Today we kick off Episode 6 of the 8-part Guest Post series: Military Life: Two Perspectives
In case you missed the introduction to the series: Military Life: Two Perspectives with Leto and Avalune
The topic today is Life in the Military, from Leto’s perspective. Next Saturday, we’ll hear Avalune’s perspective on military life and family.
*****
“This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill – the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill – you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.” – Morpheus
I’ve thought a lot about this post, how I would convey to you what/how “Military Life” is like. It’s both simultaneously utterly thrilling and utterly banal. It’s intense flashes of manic, head-on-fire action followed by prolonged bouts of the utterly mundane. It’s not so different than any office worker trying to leave for the day, and then their boss dropping a fucking volcano potato on their desk with a due date of two weeks ago (because the original email was sent out four weeks ago and it sat in the exec’s inbox for three weeks and four days before they were reminded that this was due TWO WEEKS AGO).
Humans have tried to capture war through the ages in various forms. On walls, vases, books, paintings, music, and movies. Our current generational attempt focuses on special forces and everything they go through. Honestly I hate most of those films. Even the ones that try to show a human side to their people, not just ACTION! EXPLOSIONS! FANCY GEAR!, fall flat for me. The movie/series I’ll return to time and again is Band of Brothers. And it’s not for any of the war scenes, though those are very well executed. It’s the banal moments that hold the most significance for me. People being corrected for uniform infractions, reveling in taking a hot shower after not doing so for months on end, and imitating your boss while being stuck doing tedious shit. The reason I love those is because that’s military life.
The action parts, if you actually ever see any, are mere blips in your career. Get around vets and you’ll hear us say, “Oh you were at X; yeah, that sucked” and we’ll kind of leave it at that. But we’ll spend ages talking about the kid who got shoved into a wall locker at basic training and told, “I WANNA HEAR MICHAEL JACKSON! SING BEAT IT!” because he wouldn’t stop humming while the Training Instructor was trying to show everyone how to fold their shirts properly. Or we talk about the time the guys from Civil Engineering didn’t get a dig permit before digging out near the Radar Approach Control Facility, subsequently severing the 200 pair fiber cable controlling the main radar for the airfield because they thought it was a tree root, continued digging and then hit the main water line which shot water up 50ft and filled the hole with 10ft of water. I laughed then, I’m laughing now.
One of the main complaints I heard, and still hear, is that the recruiter lied to them/a family member/a friend. Yes, we have some shit recruiters. They’re salesmen. But there’s also no way that they can answer every question a person has about military life because it’s too vast. There’s no one single path that everyone travels down. It’s like life or time. It’s relative. We do share some common experiences: basic training, tech school, first assignment, last assignment, leaving the service… and that’s about it. I’ve thought about if I had a time machine and I could tell my younger self what to expect, how to better prepare for what’s coming up. Honestly? I don’t know if I could distill it into some sort of essential map to better follow. Also I don’t know if would want to.
The experiences that I had, all the good and all the bad, shaped me into who I am today. To go back and to fiddle with that would be to produce something wholly unrecognizable now. On top of that, at 21, I was still a knucklehead who didn’t want to listen to anyone about jack shit. I also want to point out that we do have some really good recruiters who try to prepare their folk for what’s coming. But they can only do so much. “Yes it’s going to suck. We all had to do it. You’re going to get yelled at like you’ve never been yelled at before. They’re going to expect you to move before they’ve said to move, but if you move before they say to move you’re going to get yelled at. Do what you’re told and you’ll be out of there before you know it.”
For most of though, Charles explained it the best:
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair …, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way …”
Never in a million years would I try to sell someone on going in, especially now. But if they were to ask me for advice, I’d play it as straight as I could. It’s the same that I did for our son. One of the best things so far has been comparing stories with him. He’s a military brat, doesn’t know any other world, thought he knew a fair amount, but after going active duty he’s gained a whole new insight about some of the things I did, the reasons for them. An insight he’d never have if he’d stayed civilian, and not because I haven’t told him about things, which I have, but because he wouldn’t have had the proper frame of reference to appreciate it. At the same time I try to not pry too much, nor offer up too much advice (unless he asks for it) because this is his journey, not mine. I did my 22 and I’m happy where I am. This is his time, his experience, so I don’t want to rob him of that. He has enough NCOs breathing down his neck, he doesn’t need helicopter dad NCO doing the same.
