This has bugged me for a while, and I wonder if it's been bugging anyone else. Why did Dick Whitman even bother with the battlefield switcheroo?

Yes, it probably got him out of Korea a little earlier, but the deployments weren't so unbearably long that it would have been worth the risk. Yes, it gave him easy access to a new name and a slightly better backstory, but names were pretty easy to change and he obviously has no difficulty in lying about his past.

The implication throughout the series has been that he pulled the switch because he wanted to escape his old life. But guess what? He was already gone! He was 10,000 miles away, and had no reason ever to go back to Whitmanville. He could have served out the remainder of his time, moved to anywhere in the country he wanted to, and changed his name to anything he wanted. Why go through with this incredibly risky and illegal fraud?

Is there something Weiner and company aren't telling us, or is this just a plot hole?

(I've been waiting for someone else to answer...) I thought the mix-up was in the hospital, and he found it nice to be treated like an officer, and went with it. I may be confusing this plot detail with William Holden in "Bridge over the River Kwai" but I thought basically it was the same idea.

In a flashback it shows Don/Dick intentionally switch tags. This was immediately after the real Don Draper was killed, on the battlefield and before the hospital.

Draugen:

This has bugged me for a while, and I wonder if it's been bugging anyone else. Why did Dick Whitman even bother with the battlefield switcheroo?

I'm with you, its always semed contrived and implausable. I mean it took him all of about a minute to hatch up his "plan" to switch dog tags - in a wounded, hazy state - and with all the probable failure modes, he gets away with it?? In real world I'm sure he gets caught real quick before he gets out of Army - "That’s not LT Draper!". (And what about the parents/siblings who will look everywhere to find their son/brother.

And as Don/Dick tells Betty, a name is just a name. Not like he used a college degree Draper might have had to get ahead. His success appears all due to his talent and drive. No reason why someone named Dick Whitman doesn't achieve same success.

The only reason, apparently is to get out of Korean War early, and given his plan's high improbability of success and large penalty for failure, Dick was a guy who really, really wanted to get out of the war. But given that that is the only possible motive, it seems that for the show to make more sense it would revolve more around Dick's guilt about what he did in Korea, and maybe about his efforts since to become a man of courage and character. Or the other way, and about a guy going through life lying and cheating to get ahead or something. But in its current form, I don't know what the shows about in the context of this big name/identity concealment.

A common question asked men of that time was "What did you do in the war?" And Betty finding out last week that instead of being married to a man who had a measure of war heroism, was instead a "coward" (as he would be considered then) who lied and decieved to get out of the war, might have pushed an already shaky marriage past breaking point.

It was probably done spur of the moment- and I agree it was stupid and risky. He probably would have gotten out anyway since he was injured in the blast. One possibility would be so his family could get his death benefit, but overall it seemed like a plan that didn't really need to be undertaken.

You are right in thinking there is something that doesn't add up but I think we will find out fairly soon why that is. It can be only one of two things in my mind: #1 He committed some kind of crime or major offense. He joined the army to escape being found out. So by switching IDs he felt he could escape the consequences permanently. Or #2 He could no longer handle the horrors of war. They may show something even worse than the death of the real Don D. that he witnessed, some atrocity. And Dick being deep down a decent sensitive man knew he couldn't stay in that war and keep his sanity. Remember how mad he was at Grandpa Gene for glorifying war to little Bobby? I have no doubt that M. Weiner will clear this up before too long. But maybe not till next season.

"Is there something Weiner and company aren't telling us, or is this just a plot hole?"

It's possible that Dick entered the military in the first place to escape something other than a dreary farm life. Assuming Don's identity would let him escape the war and bury his past even further.

It could simply be that it was a 'heat of the moment' decision. He had just accidentally caused the death of the real Don by clumsily dropping his lighter in gasoline. That might be enough to make a man desparate to just get out of the war any way possible right then...

I agree with you that the benefits of the ID theft don't seem to outweigh the cost. There wouldn't be much story without it. Even some of the best TV/movie plots require at least a little willing suspension of disbelief.

haensgen, as my mother would say "great minds think alike". I posted the same two reasons before I saw your post appear, 2 minutes apart....

this is, folks, a fictional story. Fiction writers write fiction, meaning they make stuff up. And sometimes the stuff they make up does not track perfectly as 'realistic'. It's entertainment, people!

I agree that Don's switcheroo on the battle field was a drastic way to escape Dick Whitman. . . I think the reason Don's secret is such a burden to him is because his real secret, switching identities on the battlefield was a cowardly act that is likely to be scorned by most people.

