Well, you have a point. Perhaps we should not send soldiers, then, into combat before they are 21. I would be in favor of that. That would be a better solution, IMO, than lowering the drinking age.

 

This argument for allowing drinking at 18 simply because a person is age-qualified to go into combat contains one serious flaw: a soldier is selected from a group of applicants, then is rigorously trained for combat and tested to determine his performance. Only then is he/she declared capable of making critical decisions and given a combat role, serving directly under more experienced leadership until they develop the experience and discipline such serious matters demand. Drunks are not trained and mentored. A proven mature, well trained, and disciplined soldier can make responsible decisions and be trusted with a weapon. A drunk cannot.

Military recruits are given a battery of tests, some of which relate to their learning skills, socialization, and basic intelligence. Those who pass are trained and drilled in their combat skills. In the days of the draft where sub-par recruits were often taken into that big drag net, they were (supposedly) never put into a combat role. Today's volunteer military can be more selective. If you are unable to learn and demonstrate a certain amount of responsibility and self-discipline, you are either retrained, occasionally retained in a support role, or released. Without this internal compass and self-discipline, you are considered a liability to a combat unit.

This differs from civilian life where there are no immediate consequences for being a drunk other than a nasty hangover. You are not making life and death decisions, and certainly you are not responsible for your comrades. However, just because it is not written into your job description as a civilian, you ARE still responsible for the safety of those around you. Suddenly allowing a person unused to making critical decisions to determine his/her own state of intoxication is ludicrous. Even mature and experienced drunks don't easily turn over their car keys.

Setting a calendar age for drinking is dangerous. Some of us are responsible at 14, while others never mature at all. There is medical evidence that the brain is not capable of making mature, reliable decisions until the age of about 22-23 because some critical areas of the prefrontal cortex have not fully developed. Focusing the mind is an act of will that can to some extent, be trained to allow good decision-making processes. That's one of the purposes of military discipline. Perhaps we need to test and train teens to make the decision to drink with the same sort of diligence we use to instruct and discipline our soldiers.

Rather than just allowing people to drink at a certain age, maybe we should require training, simulated experience, and testing before allowing them to drink and pick up a lethal weapon like a motor vehicle.