As I close this out I’d like to take this opportunity to thank WaterGirl and John for giving me a chance to talk to everyone about this. I’d also like to thank everyone who dropped in to ask a question or share their stories. Seeing vets pop out of the woodwork is always a satisfying thing just because of solidarity, plus most of you have good stories that you tell well. So thank you.
With that, the floor’s open and I’m here for the next few hours. Have at it!
Leto
Hey everyone! I’m here, watching Casino Royale (the best Bond film next to Goldfinger), and having coffee. See everyone in the comments :)
Eunicecycle
Hi Leto, thanks for sharing your insights. It just reminded me of a nephew who was always a bit of a wild one, and a recruiter talked him into joining the military. When he was telling us about it, he said, “I need to get out of here. I’m tired of people telling me what to do.” No,he didn’t make it. He didn’t get a dishonorable discharge, it was “for the good of the service” or something like that.
Amir Khalid
@Leto:
Which Casino Royale?
raven
It was just so different 50+ years ago. Ya’ll are smarter and better trained than we ever were. When I think about Project 100,000
and the stupidity of taking underprivileged and undereducated to counter draft deferments it still makes my blood boil. Even though I was 17 year old kid my background from an educated family and my reading ability put me in the upper reaches of the Army. There certainly are similarities in terms of the boredom punctuated with moments of terror but much of it is different. Now, for the grunts it’s probably similar except that their time in the bush is probably much more limited in the current shit. It’s also important to point out how few are really in the shit. Sure there are mines (IED) and the odd angry incoming but most people in the military (and this includes “the greatest generation) are pretty far removed from combat. E.B. Sledge in his “With the Old Breed at Pelilu and Okinawa” points out that people 50 yards behind the line don’t really know what it’s like. God bless those poor motherfuckers who really were “the point of the spear”.
Jager
@Leto:
When I was in Army basic, we had Labor Day weekend off. (noon Saturday to 6 pm Monday) Everybody had big plans, not me. I bussed 90 miles to a little resort town on a lake, rented a room, bought a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, a bag of chips and a half-gallon of milk, then watched a baseball game on TV. Fell asleep, woke up at 10 found a pizza house, ate a large pepperoni along with a couple of beers and went to bed again. I was so tired of being asshole to elbow with other guys, that unless I went out to eat I just stayed in the room, by myself. I felt like a new man when I got back to basic.
raven
@Eunicecycle: General, hopefully under honorable conditions. If I was black I’d still be in Leavenworth but, as it is, somehow I got an honorable (there was also a “reenlistment code” on your 214 and mine was “hell no”.
raven
@Jager: When I was in basic at Campbell in 66 they sent us HOME halfway through for Christmas . Now for a 17 year old skin and bones kid it didn’t matter much but some of the guys with weight issues ended up getting recycled because it was just enough time to fall out of shape.
Leto
@Amir Khalid: Ha! Was hoping someone would remember the original; for me I’m referencing the Daniel Craig re-make of the series. The OG Casino was a bit too campy ;)
@Eunicecycle: yeah, I’ve trained a fair number of troops like that. For some the military is a course correction in their life. Helps temper them, refocus them, and in some cases saves them. For others it’s oil and water. We try to determine that early on in the process to save everyone the headache of what will ensue.
@raven: One of the things that tripped up most people in my career field is the fact that Air Force Technical Orders are written at the 10th grade reading level. You would think that wouldn’t be a problem until you find out that most kids never make it there. When I was an instructor, a good part of my time was making sure the kids understood wtf they were reading. Making sense of the TO, how to navigate it, how to find information. You could see it click for some people, that “A-HA!” Moment. For others it was always a struggle.
