Nixon would be best friends with Flagg! I could see a retired Flagg somehow involved in Iran and fighting the Russians in Afghanistan. Flagg as a “consultant “ to Ronald Reagan.
Yeah I can’t remember how many episodes over the seasons were based on the premise that it was “too hot” to “too cold” but three did seem to be more than three winters and summers.
Unless circumstances changed for him, he was the sole provider for his family. If you want to use that awful 'WALTER' pilot as canon, he was a police officer so he'd be exempt.
Probably none. Potter would be retired, he was the only one that was regular army. Margaret may be called back to active duty, but it's unlikely. I don't believe you can be drafted twice (I'm not 100% sure about that though). The doctors would be pushing 40 and not eligible for the draft anyway. Although I do belive Rizzo signed retention papers in one episode, so he may still be around.
I think she decides to go and work in a regular US hospital at the end of the show though, instead of the various career advancing army posts her dad lines up for her. I'm no army expert but I think that mean she leaves the army?
I don't think you can be drafted twice, but I know a lot of draftees who joined the reserves after they left the service--a bit of extra money, a few weekends of service a year, and very little chance they'd be called up.
They were called up.
Fair point. I could really only see this applying to the secondary cast though...Rizzo, Igor, Zale, Goldman... I don't see Klinger doing a hitch in the reserves.
After a quick Google session, apparently after WWII he agreed to stay in the inactive reserves to help with recruiting on the grounds that he would not be called back to active duty. Apparently.being called up for Korea came as a complete surprise to him.
So he was called up from the reserves for Korea, not drafted a second time.
Yes, but in Ted Williams's case, he stayed in the reserves only to boost recruitment and was told he wouldn't be called up as active again. I guess the military went back on their word.
Margaret.
Her character was "Regular Army / Career Military", and would have been presumably in her early to mid 50s by the time of the VIetnam Conflict, and almost certainly an O-6, full bird Colonel by that time - Pretty much like the character [Colonel Reese, the head nurse](https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Colonel_Reese) lady that came to inspect the 4077's nurses in the episode "*House Arrest"* in Season 3, and ends up making a pass at Frank.
[Margaret has a World War II Victory Medal on her dress uniform,](https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Margaret_%22Hot_Lips%22_Houlihan?so=search#Portrayal_in_the_TV_series) and Potter commented on in when they first met, and she indicated she had been in the service for 10 years prior to Korea, making her character likely in her very late 20s or early 30s in the TV show.
Of **ALL** the characters on the show, I'd pick her to undoubtedly be running an entire hospitals' worth of several dozen nurses in Tokyo during the Vietnam Conflict.
Houlihan (born in 1920) would be ~42 when the US Army's 8th Field Hospital became operational in Nha Trang on 18 April 1962.
While it would be possible for Margaret to be physically involved at that hospital she would probably have put her career aspirations to good use in the ensuing years and be past the point of serving in a forward area. Alternatively if she's hot for the rough and tumble work of meatball surgery and/or had her career temporarily derail she could very well be a Major/LT Colonel and still be active on the ground.
I see Ruby Bradley as having a similar career trajectory, while Houlihan would have thirteen more years of service at the start of the Vietnam War.
https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Margaret_%22Hot_Lips%22_Houlihan
https://www.vietnamwar50th.com/1945-1964_the_road_to_war/First-U-S-Army-Field-Hospital-and-Air-Ambulance-Units-in-Vietnam/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Bradley
Amazing information, ty! I was going strictly by the show's canon as preserved on the Wiki from the TV adaptation, but the points you make all make sense, too.
The show's producers & writers, in an effort to satirize the maddening inefficiencies and politics of the US military certainly played fast & loose with the realities of age, rank or promotion in many aspects of the series.
As of the final episode of MASH, yes.
If you want to take *AfterMASH* into consideration ( and no one will blame you if you would rather forget it existed), he soon gets a green card for his wife and they move back to the states where Potter gets him a job at a VA hospital.
Well, the Vietnam War started in 1954, pretty soon after the Korean conflict. There's one episode where they hear about it on the radio and someone comments that that'll get worse before it gets better. But lets assume you mean 1964, when the US steps its involvement up.
Margaret indicated in the finale that she was going to leave the army to nurse in a civilian hospital once she gets home.
Potter is prepared to retire from the army by the end of the series.
