The 60s and 70s were such a strange time in history.
My dad was drafted and became a medic in the Army, and was discharged just before they started sending "advisors" to Vietnam in the early 60s. The whole thing went on long enough that I remember reading the paper as a kid, counting dead and wounded teenagers from my hometown and the small towns around us.
The draft and the war ended before I came of age in 1981, but I was keenly aware of the horror of the entire thing. "Alice's Restaurant" and all of the other antiwar protest songs were part of the soundtrack of my adolescence - not front and center, but there. They all resonated with me.
To those who served - thank you. This country owes you a debt of gratitude for not shrinking before a call to duty in a place you didn't want to go, for a reason nobody ever explained adequately.
You are heroes.