Also regarding combat, that’s still true. On the mega bases, it was basically like living in the States. The team of people I deployed with to Iraq, and I’m considering the entire team of 80 members even though we were all split up to different parts of the country, several of us saw lots of action. One group was hit by an IED and their people sent home early. Another faced repeated shelling, with a few receiving the Purple Heart for wounds sustained.
Kirk Spencer
@raven: It’s always different. And it’s always the same. I mean, was 80s-90s and saw the folk from yours and the folk coming in, so I could see what you’re talking about re brains.
Yet we were all soldiers. And you know what I mean, none of that crap they put in movies. It ain’t the blood you share, it’s, well, like Leto said. The guys who found the perfect spot to duck away too bad there was all that poison sumac there. The LT with too much time on his hands who… yeah.
Leto
@Jager: @raven: Man… that doesn’t happen anymore! Once in basic, you’re there for the duration. Here’s my end of basic story: I graduated right after Fourth of July, but during that last week is when the families would come in for the parade and graduation ceremony. You’d usually get two days off, by which you could go with your families (if they came), and “be normal” for 48 hours. What that meant for me was going to Burger King, eating a greasy ass burger, then heading over to a distant cousin’s house for Avalune, the kid, and my parents to hang out. When they dropped me off several hours later I was greeted at the barracks door by our TI yelling at me for “being late!!!” Apparently at the end of week 1 we’d been docked 4 hours from our leave time and I, along with so many others, had forgotten that. To top that off, the greasy BK burger made me sick (because I’d eaten nothing but really good/clean food for 5 1/2 weeks), and I felt like shit the rest of the night.
Good times :)
trollhattan
Twenty quatloos for the canned “carrots” pic. Hilarious and probably quite apt.
raven
@Leto: I studied the GI Bill and GED as part of my dissertation and the GED was created because the education component of the post WW2 Bill was basically for post secondary education (trade schools and such were included) but almost half of those who served in that war didn’t have a secondary credential so they created the GED to allow them to gain that credential.
“Soldier” by Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Herbert has a part in it that looks at how many people there actually were in the field at any one time in Vietnam and it was a ridiculously low number. Yea, you are right, the logistical tail has always wagged the dog.
One thing you haven’t discussed it the “inter-service” and even inside the various unit “conflict”. In my experience the military fostered that kind of shit as way to promote unit pride. I know guys who think you weren’t shit unless you were in THEIR unit. Everyone hated the signal corps until they needed air called in.
Jager
@raven:
I was a squad leader in basic at Fort Wood, had a kid in my squad who was on the “fat boy diet”. Didn’t help, he’d spent 10 bucks a night at the ice cream truck. He got recycled and we didn’t miss him, damn he was a whiny little, but fat, shit. His mother sent him cases of treats, he’d sit on his bunk and gorge himself and never share.
raven
@Leto: Army times, 2017
Fort Jackson, South Carolina, the Army’s biggest basic training post, had several thousand of its own to ship off for Victory Block Leave a week before the holiday, set to return on Jan. 3.
raven
@Jager: The one guy I have vivd memories of looked just like Pet Pyle in Full Metal. I have my yearbook from basic and I go right to him when I open it.
You know that now the Marines do specialty training at the Army bases? I knew a guy who was USMC Motor Trans and he did his AIT at Lost in the Woods. Ditto Arty, they all go to Ft Sill.
Leto
Here’s another basic story, with bonus bad recruiter content:
When you get to basic training, you usually arrive in the dead of night. I think we got off the plane around 11pm, on the bus and at Lackland by 12am, where you’re then greeted by the same sloped forehead Neanderthal you saw in the basic training video playing at the recruiters office, and prayed you’d never meet, yelling at you to, “GET THE FUCK OFF MY BUS!!! NOW NOW NOW NOW NOW!!!” You then spend the next several hours standing on these yellow footprints spray painted on the ground, dropping and picking up your bags, and getting to know the specific brand of cigarettes the TIs smoke because they’ve taken a personal interest in your and are 3” from your face “gently reminding you” of your many imperfections.