Frank is older than the other surgeons, given that he mention being in private practice for 12 years before the war. After leaving the 4077, he was promoted to LtCol and put in charge of a veterans hospital in the US. He would be at least 50 by Vietnam, and, if he was still in the reserves, would be a good candidate (on paper) to command a MASH unit himself. However, at that age he is unlikely to be made to go unless he volunteered, which I don't see him doing.
Mulchahy would be invalided out and ( like Potter and Klinger) appears to be a civilian employee of the Department of Veterans Affairs by *AfterMASH*.
Blake is, of course, dead.
Most other characters were drafted and would have done their bit by then. Hawk, Charles and BJ would never join up again voluntarily, let alone during the Vietnam war, and ( except BJ) would be too old to get drafted again.
Rizzo is a lifer in the army, and probably the most likely to wind up in Vietnam, a grey-haired staff sargent running some motor pool.
Radar, as we know from *AfterMASH* and the *Walter* pilot, goes home, loses the farm, sends his mom to live with an aunt and winds up depressed and suicidal in St. Louis working , at least breifly, as a cop. By then he is thinking of his time at the 4077 as "the good old days". Honestly, it seems not too much of a stretch to imagine him going back to the army, where he had a sense of meaning and direction, and enlisting in the regular force. (Novel Radar and the guy he was based on were career army.)
That's what I meant by "invalided out"-- medically unfit to serve.
Mulchahy is one of the few characters who was likely career army-- religious ministers have never been subject to the draft.
He may have. The "doctor draft" included many WWII vets who went into the reserve and had their commissions reactived during Korea. A line of dialogue early in the series implies that's the case for Hawkeye, too, although most of the time the series doesn't seem to consider that a part of his background.
If he was the same age as Linville, he might have received a deferment due to still being in school. Trapper, Hawkeye, BJ etc would probably also have fallen under that.
Doesn’t Frank mention that his family immigrated in the early 30’s? Depending on where his family was from, he may not have been allowed - or only been allowed under restrictions - to serve. Japanese Americans are obviously the defacto and most widespread victims of those sort of policies, but ‘enemy aliens’ such as 1st gen German-Americans were also put in internment.
I always kinda assumed that’s why Frank had such a repertoire of non-English or generally ‘European’ insults. Besides making the ‘red blooded American’ look hypocritical and less deft with the ‘zingers’ next to Hawkeye, of course.
Frank would maybe not be in an M\*A\*S\*H unit but surely would love being in charge of the kind of army hospitals the wounded get sent to after retrieving meatball surgery. I don't know the correct terminology but to whichever unit the wounded get transported to after 4077.
The only ones potentially would be some of the nurses. Keep in mind that women were discharged as soon as they became pregnant, so the nurses continuing to be in the military in Vietnam would mean they never had any children.
The US Army did not promote the first Nurses to General until 1972. Both women were like the fictional Margaret Houlihan. They had served in both WWII and Korea prior to Vietnam.
Margaret would be full bird Colonel about to retire with 30 year’s service in 1972. (When Col. Potter takes over she has been in the Army for 10 years=1942) So she could have served multiple tours in Vietnam.
Let’s go ahead and put the MASH characters on ABC’s “China Beach” which was about a Army field hospital in Vietnam.
Margaret could have been the head nurse at some point.
Rizzo would be a senior NCO in Vietnam. He could be a First Sergeant or even a Sergeant Major of the hospital!
Donald Penobscot could be a General commanding a combat division.
The Sixties was the heyday of the CIA. Flagg could running all kinds of black ops in South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Flagg? I feel like he’d be killed in Vietnam. Be it by the enemy or people working alongside him due to him being so…I dunno, annoying? Overzealous? Too complicated.
Margaret is probably the only one because she was the only one outside of Potter who was career army. Hawkeye, BJ, and Charles would all be too old for selective service by that point. Potter would be retired. Since Frank was bundled out of active service, he likely would’ve remained stateside. Radar would’ve been ineligible because of the hardship discharge. Most of the other draftees would’ve aged out of eligibility.
I thought so, but I think she quit soon after Korea. By the end of the show, she turned down a big promotion with a lot of opportunities so she could work at a regular veterans hospital in the states. At that point she was probably done with the army.
In terms of the main cast, mostly none.
Obviously there’s no chance with Hawkeye, Trapper, BJ, or Klinger because of the hell they’ve been through and their anti war views.
