video
showing the smallest man in the navy. His exact stats aren’t given but he is said to weigh less than 90 pounds, and is prob under 5 ft tall.
Shorter than the 5’2” woman interviewing him. A bigger, stronger guy lifts him over his head and easily twirls his body around; hand comparison too

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note: one of the comments says he’s 4’9” and it’s said 4’11” is the shortest you can be to get into the navy—maybe he does clerk work? He says he gets out of doing manual labor somehow

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Before WWII the minimum height for the US military was 5-4. During the war it was lowered to five feet in order to enlarge the draft pool. It remained at five feet after WWII, but maybe its been lowered another inch more recently due to the greater number of women entering the service.

The 4-9 navy guy in this video isn’t unique, however, just unusual. Searching newspaper archives using phrases like “shortest soldier” or “smallest man in the army” I’ve come across articles about other very short guys serving in the military who were 4-9, 4-8, and in one case 4-7. They all needed waivers in order to enlist.

There are plenty of jobs in the military that small guys can handle, such as clerks or communications techs. Small size might even be an advantage for some jobs; for example, mechanics who have to access tight spaces for repairs or inspections. But a lot of jobs in the military require physical strength. Also, military equipment is designed for the normal height range — a 4-9 man (or woman) might have trouble driving a jeep or transport truck. Military trucks don’t come equipped with seats with power height adjustments or extension pedals. The military has upper height limits for the same reason — very tall men don’t fit the equipment either.

I read an article about one 4-10 soldier who had trouble keeping up on long marches because of his short stride. He ended up transferring out of the infantry to a different branch of the service where his size wasn’t as much of an issue. A 4-9 paratrooper who weighed less than 90 lbs had to have the guy next to him in line fasten his rip line to the overhead rail because he was too short to reach it, and he always hit the ground after everyone else. The standard size parachute was probably designed for an average weight as twice as much as his, which meant that he floated down slower than everyone else. I would think that dropping more slowly than the rest of his platoon would be a safety issue in combat, although I suppose being a smaller target might mitigate to some extent.

In addition to issues of physical strength and ability, another consideration for the military in granting height waivers is how to outfit little guys who are outside of the normal size range. The smallest size uniforms have to be cut down to fit and shoes may have to be specially ordered. I read about one 4-10 guy who was discharged after training camp because the quartermasters couldn’t find shoes small enough to fit his size 2 feet.

However, I suspect the hardest part about being in the military for someone as small as the seaman in this video is having to endure constant ribbing about his size. This guy comments in the video that getting made fun of isn’t just a daily occurrence, but more like hourly. One very short soldier told a reporter that his drill sergeant was constantly yelling at him in front of his platoon to stand up straight and look him in the navel. Another guy said it was a daily source of amusement to his barracks mates that he had to stand on an upturned bucket in order to see his face in the mirror when he shaved. It takes a strong person to put up with that kind of constant verbal harassment and remain a good sport about it. The little guy in this video has my admiration.

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Thanks for the info…I do know once I toured the Nautilus submarine in Groton CT and it was tough for an avg sized but heavy guy like me but some kid, 12 or 13 and thin, had an easier time and I thought it would be advantageous to be on the petite side in something like that

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