You then are taken to your barracks room where you’re told to find an empty bed, stand between it and the lockers, and put your luggage on the bed. A team of 5-6 TIs then proceed to empty the contents on the bed because they’re looking for any contraband. A few beds down, one of the guys empties a complete set of hunting gear (minus guns/knives) onto the bed. The TIs howl in laughter and ask him why the fuck he brought any of this stuff. The guy stammers out the the recruiter said he’d have time “to hunt”. Again, the TI’s howl in laughter. They then proceed to make him dress up in all his highlighter orange glory and march around the barracks yelling, “DON’T SHOOT, I’M HUMAN! DON’T SHOOT, I’M HUMAN!”
You want to laugh at this because it’s probably one of the funniest things you’ve seen. It’s like a John Candy movie come to life. But you don’t because any sound will invite the furies to visit you early and you don’t want that.
/end scene
Leto
@trollhattan: A friend of mine shared that with me earlier in the week and I knew it had to accompany the post. :)
@raven: OMG, the amount of “you’re shit unless you’re X” is/was still alive and kicking. Every career field has that. For comm it’s “Without comm, there’s no bombs!” I remember seeing a whole list of those sharpied onto a picnic table in Kuwait. They were funny.
The best way to relate this is, it’s like family and siblings. The siblings (different branches/units/etc…) all pick on each other. We all give each other shit, and we are allowed to give each other shit. But as soon as someone else comes along and tries to stir it up, we all come together and focus fire out.
Unless it’s the Coast Guard. /s
raven
@Leto: Here’s a strange one for you. This guy, Sgt Dallas Pinkney III was my DI. He’d been a grunt in Korea and said he knew as an 11B he would die in the Nam (he didn’t). I always wondered what happened to him so I’d google him now and then. I came across this picture on the Stars and Stripes site. It’s from when he created the USAUER Drill team! He was one strak motherfucker and at the end of basic he gathered us and said “I know we were tough on you but the politicians are sending you to a war and we hope we gave you a bit of discipline that might save your life”.
raven
@Leto: In “The Great Deluge” about post Katrina New Orleans the Coast Guard rescue people really came through.
Leto
@raven: I’m not surprised by that? I’m sure it’s part of trying to reduce resources spent on duplicate efforts, as well as more total force integration. But some of the more long term studies have found that doing these types of integration, specifically the mega joint bases here in the states, are just a massive waste of funds.
Brachiator
@Amir Khalid:
Heh! Good one.
@Leto:
Enjoyed both Casino Royale and Goldfinger. But pound for pound, From Russia, With Love is the best Bond film.
ETA: I remember when dopes were claiming that Daniel Craig just wasn’t right for the role of Bond. But he has nailed it. And it is a crazy sign of the times that they have had to delay the upcoming Bond film.
Leto
@raven: It’s a long standing tradition of treating the Coasties like the red-headed step children they are. But if I can’t have an Air Force Pararescue team come rescue me , I’ll have a CG rescue swimmer do it. I do have a few CG friends and their pictures/stories are something else.
Zelma
Very interesting posts. I have two cousins-in-law who were in the services. One was a Marine in Vietnam; the other spend 22 years in the Navy as an aeronautics tech so he spent a lot of time on carriers. He was in for the first Gulf War. For both, the service was formative of who they are and both talk about the funny stuff, not the tough stuff.
I know that the quality of the services has increased without the draft, but I can’t help but feel the volunteer military has created a gap between the country and its military. When I was growing up post-WWII, there were so many who had shared the same (or similar) experience. Now it’s like a different world for most.
narya
Comments about reading/comprehension level are interesting. Dad was in the Army from 50-52; one battalion went to Korea, one to Germany. He went to Germany. He kept getting sent to training/education sessions, because dad is smart and literate (only HS education, and still one of the smarter people I’ve every met), and they had to send SOMEone, and a lot of guys around him weren’t quite so literate.
