The combatants of all wars are frightfully young, but the American combatants in Vietnam were significantly younger than in any war in American history. Most were drafted at eighteen and experienced combat during one of the most malleable and vulnerable stages of their lives. This was America’s first “teenage war,” with the average combatant having not yet seen his twentieth birthday, and these combatants were without the leavening of mature, older soldiers that had always been there in past wars.
