Dick Cheney, conservative war hawk and former Defense Secretary, had the opportunity to serve in the military during the war in Vietnam, but carefully avoided it. As he famously explained, “I had other priorities in the ’60s than military service.”
I did not know, however, the lengths Cheney was willing to go to in order to steer clear of the military. In fact, it seems a significant part of Cheney’s family life was shaped directly by his overwhelming desire to avoid Vietnam. Yesterday, Eric Alterman and Tim Noah offered valuable explanations.
First off, Vietnam may have influenced when Cheney chose to get married. Alterman noted:
[Cheney] received four 2-S draft deferments — granted to students — from 1963 through 1965 while he was a student at the University of Wyoming. He married Lynne in 1964, and was thus banned from the draft.
That bought him a little time, right up until the government said only married men with children could avoid the war.
Take a wild guess what happened next.
Noah has the timeline:
Oct. 26, 1965: The Selective Service declares that married men without children, who were previously exempted from the draft, will now be called up. Married men with children remain exempt.
Jan. 19, 1966: The Selective Service reclassifies Dick Cheney 3-A, “deferred from military service because service would cause hardship upon his family,” because his wife is pregnant with their first child.
July 28, 1966: Elizabeth Cheney is born.
Hmm, Oct. 26 to July 28. What’s that…about nine months?
Dedicated students of obstetrics will observe that Elizabeth Cheney’s birth date falls precisely nine months and two days after the Selective Service publicly revoked its policy of not drafting childless men. This would seem to indicate that the Cheneys, though doubtless planning to have children sometime, were seized with an untamable passion the moment Dick Cheney became vulnerable to the Vietnam draft. And acted on it. Carpe diem!
Who says government policy can’t affect human behavior?