A lot of the people in the US army during the revolution were civilians prior to the shooting, but they were led by men who had fought in the French & Indian wa

A lot of the people in the US army during the revolution were civilians prior to the shooting, but they were led by men who had fought in the French & Indian war for the British. How is this any different from today? There are nearly 25 million veterans in the U.S. today. That's nearly a tenth of the population with previous military experience, many of them officers, trained in the same rifle platform that is the mainstay of our infantry today. It does however seem likely that there are fewer civilians with practical firearm experience nowadays, though I am not aware of any statistics from the revolutionary era to compare to (anyone have a source?).