During the draft period, what happened to conscripted members who could not make it past the initial training?

Back in 1970 we had a young lady named Teresa Fly from West Virginia
She tried everything to get out, and none of it worked

Marine Corps recruit training Parris Island rejected recruit trainees after a punishing 6 months in most cases. General Conduct discharge or General with a medical for injuries and mental problems. Getting dropped from a platoon was the beginning of a very bad time for "the maggot"s. Brig, correctional custody, crap details for sick, lame, crazy. Observed some painting with leg and arm casts once marching through third battalion area.
Early one Sunday morning a large block formation marched across the parade deck towards the old brick PX area. On their return they were in civilian clothes marching in the direction of the gate road. We were cleaning and not supposed to look out of the windows but we did. Scuttlebutt from a pick up had it they boarded buses out of site of first battalion area. The pickup had been recycled for three months before joining our training platoon.

I enlisted in July 1966. In my BCT unit we had one person who was absolutely a mental case, who honestly couldn't tie his boot laces, or dress properly, and no he wasn't putting this on. We had another guy who couldn't red or write, add or subtract. Quit school at a very young age..
It appeared they're scraping the bottom of the barrel. After the cycle completed, they did discharge the mentally incompetent guy, but the guy with no education went on to be a grunt. The strange thing about all of this was that, about 75-80% of our BCT group were OCS candidates!

Recycling was the norm. That could prove a strong motivator to get out of basic. More than a few acted mentally I’ll and unless they were obvious fakes they could get out as unfit, with a general discharge.

Seriously? We, who were drafted in 1965, were mainly highly patriotic, motivated and adapted to the military. We were just out of high school and in fairly good shape. As soon as we arrived at Ft. Lewis, WA, we were told "you're in the 4th ID and are going to Vietnam". It was train and retain. Instead of DI's, we had cadre that mostly had already been to Vietnam. They motivated us to take our training seriously and provided great leadership. We served with honor and fought hard.

Good afternoon @MAJ Vance Fleming. Excellent post. Thank you for sharing this Sir. :->

Conscripted is absolutely the wrong term
They where drafted into the military
Where conscripts will serve their time in various positions in government organization
So as a public affairs officer you need to consider that
Most ineligible or unable to make it through basic training where medical out or less than honorable depending on the situation

I was RA in 1969. During the medical that was given prior to being sworn in. The majority of men going thru the medical stations were drafted. One fellow had a STD so everyone had him pee in their cup. Hearing test after the tone they either did nothing or pressed the button. Needless say everyone was medically cleared and sworn in! Nobody failed!!

I made it and I'm a real pussy. Never played sports because I kept getting hurt and I didn't like snow sports like Hockey or phys ed/gym in high school. Was a volunteer "candy striper" at "Windham Community Hospital in Willimantic, Connecticut in the Radiology (X-Ray) Dept. and that's why I went to Hartford Hospital (Hillyer College) for an X-Ray technologist License after graduating from Windham High (1957).

All of the above. As CPT Cable pointed out, the Selective Service System was supposed to weed out those who had no chance of successful service as well as those from rich and/or politically-connected families. The physical and mental standards for the draft could be quite flexible at times, especially since each district was expected to provide a number of draft-eligible young men based on population. In the 1960s the draft was not formal lottery system that came later.

Once a draftee made it through the induction center and arrived at the military for training, very few were weeded out. The military generally worked on the assumption that any draftee who didn't meet standards must be unwilling rather than unable.

The Army approach in the mid-1960's was to try to push everyone to meet minimum standards. If a recruit didn't meet standards, some waivers were authorized, but if the recruit was completely unusable they would eventually get a General Discharge for "Failure to Adapt."

Recruits who didn't meet standards in Basic Combat Training would initially be "motivated" by their Drill Sergeants. If that didn't produce the desired results recruits who were deemed to be trying and making progress but not passing might be recycled to repeat part or all of BCT with another company.

Most who didn't meet BCT standards would be sent to the Special Training Company which each BCT location operated. At STC, recruits would be categorized based on the perceived problem:
- Academic Failures (Language) -- anyone who didn't speak or understand English
- Academic Failures (Slow Learners) -- anyone apparently dumber than a rock
- PT Failures -- anyone who couldn't pass the PT test but seemed to be trying
- Motivation -- anyone who wasn't trying to pass whatever they were failing.

The Language platoon was generally about 98% Spanish speaking recruits. The Drill Sergeants assigned were all fluent in Spanish. The strategy was pretty much to just teach them in Spanish and to give them enough English comprehension to pass BCT. The occasional recruit who didn't speak English or Spanish would learn one or the other through immersion or eventually be discharged.

The Slow Learners got small group or individual tutoring on each required skill until the could pass the test (once) or until the cadre decided the recruit really was too stupid to send to a unit even as a door stop.

The PT failures just spent all day every day doing PT and taking the PT test 2 or 3 times a week. As long as the recruit was trying there was no harassment and the physical training was more professionally done than in BCT. Eventually the recruit would pass the PT test (once) and be sent on their way. If the cadre decided he wasn't trying he'd be sent to the Motivation Platoon.

The 'training' for the motivation platoon was simply harassment all-day-every-day. Think of any bad movie about USMC Basic Training and double it. There was some time limit on how long a recruit could stay in the motivation platoon. Most would decide that being in the army was better than being in the motivation platoon, some would stick it out long enough to be given a General Discharge for "Failure To Adapt."

AIT failures were generally reclassified and sent to training in a different MOS. The two most common MOS to dump people were Infantry or Cook, both of which were assumed to require no real skill.