Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?

The US military CLAIMS that drug use among soldiers is not allowed.



However, during the Vietnam War, a HUGE percentage of soldiers engaged in illegal drug use, from pot to heroin.



Why did the US military allow this to happen?



Why did the command and discipline chain break down so severely?



Why did the generals at the time completely fail to manage this issue?Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?These are all great questions and all inter-related.



All I can say is that the Army learned from its mistakes in this regard and in other regards. COIN comes from direct Vietnam study. Gen. Petraeus studied Vietnam, took over command in Iraq and won that war.



But yes, what you ask is very true and sad. HERE ARE YOUR ANSWERS:



1. the US Army was a bit in dissaray due to politicians not allowing it to fight the war all out. We would have invaded North Vietnam and bombed it to hell like we later did in Linebacker.

2. discipline and command broke down. there was a lot of fragging of officers. remoteness and inexperience of the Army vs. terrain and vs. enemy. Disbelief in the mission. Furthermore, allowing criminals in was the single biggest mistake.

3. generals were coming out of WW2 and Korea wars, where they fought linear frontal warfare. This was the first Guerilla War they were in, far from home in terrible terrain and weather which made logistics a huge problem.



SO: criminals in the Army, Drafting of unwilling civilians, logistics, politicians resulted in tha debacle.Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?
Times were greatly different then. It was the time of "free love" "tune-in" and "drop out" and the drug culture coming into vogue. Experimentation with drugs especially marijuana become wide scale with over half the civilian population trying it at some point. You also have to remember that not all that much was known about it and how it led to harder drugs and there was a huge counter culture rising up for the first time against established social aspects, legal and law enforcement parts of society as well as the military. Testing was not widespread and counter drug approaches were not developed yet and in place to keep pace with this overwhelming swell. It was also thought that soft drug users could be rehabilitated an the military developed the drug retraining program which largely failed and was discontinued in 1973. Also the need for the draft and sufficient numbers of US males for the Army really also helped create an atmosphere where you were retained and kept in the military even though you might have been busted for using soft drugs like marijuana. The zero tolerance policy that is in place now was not adopted by the US military until the mid to late 80's and well after the end of Vietnam.Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?Interesting question, depends on the people in the chain of command, I was in a unit with a bunch of people from, the crib/projects, the 1SGT who got deployed to Bosnia was always punishing the SGT's for allowing this ghetto behavior to esist in the unit, but as soon as he was deployed and the new 1SGT took his spot, this one, now he though he was a player and a pimp (drugs, sex and rok n roll)and he was having sex with all the SGT's in the unit and got caught, I could not wait for the real hardcore 1SGT to get back from deployment, by the way the other 1SGT got caught and was taken out of command for some time.

military people hate it when I tell this story.Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?
1) General's don't control corporals. It came down to the disciplinary control of the junior officers. 1st and 2nd Lieutenants are young and often recent college grads. Conscripts are men between 17 and 35. We are talking about a 25-year-old telling a 27-year-old not to smoke pot.



2) Consider the time. A larger portion of the youth population experimented with drugs in the 60's and the percentages (I can find them if you want, I remember seeing charts during a course on modern US history) were higher on college campuses. Junior officers were youth -from college campuses.



3) This is my opinion, but disciplinary measures are likely more difficult to enforce on conscripted forces. All current US Marines are volunteers. In 1966, many G.I.鈥檚 were draftees -unwilling draftees.Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?The percentage that used drugs especially hard drugs was no greater in Viet Nam than it is in this country today. Probably much less considering that we have more liberals now..Why did the US military permit so much drug use among soldiers during the Vietnam War?
Why do they permit movie and TV show piracy in this war?





Illegal jive can increase morale