[Who dat?]

Untrue..The average age of recruits is 19 yrs old...The average age of the entire military is 24-25 ears old.

I always wondered about the 19 year-old average age claim. I know several that are career guys with 15-18 years in so far. That puts them in their 30’s at a minimum… There are a lot of people that fit that description too.

It would tend to skew the 19 year old figure upward, that’s all.

I don’t know where they pulled that figure from. I seem to recall reading somewhere that the average age of an Army infantryman in Viet Nam was 19 or so… maybe that’s where it came from.

[FormerlyAnotherLurker]

That's why I usually don't bother reading stuff "from e-mails". Especially when they say anonymous. They almost never are anonymous but are just someone too lazy to credit the author or search for the source.

" The mean age of all active officers was 34 years, while that of enlisted members was 27 years."

FROM:
http://www.defenselink.mil/prhome/poprep2001/chapter4/chapter4_4.htm

[dwilli]

It's the spin that the antiwar factions put on any conflict
to make it appear that the only military people fighting the war are young, underprivileged, uneducated boys fresh from the farms and housing projects.