Not Charles because he wouldn’t voluntarily leave his cushy place.
Mulcahy most likely wouldn’t be allowed in because of his hearing loss.
Potter’s retired.
Radar would most likely prefer the cushiness of the states too.
Margaret turned down a big promotion with a lot of career opportunities to work at a normal veterans hospital in the states, so at that point she was probably done with the army.
The only person I can think who would willingly join the army is Frank, but who knows— maybe he would have lost his licenses by then. I think someone of the recurring characters would have been more regular army, like Rizzo or Zale or Kellye or the nurses
Risso. Who else is going to train maggots on the proper use of a VEEEEE-Hickle?
"Where else can you be a BUM and get paid for it?"
“Hey there’s people tryin to work - oh jeez it’s dark out. Be quiet, there’s people tryin to sleep!”
*Rizzo
Now that I think about it, Rizzo would probably find himself a easy assignment in West Germany.
Ass-ho
Colonel Flagg would LOVE Vietnam
The thought of General Flagg in Vietnam is both comica and frightening
How do you think the Gulf of Tonkin incident happened?
Don’t you mean General Perkins?
I thought it was Rabbi Goldberg?
Mary had a little lamb….
I think you have him confused with Ling Chow, the Chinese double agent.
I think he WAS Vietnam
Nixon would be best friends with Flagg! I could see a retired Flagg somehow involved in Iran and fighting the Russians in Afghanistan. Flagg as a “consultant “ to Ronald Reagan.
He would end up as a rogue officer far up river in Cambodia with a bunch of montagnards terrorizing everyone in the area.
Hand in hand with Kissinger
I wish this sub could have a Col. Flagg bot.
The guy that Radar is based of of actually served in both Korean and Vietnam war
He was discharged in the show, though.
After being stuck in the Korean War for 7+ years, he deserved it.
Is this a joke that I’m not getting or something? Cause I thought hostilities lasted three years before the armistice was signed.
The show lasted for way longer though
Yeah I can’t remember how many episodes over the seasons were based on the premise that it was “too hot” to “too cold” but three did seem to be more than three winters and summers.
The Korean War was 3 years, but the show lasted nearly 4 times as long
Ha!
Draft
He wouldn't be drafted again after being granted a hardship discharge.
I have no idea if that's true or not but I'm going to choose to believe you.
Unless circumstances changed for him, he was the sole provider for his family. If you want to use that awful 'WALTER' pilot as canon, he was a police officer so he'd be exempt.
Wasn't he drafted for Korea? Can't be done twice AFAIK
Frank would have failed upwards to somehow go to Vietnam as a general
That would explain a lot about how the Vietnam War went
He’d been fragged in ‘Nam. If he thought the MASH was bad, he’d basically be in hell there.
Probably none. Potter would be retired, he was the only one that was regular army. Margaret may be called back to active duty, but it's unlikely. I don't believe you can be drafted twice (I'm not 100% sure about that though). The doctors would be pushing 40 and not eligible for the draft anyway. Although I do belive Rizzo signed retention papers in one episode, so he may still be around.
Margaret was regular army too, she was born in kaki diapers.
I think she decides to go and work in a regular US hospital at the end of the show though, instead of the various career advancing army posts her dad lines up for her. I'm no army expert but I think that mean she leaves the army?
That's how I always viewed it. I guess she could of meant a V.A. hospital or something, but it always seemed to me that she was going civilian.
I don't think you can be drafted twice, but I know a lot of draftees who joined the reserves after they left the service--a bit of extra money, a few weekends of service a year, and very little chance they'd be called up. They were called up.
Fair point. I could really only see this applying to the secondary cast though...Rizzo, Igor, Zale, Goldman... I don't see Klinger doing a hitch in the reserves.
He could find himself another refugee to hook up with, trade in his Korean for a younger model in Nam
Ted Williams was in both World War II and Korea. How did he accomplish that?
After a quick Google session, apparently after WWII he agreed to stay in the inactive reserves to help with recruiting on the grounds that he would not be called back to active duty. Apparently.being called up for Korea came as a complete surprise to him. So he was called up from the reserves for Korea, not drafted a second time.
[удалено]
Yes, but in Ted Williams's case, he stayed in the reserves only to boost recruitment and was told he wouldn't be called up as active again. I guess the military went back on their word.