Jager
@Leto:
A college friend of mine went to Army OCS, Some guy from Lousiana brought a fishing motor and gear with him when he arrived at the Benning School for Boys, he put it in the luggage room. Of course, the training officers went bug shit on the guy when they found his gear. He told them, “I heard there was some good fishin’ around here.” From then to graduation he was called “Fisherman” and got a never-ending ton of shit.
trollhattan
@Jager:
Who the heck travels with their outboard?!?
Leto
@Brachiator: What sets Casino apart for me is the fact that the women in the film are more than equal than Bond. Like I’m watching the scene right now with Vespa giving Bond his perfectly tailored dinner suit, and telling him, “I sized you up the first time I saw you.” I think also it’s the fact that there’s actual character exploration and growth. He’s a different man by the end of the film. That’s extremely rare for this series, if not almost singularly unique to this film.
raven
@narya: That’s funny, my entire bn from AIT went to Germany and I went to Korea. I think it was because I volunteered for Vietnam but I was too young (had to be 18). I fooled them, after Korea I went to there Nam anyway!
Mike in NC
That giant can of ‘carrots’ reminded me of getting dried vegetables onboard ship. The peas were freeze-dried and compressed to look like green hockey pucks. To this day I refuse to eat peas.
raven
@Leto: Last time I was at the beach I was surf fishing and it was pretty chilly. There were a couple of dudes just splashing around having a big time. When I walked down to talk to them they were in Navy Rescue school at Pensacola and the water was just balmy for them.
Caphilldcne
I grew up as an AF brat, went to ROTC and got out 4 years to the day I went in. That’s almost half my life. I still have friendships from the military. I spent most that time worried someone would figure out I was gay which was a thought crime under that moron Reagan. I do miss the occasional fresh start of moving. But I was probably not a good fit for the military. I frankly feel bad that the military has been so Politicized and tragically misused. Also all the fake patriotism leading to a type of worship of the military makes me want to puke.
Jager
@raven:
One of our Platoon Sgts in basic name was “Bill Manley”, when he came to pick us up at the reception station, he had on faded green, perfectly tailored fatigues, Jump boots with a dazzling spitshine, a shiny black helmet liner and bug-eye sunglasses. He scared the living shit out of us, the first thing out of his mouth was “You fucking people…”. He was a Korean vet and turned out to be a really good guy. Our other platoon Sgt was a shake and bake, he told me one night that he’d seen Manley and his wife at dinner and said, “Old Sgt Manley loves the Army so damn much, he wears khaki pants and low quarters with a Hawaiian shirt when he takes his old lady out to eat.”
cmorenc
I missed my chance to experience military life back in 1969, when I was 20 and flailing around in college but still gung-ho in favor of the Vietnam War, and so decided to visit the local Marine recruiting office in Raleigh. The recruiter said if I signed up, he would send me to OCS in Quantico. We sat there and filled out all the paperwork, but when the moment came to sign, I realized this was a big step that I really should consider overnight, and despite his attempts to persuade me to go ahead, I held firm and he said “OK, see you in the morning”. I never went back, drew #330 in the very first Vietnam war draft, and never wound up serving in the military.
Which in retrospect was, given the times and circumstances, a wise decision – even had he made good on his word to send me to OCS, green-as-a-stick Marine 2nd Lts in ‘Nam had a rather high casualty rate, and two of my home-town contemporaries in high school are on the Memorial wall in D.C. Of the ones who survived and got through it, none reported it as a good experience, except the classmate who wound up a staff sergeant at the PX in Saigon, for whom his war experience was one continuous debauched party.
Jager
@trollhattan:
His Momma and daddy dropped him off
raven
@Jager: I love it!
Leto
@Zelma: Of of the main reasons why a lot of us (career long people) don’t want the draft to return is because of exactly what you’re saying: we want smart people. We want people who actually want to be there. The draft brings too many variable to the equation.
