Daddy’s gone to war, and baby brother’s gone, too

“Selective Service exemptions for fathers were belatedly abolished: one million would be drafted in 1944-45. The average age of draftees had climbed from twenty-two in 1940 to twenty-six in 1944, and many new privates were over thirty-five. A ban on shipping eighteen-year-olds overseas was rescinded in August [1944]. Induction standards for ‘physically imperfect men,’ already loosened, were further relaxed in October. Draft examiners were advised that ‘such terms as “imbecile” and “moron” will not be used,’ but 330,000 inductees, some of whom could fairly be classified as at least dull-witted, were subsequently discharged for sundry mental defects.” – Rick Atkinson, The Guns at Last Light