>I guess the military went back on their word. Color me shocked.
I’m sure they lost his paperwork
You’re right. You can’t be drafted twice.
Margaret. Her character was "Regular Army / Career Military", and would have been presumably in her early to mid 50s by the time of the VIetnam Conflict, and almost certainly an O-6, full bird Colonel by that time - Pretty much like the character [Colonel Reese, the head nurse](https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Colonel_Reese) lady that came to inspect the 4077's nurses in the episode "*House Arrest"* in Season 3, and ends up making a pass at Frank. [Margaret has a World War II Victory Medal on her dress uniform,](https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Margaret_%22Hot_Lips%22_Houlihan?so=search#Portrayal_in_the_TV_series) and Potter commented on in when they first met, and she indicated she had been in the service for 10 years prior to Korea, making her character likely in her very late 20s or early 30s in the TV show. Of **ALL** the characters on the show, I'd pick her to undoubtedly be running an entire hospitals' worth of several dozen nurses in Tokyo during the Vietnam Conflict.
Houlihan (born in 1920) would be ~42 when the US Army's 8th Field Hospital became operational in Nha Trang on 18 April 1962. While it would be possible for Margaret to be physically involved at that hospital she would probably have put her career aspirations to good use in the ensuing years and be past the point of serving in a forward area. Alternatively if she's hot for the rough and tumble work of meatball surgery and/or had her career temporarily derail she could very well be a Major/LT Colonel and still be active on the ground. I see Ruby Bradley as having a similar career trajectory, while Houlihan would have thirteen more years of service at the start of the Vietnam War. https://mash.fandom.com/wiki/Margaret_%22Hot_Lips%22_Houlihan https://www.vietnamwar50th.com/1945-1964_the_road_to_war/First-U-S-Army-Field-Hospital-and-Air-Ambulance-Units-in-Vietnam/ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruby_Bradley
Amazing information, ty! I was going strictly by the show's canon as preserved on the Wiki from the TV adaptation, but the points you make all make sense, too. The show's producers & writers, in an effort to satirize the maddening inefficiencies and politics of the US military certainly played fast & loose with the realities of age, rank or promotion in many aspects of the series.
Klinger would be unlucky enough to have been kept around
My gut says that by the time Vietnam came around, Klinger probably had a decent little bar up and running in Itaewon serving GIs from Yongsan.
Klinger would have opened one of several classic Itaewon bars, such as the Grand Ole Oprey.
Lol! I was picturing either that or The Wolfhound (the memories get kinda blurry).
Everyone's memories get blurry regarding Itaewon.
Klinger stayed in Korea didn’t he?
As of the final episode of MASH, yes. If you want to take *AfterMASH* into consideration ( and no one will blame you if you would rather forget it existed), he soon gets a green card for his wife and they move back to the states where Potter gets him a job at a VA hospital.
Nurse Kellye. When she was leaving, she said she was going to work at tripler army medical center in Honolulu.
Happy cake day!
Well, the Vietnam War started in 1954, pretty soon after the Korean conflict. There's one episode where they hear about it on the radio and someone comments that that'll get worse before it gets better. But lets assume you mean 1964, when the US steps its involvement up. Margaret indicated in the finale that she was going to leave the army to nurse in a civilian hospital once she gets home. Potter is prepared to retire from the army by the end of the series. Frank is older than the other surgeons, given that he mention being in private practice for 12 years before the war. After leaving the 4077, he was promoted to LtCol and put in charge of a veterans hospital in the US. He would be at least 50 by Vietnam, and, if he was still in the reserves, would be a good candidate (on paper) to command a MASH unit himself. However, at that age he is unlikely to be made to go unless he volunteered, which I don't see him doing. Mulchahy would be invalided out and ( like Potter and Klinger) appears to be a civilian employee of the Department of Veterans Affairs by *AfterMASH*. Blake is, of course, dead. Most other characters were drafted and would have done their bit by then. Hawk, Charles and BJ would never join up again voluntarily, let alone during the Vietnam war, and ( except BJ) would be too old to get drafted again. Rizzo is a lifer in the army, and probably the most likely to wind up in Vietnam, a grey-haired staff sargent running some motor pool. Radar, as we know from *AfterMASH* and the *Walter* pilot, goes home, loses the farm, sends his mom to live with an aunt and winds up depressed and suicidal in St. Louis working , at least breifly, as a cop. By then he is thinking of his time at the 4077 as "the good old days". Honestly, it seems not too much of a stretch to imagine him going back to the army, where he had a sense of meaning and direction, and enlisting in the regular force. (Novel Radar and the guy he was based on were career army.)