But like you said, as have I and many other, it’s creates a gap. It’s also why I think a national service program is so very needed. Maybe it’s something positive that can emerge after this clusterfuck of an administration. A New Deal Great Works Program 2.0, of sorts. Something to shoot for, at least.
@Jager: I just laugh at each of those stories.
Ok, here’s a story where you find out Leto is an asshole:
We had this one kid that just wasn’t going to make it. He was a fuck up, we’d tried helping him but to no avail. I think this was right around the end of week three, but we were taught how to salute. Stand straight, raise your right arm at a roughly 90 degree angle to your body, tip of right middle finger lightly touching your right brow.
We spent about a half hour in the day room going over this, at which point the TI dismisses us saying that she was going to call us to her office to demonstrate it. As we’re filing out, Leto gets a bright idea (if you’re already groaning, good call). He calls over Airman Screwup and says, “Hey, did you get that?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it.”
”Ok, show me.”
He proceeds to show me a proper salute, where I then say, “What the hell are you doing? That’s not right! It’s with your left hand!” I then proceed to do a perfect salute with my left hand. I can see the confuse on his face as his brain tries to process this. I have him demo this a few times, he gets it, and then we separate.
My last name is a B so I’m called in fairly early, while his is an S, and it takes him a while. But I’m patiently waiting and then I hear his name called. He walks in (out of my view), gives the reporting statement, salutes, and I hear an eruption of anger that I’m sure is still radiating out into space:
”WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST DO? DID YOU SALUTE ME LEFT HANDED? WHAT ARE YOU, A GODDAMNED COMMIE?!?!?! GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY OFFICE AND DO IT AGAIN!”
At which point Airman Screwup comes out, sees me (and the other guys I’d told to watch/listen), and says, “Very funny guys, very funny”.
raven
@Caphilldcne: There were gay troops everywhere I served and, to a person, they were all great soldiers.
Wapiti
@raven: He was one strak motherfucker
Strak. I haven’t heard that word in a long time.
We also had a word, shamming, to describe people who would vanish during the duty day. It was probably related to the concept of malingering, faking illness to avoid duty. Later in my career I used “shamming” around an Air Force guy and he had never heard it.
raven
@cmorenc: Good, it was fucking stupid at best.
raven
@Wapiti: Goldbrickin!
STRAK
Standing Tall and Ready for Action! (so prolly a C)!
Leto
@Mike in NC: I hate peas. Pretty much always have, I think I always will. Avalune still makes me eat them. /shakesfistinimpotentrage!!!!
@raven: Part of the Combat Controller school is there at Keesler AFB, and you’d catch those guys doing the same thing. They’re just a different breed.
@Caphilldcne: Agree with that. Also thank you :)
@Jager: My TI turned out to be a really good person, but I will forever hear her quiet, rage screaming and just… she had a way of yelling that was just so effective. Not like top of the lungs but this just perfect pitch controlled fury. Highly effective motivator.
@cmorenc: I’m glad you took the extra time.
Brachiator
@Leto:
A really great series of articles. It’s funny, you note that life in the military is not like what is shown in the movies, and yet some of the stuff you describe is still kinda like what I have seen in some movies.
But I note that it is probably hard to convey the tedium of a lot of military life.
I noted that I never served. Had family members and colleagues who have. I’ve known people who never wanted to talk about their service, people who were glad to be out of the service, and people whose lives were profoundly changed by their time in service.
I may have missed the discussion, but I am curious about how you and others may have dealt with people who were not like you, in background, social class, ethnicity, gender and what bonds were formed (or not) based on common purpose and mission.
In the non-military world, I know folks who have gone out of their way to make sure that they never have to live with, work with, or work for people who are not like themselves. I guess you don’t have that choice in the military.
