McNamara’s Morons: the history of project 100.000
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- This topic has 1 reply, 2 voices, and was last updated 6 years, 6 months ago by
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After the gulf of Tonkin incident in 1964 the Vietnam war began to escalate. President Lyndon Johnson promised take any measures he believed were necessary to retaliate and to promote the maintenance of international peace and security in southeast Asia. This was essentially a blank cheque to wage total war in Vietnam. Several major battles and operations would quickly follow this, such as the battle of Ia Drang (the first large scale battle against the PAVN) and operation Rolling Thunder. By 1966 more and more soldiers were needed to fill up the ranks, and even though thousands volunteered it was not enough.
The Battle of Ia Dang, 1965In 1966 the USA still had the draft and it would have been possible to simply recruit college students and middle-class young adults, but this would have been politically unfavourable. The Vietnam war was a very unpopular war and these drafting laws could seriously threaten Johnson’s and McNamara’s political careers. So, another solution was found: project 100.000. This was launched on 1 October 1966 and its goal was to draft 100.000 low aptitude men which would have been rejected by the army by previous standards every year. They were dubbed by the rest of the army as ‘McNamara’s Morons’. Most of these were young men from low income families and had lower than average intelligence. These recruits would often fail basic training and even programs for those who failed basic training. The military branches weren’t happy with getting low aptitude men, but they didn’t have a choice. Soldiers were dying, and they needed men to fill the ranks. Over the course of the war some 354.000 low aptitude men would be drafted under project 100.000, most of them were sent to Vietnam. Of these half were assigned to combat units. 5.478 of them would die in the war, their fatality rate being 3 times the rate of other soldiers. Sadly, these soldiers didn’t only bring themselves in danger, but their comrades as well. On one occasion a soldier accidentally shot and killed a very popular officer while being on patrol duty. By next day he was gone.
Lyndon B. Johnson with Robert S. McNamaraSo why then were these men sent off to Vietnam while clearly they should have never even been considered for duty? McNamara was a vivid technophile. The 60s were an exciting age: satellites, cassettes and all kinds of new technology was being introduced in the army. McNamara honestly believed, and kept believing to the day he died, that the military would raise the intelligence of those recruited in project 100.000 and that when they came back home, they would be functioning individuals in society. He believed the army would raise the IQ of those who failed school by up to 20 points. Unfortunately, he was wrong. Whether this justifies the result of his program is up to you to decide.
It is worth mentioning that the recruiting of low aptitude men is still happening today, albeit on a much smaller scale. While the USA doesn’t have a draft anymore, the military still has quotas to fulfil. When those quotas aren’t reached, they are allowed to lower their standards. A number of them have also been sent to the war of Iraq.
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