US President Donald Trump on Wednesday 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.

“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.

His avoidance of combat was hardly unusual among young Americans from wealthy families or those able to go to college.

These include former presidents George W Bush who served in the Air National Guard and was never sent abroad, and Bill Clinton, who received education deferments and has been accused of manoeuvring to avoid the draft.

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.

Trump, who at the time was a keen sportsman and had attended a military school before going to college, has offered a variety of explanations over the years for how and why he did not serve in Vietnam, instead going on to pursue a career in real estate.

Democratic 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden also received five student draft deferments during the war and was later given a medical exemption due to previous asthma as a teenager.