SFBayAreaGal
@Jager: My advanced training was at Ft. Leonard Wood. In my days there it was fondly known as Ft. Hole in th Wall, or Ft. Little Korea (my training occurred during the winter).
raven
@Brachiator: I’ll answer from my perspective. Being thrown into the melting pot that was the Army in the 60’s was a great learning experience. Half of my basic unit was from the Chicago induction station and half from Memphis. So you had militant brothers from Chicago and rednecks from the hills of Tennessee. These were folks who did not get along. Then there were the Puerto Ricans and Mexicans who hated each other as well. So what was my experience? Have you seen Platoon? Now I wasn’t a grunt but everywhere I was the “heads” hung with some of the brothers. There were black dudes who would never even talk to you unless it was in the line of duty but the guys who liked to party and listen to the jams. . .it was awesome. That kind of contact rarely happens in “the real world” but it did then and I’ll always miss it.
Caphilldcne
Brachiator
@Leto:
True enough. But one of the things I remember when I first watched Dr No as a teen was that the woman at the card table in the beginning was presented as an equal. He wasn’t trying to impress her or teach her how to play cards or to watch him play. And she pursued him.
It was very different from the way some women were portrayed in movies before this.
Yep. Very good point.
CaseyL
I have really enjoyed this series from Leto and Avalune. Many thanks to you both for sharing your experiences and insights!
During college, I thought vaguely about joining the AF. I wanted to “go to the stars!” and knew the AF was the best/only way to even hope to become an astronaut. But being petite and terribly nearsighted made that a non-starter from the word go (plus being female, though at the time that didn’t occur to me). Just as well – even then I was wilful and independent, not cut out at all for the military.
raven
This was my rack in the Nam.
What we have here is the difference between Leto who served honorably as a career NCO and a raggedy ass motherfucker like me who did everything to do to subvert what I thought was a racist, bullshit war that needed to be stopped. It’s amazing to me how many Nam vets have become Trump fuck ass holes and that the Anti-War movement inside the military has been whitewashed.
There is even a movie about it
This feature-length documentary focuses on the efforts by troops in the U.S. military during the Vietnam War to oppose the war effort by peaceful demonstration and subversion. It speaks mainly to veterans, but serves as a ready reminder to civilians that soldiers may oppose war as stridently as any civilian, and at greater personal peril.
Leto
@Brachiator:
Think Office Space, but in camo. Like raven said, most of the military is support functions. You have to have those functions to ensure that your fighters (tip of the spear people) are effective. But trying to convey that into some type of story… idk, it would be hard. I’m sure it could be done but for the most part we really are office workers, paper pushing our way through service. Regardless of career field, there’s paperwork that has to be done.
The overriding bond we have is: mission first. It’s what we stress ad nauseum. Doesn’t matter if you hate the person you’re working with, which there have been many a mofo that I despise, but we understand that we put mission first and get the job done.
For the most part, we try to get along. All the usual bonding mechanism help: sports, music, movies… also throwing them together in an environment they can’t escape will tend to be a forging device, like being stationed overseas. I have a number of friends that I disagree with politically, but we have a very similar shared view on many other things: what the military is fucking up, how to best train our Airmen, things that we can do within our own limited sphere of influence to make things better.
The military is good about breaking down most barriers because at the end of the day, we’re all stuck in this together and the only way out is through it, together. And if you don’t want to come, that’s ok, we’ll be sure to drop you off along the way (maybe bouncing on the way out, but still out), but we’re still going to get this done.
trollhattan
@raven:
Was gratified to see plenty of “Veterans against Trump” folks at the Hillary rally I went to in ’16. No idea how large a fraction they represented but they were proud to communicate their stance, with no fucks to give if somebody objected.
Jager
My college roommate let his grades go to hell in 66 and lost his deferment, drafted. He ends up training as a combat medic at Fort Sam. One of his buddies has a brother stationed at Lackland. The buddy says, my brother will let me use his car this weekend. They pick the car up, it’s a 59 Plymouth sedan, an ex-Navy car, gray. Of course, you can still see the Navy stenciled markings on the doors and deck lid under the quickie spray job. Off they go to Mexico, cooler of beer in the backseat. My buddy is thinking, this is about as fucked up as things can get, 2 Army Privates, driving an ex-Navy car with Lackland AFB stickers on the windshield and bumpers and its owned by Air Force E-4.
