Trump says was ‘never a fan’ of Vietnam war

US President Donald Trump yesterday said he has no regrets about being able to avoid serving during the Vietnam war, because he was not a “fan” of the highly unpopular conflict. “I was never a fan of that war, I’ll be honest with you. I thought it was a terrible war.

I thought it was very far away,” Trump told interviewer Piers Morgan on ITV television while visiting Britain for ceremonies marking the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion in World War II. “You’re talking about Vietnam and at that time nobody had ever heard of the country,” Trump said.

“This isn’t like ‘I’m fighting against Nazi Germany, we’re fighting against Hitler.’” Trump graduated from the Wharton School of Finance in 1968, becoming eligible for the draft to be sent to the war which, despite his comment, was at a peak in that year, with around half a million US soldiers deployed.

It was also the year of the Tet offensive, a failed push by communist forces into US-backed South Vietnam that left thousands dead and marked a turning point -- electrifying the US anti-war movement and eventually prompting the Americans to withdraw. Shortly after Trump left Wharton, a doctor diagnosed bone spurs in his heels, a condition enabling him to get a medical deferment from the draft.