Dick tells Don, when they meet in Korea, that he has only been in the Army a short while and he is grand new to Korea. Heck, Dick probably enlisted expecting to be stationed state-side, right? He didn't realize that as a poor, unconnected grunt, he would be shipped straight to the front?!!

Dick switched those dog tags because he had a LONG time left in combat position: I don't know how long guys were sent to Korea .. but I think the minimum amount of time you could enlist was two years. . . so give two months for basic training. . . wouldn't that mean Dick was facing, easily, another year in Korea as a PRIVATE, meaning he was going to be digging ditches when he was lucky and in direct combat when he was unlucky. I saw him digging that ditch, and watching Don do absolutely nothing. . . remember how Don told Dick to start digging, that he was the only one. Don made it very clear that he wasn't going to do that work because he was superior to Dick in rank. Don flaunted his rank. I think that with each shovel full of dirt, Dick's resentment of Don's privilege surge. He had to be thinking about why Don got to be an officer and he a lowly private and what was so special about Don and his elite ability to just sit around and watch one guy dig? I think all of Dick's class resentment had time to fester as he dug, even if it was just a day or two . . . I think he had spent a whole lot of thought wondering what it would be like to go through Korea as an officer.

It was convenient that Don's hitch in the army was almost over -- he only had a few more weeks. . Dick switched dog tags as a way of deserting.

Don's big secret is the cowardly act of desertion, not the name switch. Living with an assumed name has given him a way to dissociate from the underlying cowardice. . he can snivel and cower about his fear of being found out but his real fear is having guys like Roger and Bert Cooper and even a sniveling drip like Pete Campbell found out that in the battlefield, in combat, he took a cowardly way out.

Now don't get me wrong. I don't want any humans to be trapped into war. Desertion is okay with me. I think there should be no military. Let's all turn the other cheek and trust that the intrinsic goodness that is commonly labeled 'god' or 'allah' will carry us through.But our society, Don/Dick's society, attached a lot of scorn on deserters. Our military complex needs that scorn to perpetuate itself. If everyone shirked their combat position the way Dick did, how could the guys on the top keep practicing war all the time, war rooted in profiteering?!! In the military-industrial complex, there aren't many crimes greater than desertion. . . and that is the root of Don/Dick's secret.

The name change, as has been suggested, is not that big a deal.

tizzie.lish:

I don't know how long guys were sent to Korea .. but I think the minimum amount of time you could enlist was two years. . . so give two months for basic training. . . wouldn't that mean Dick was facing, easily, another year in Korea as a PRIVATE, meaning he was going to be digging ditches when he was lucky and in direct combat when he was unlucky.

All I know about it is from watching M*A*S*H, where (at least the doctors) they were always having their discharges put off as the war ground on. (I don't know if that was what actually happened in Korea.)

Don't forget how much his upbringing made Don hate himself, which would cause him to be eager to take on the identity of someone else. I wonder if he would have done the same thing if he'd been clear headed.

It's so obvious, but, until you said so, it didn't stand out. Yet, there was always the nagging question of what exactly was going through his mind.

Either this is a major plot point -- Dick Whitman was escaping something huge (either the war or a big problem at home, but one that Adam neglected to mention) or the writers just sort of thought it was a nifty device to make him a man of mystery and deception. Only they also forgot to fill in the years of the mid-to-late-40s.

Perhaps all these things will be revealed. If they're not, then the entire "Man Men" story, while fascinating, is based on a major character whose purpose in life, his subterfuge, his tragedy, his enigma, his motivation, are phony. That will leave a bitter taste.

Although, really, it has been a sleight of hand for them to have made us care about a guy who stupidly blew up his commanding officer while he was going for a smoke.

The plot hole is in the Dick Whitman saga between the ages of 12 and 25.

Dick is around 12 when the hobo comes to visit. He's at least 25 in Korea. What happened in between those years?

I'd like to know how it is he didn't get drafted during World War II; he would have been 18 in 1943.

What gives?

Arubyan: We've already been through this on a different thread. Dick Whitman took Don Draper's identity and therefore also his AGE. Lt. Draper was 25 NOT private Dick Whitman. Dick was at least several years younger.

arubyan:

I'd like to know how it is he didn't get drafted during World War II; he would have been 18 in 1943.

How do we know he wasn't? Maybe in WW II he saw more action than any 18 yo should see. Then later got called to Korea (it happened to lots of men), and with his WW II memories he just couldn't go through that again. That may provide more explanation and a measure of redemption.

The assumption of the original question seems to be that Don/Dick has a pattern of behaving in a rational, low-risk manner, and that his tag switch in Korea was a departure from the almost Spockian logic of most of his decisions. I'd say that the Korea gambit wasn't his only lapse in judgement, or rash act. So, not necessarily a plot hole, in my opinion.