live, and I chose to join an Armor unit. Tanks. M1A1 tanks. I could have stayed in the Special Forces but I'd have had to commute to another state once a month (for my drills) to do so, and it seemed more hassle than it was worth, so I decided to become a tank commander instead.

Upon enlisting in the Guard I had to go through the same Advanced Individual Training that all US tank crews go through. I was sent down to Ft. Knox on active duty for 4 months to complete that and some related training. A while later I did a full active duty reclassification (M1 to M1A1/M1A2) course - that took another month of active duty. Then I was sent to the Tank Commanders Course - another month of active duty. I also had to complete my Advanced Course for promotion. That was another 8 weeks of active duty time. Later I went to the Master Gunner course - 2 more months of intensive training.

In my Guard unit we spent most weekend drills out on the firing ranges, working with our tanks and crews. We travelled to the NTC at Ft. Irwin for two weeks every summer to train and to compete against our "sister-battalion", which is a full-time active duty armor unit. We beat them in gunnery and tactical competition at the Desert Warfare Training Center nearly every year.

When Desert Shield began my Guard unit was not slated to be deployed, so I requested and was granted transfer to a full-time active duty armor unit, and I was deployed to the Gulf War with the regular Army. That deployment lasted a year. Upon completion I returned to my Guard unit, along with the 38 other guys from my Guard unit that deployed on active duty with me.

Now, there are about 175 guys in my Guard unit. Most of them have as much military experience as I have. We are not noobies, by any means. Many guys have even more "time in service" than I do. Many have as much combat experience as I do. Several even have more combat experience than I do. I think that in our entire unit we only have about a dozen "kids" that are new to the military, and even they have all the training, and the exact same training, that all the active duty regulars in the military have. They all trained together in the very same schools. In the Guard we have a regular "training cycle" that mirrors the training schedule of our active-duty sister unit.

If you look at the differences between the Guard unit and our active duty sister-battalion this is what you'll find:

They do a lot of "post support" duty that we don't have to do. That's mostly guard duty, maintenance, and standing around in lines waiting, for various reasons.

That's it. That's the only major difference.

The number of man-hours (or man-years) of actual hands-on (and combat) experience in the average Guard or Reserve unit is often greater than the number for full-time active duty miltary units. That's a fact.

I think you really blow your own perceptions of the "experience gap" out of proportion. Whether you're infantry, armor, or something else altogether, once you learn a skill and become proficient at it, it does not take that much time or effort to remain proficient. It's rather like learning to ride a bike; once you learn how to you never really forget. We train more than enough to keep our skills sharp. And we go on training right up to the moment of actual combat, and beyond. It truly just becomes second nature after a while. Ingrained.

So far as "draftees" are concerned, they train right alongside the non-draftees, and they go on to serve with them, so there is absolutely no difference at all in their skill levels. None. Zero. Zip. Nada. They are exactly the same in every way, so far as skill and proficiency goes.

Draftees [here] can and often do become tank commanders, etc. Those positions are given out based upon ability, and are not based upon whether you are a draftee or not. Same-same with promotions, etc. If a draftee wants to become a fighter pilot - or anything that takes a long training cycle - all they have to do is ask to be changed from draftee status to full active duty status, and they have to agree to serve the slightly longer enlistment term. Many do just that.

No. Plain and simple answer: no. You must be fluent in English - able to speak, read and write at the level of a high school graduate. You must be able to pass the same physical tests that everybody else passes. All tests, both educational, mental and physical, are standard in the US military. If you cannot pass them you cannot get in. Period. You must be a high school graduate. You cannot have any sort of criminal record. Our military makes absolutely no exceptions in this regard. None at all. A lot of volunteers get turned away for this very reason. They are extremely hard-assed about this stuff in our military.

I have known guys that were in excellent physical shape, and were mentally as sharp as a tack, and yet they were still rejected for military service because their "body-fat calculation" was considered too high, and they were unable to bring it down enough (the military uses both the caliper "pinch test" and also full body submersion tests to calculate exact body-fat to weight ratios). It did not matter that they could pass every physical test - they could not meet the standards and that was that - they were out.

That's taken directly from here:

http://www.knox.army.mil/school/16ca...areer%20Course

The reason for the "accidents" you mention is just as I posted earlier. The modern battlefield is far more dangerous and dynamic now than it has ever been in any previous wars. Call it one of the costs of progress.