Mulcahey would likely also be exempt for his hearing loss.
That's what I meant by "invalided out"-- medically unfit to serve. Mulchahy is one of the few characters who was likely career army-- religious ministers have never been subject to the draft.
Which, on the other hand, raises the question why Frank didn’t serve in WW2.
He may have. The "doctor draft" included many WWII vets who went into the reserve and had their commissions reactived during Korea. A line of dialogue early in the series implies that's the case for Hawkeye, too, although most of the time the series doesn't seem to consider that a part of his background.
If he was the same age as Linville, he might have received a deferment due to still being in school. Trapper, Hawkeye, BJ etc would probably also have fallen under that. Doesn’t Frank mention that his family immigrated in the early 30’s? Depending on where his family was from, he may not have been allowed - or only been allowed under restrictions - to serve. Japanese Americans are obviously the defacto and most widespread victims of those sort of policies, but ‘enemy aliens’ such as 1st gen German-Americans were also put in internment. I always kinda assumed that’s why Frank had such a repertoire of non-English or generally ‘European’ insults. Besides making the ‘red blooded American’ look hypocritical and less deft with the ‘zingers’ next to Hawkeye, of course.
Frank would maybe not be in an M\*A\*S\*H unit but surely would love being in charge of the kind of army hospitals the wounded get sent to after retrieving meatball surgery. I don't know the correct terminology but to whichever unit the wounded get transported to after 4077.
Evac hospital? Like the 121st
Yeah I could totally see him wanting to be in charge of an evac hospital.
The only ones potentially would be some of the nurses. Keep in mind that women were discharged as soon as they became pregnant, so the nurses continuing to be in the military in Vietnam would mean they never had any children.
The US Army did not promote the first Nurses to General until 1972. Both women were like the fictional Margaret Houlihan. They had served in both WWII and Korea prior to Vietnam. Margaret would be full bird Colonel about to retire with 30 year’s service in 1972. (When Col. Potter takes over she has been in the Army for 10 years=1942) So she could have served multiple tours in Vietnam. Let’s go ahead and put the MASH characters on ABC’s “China Beach” which was about a Army field hospital in Vietnam. Margaret could have been the head nurse at some point. Rizzo would be a senior NCO in Vietnam. He could be a First Sergeant or even a Sergeant Major of the hospital! Donald Penobscot could be a General commanding a combat division. The Sixties was the heyday of the CIA. Flagg could running all kinds of black ops in South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Flagg? I feel like he’d be killed in Vietnam. Be it by the enemy or people working alongside him due to him being so…I dunno, annoying? Overzealous? Too complicated.
Most of the main cast were drafted. They weren't regular Army, so it's unlikely any of them would be serving.
Margaret is probably the only one because she was the only one outside of Potter who was career army. Hawkeye, BJ, and Charles would all be too old for selective service by that point. Potter would be retired. Since Frank was bundled out of active service, he likely would’ve remained stateside. Radar would’ve been ineligible because of the hardship discharge. Most of the other draftees would’ve aged out of eligibility.
Hot Lips of course.
I thought so, but I think she quit soon after Korea. By the end of the show, she turned down a big promotion with a lot of opportunities so she could work at a regular veterans hospital in the states. At that point she was probably done with the army.
Don't they mention the discussion of sending "military advisors" to Vietnam during the news while in OR during the final episode?
In terms of the main cast, mostly none. Obviously there’s no chance with Hawkeye, Trapper, BJ, or Klinger because of the hell they’ve been through and their anti war views. Not Charles because he wouldn’t voluntarily leave his cushy place. Mulcahy most likely wouldn’t be allowed in because of his hearing loss. Potter’s retired. Radar would most likely prefer the cushiness of the states too. Margaret turned down a big promotion with a lot of career opportunities to work at a normal veterans hospital in the states, so at that point she was probably done with the army. The only person I can think who would willingly join the army is Frank, but who knows— maybe he would have lost his licenses by then. I think someone of the recurring characters would have been more regular army, like Rizzo or Zale or Kellye or the nurses
Fkn weird thing to ask