raven
@trollhattan: I went to a Kerry rally in Atlanta and the dude at the gate said, you can sit in the seats behind him, you look like a Vet. I said “Dawg, I don’t LOOK like anything”! That said I went up to him at the Wall after a Vets Day ceremony in the 90’s and said “Hi, I was here with you at Operation Dewey Canyon III”. He ran away from me like a Chattanooga Hound Dog!
trollhattan
@Leto:
I appreciate the crucible of integration the military provided and IIUC to an extent, still does. I don’t doubt it was and is still messy, but I can’t name another part of American society where it occurred earlier. Harry Truman–radical.
Jager
@SFBayAreaGal: I was there in the hot, muggy shitty summer
Leto
@Brachiator: @raven: this here; the military doesn’t give a shit where you’re from, who you do/don’t want to talk to… you’re there to do a job, and you better get the job done.
I’ve met exactly 1 person from my home town during my time in service, only a handful from my state. I’ve met rich, poor, all the shades under the sun, immigrants/native-born, the guy who could be a fucking rocket scientist brain surgeon with only a 10th grade education level from Georgia, the Ivy League grad who couldn’t find his way out of a paper bag, the proudly open gay man, the not so closeted racist KKK supporter… I mean, it’s all there. You don’t have an option of segregating yourself. You don’t get a chance to wall yourself off from “others”. They work with you, they lead you, you lead them.
And at the end of the day you have to find a way to work together to get the job done. A lot of vets miss this and that’s what they have trouble with when they transition. A singular purpose, a shared/common mission.
SFBayAreaGal
@Leto: In my unit “hurry up and wait” was the motto for all of us truck drivers
trollhattan
@raven:
Man, that’s funny. I’ve never known quite what to make of Kerry, complicated guy with some good and some…puzzling aspects. He was never going to unseat Bush but at least he could have put a scare into them.
America is nuts. Actual war hero McGovern loses to lying, cheating, war-escalating bastard Nixon in a historic landslide.
raven
@trollhattan: When we showed up at Dewey Canyon III and this clean cut officer lookin dude was walking around with a bullhorn like he was in charge we laughed like hell! That said we needed someone like him as the face of the VVAW because most of us were raggedy ass and really pissed. When they slammed the gates of Arlington in our, and Gold Star Mom’s, faces there were plenty who wanted to go over that wall. He calmed it down and, when we went back the next day, they let us in to lay a memorial wreath.
Leto
@trollhattan: we have a pretty vocal contingent. Idk larger numbers but I do know that after the election, most of my peers understood the gravity of the situation and just how fucked up it was going to be. Of course it’s worse than we expected, so…
@Jager: Hahaha, that sounds like an excellent road trip!
@trollhattan: it’s always a mess bringing large groups together like this, but it’s also one of most positive aspects of our society. It’s one of the reasons I think mandatory national service is a good idea.
Leto
@SFBayAreaGal: I’m proud to say that we’ve kept that tradition alive :)
@Jager: oh, so speaking of road trips here’s another story:
This was when I was an instructor at Keesler AFB, roughly 90 mins from New Orleans. One of the long standing rules was that students weren’t allowed to go there. Most of the time, NO was off limits because they’d always get in trouble.
I was teaching night shift and one of my good friends, civilian instructor/retired military, came into my class room at the first break (about 4pm), and asked if I knew where Airman So&So was. I was like no? He goes to inform the supervisors that Airman S&S was missing. Later that night we find out what happened to Airman S&S:
Him and two buddies went down to NO bar hopping. Upon exiting one of the bars, Airman S&S needs to relieve himself, there’s no bathroom nearby, so he goes into a doorway to do the deed. Two cops come along, spot him, yell, “Hey, what are you doing?!” He spots then, attempts to run, they give chase, tackle him, and take him in. His two friends are like, Oh F*CK!, realize what’s just happened, but still have to go back to the dorms. They make the drive, get back, and have to inform the NCO on duty that the dipshit was arrested. This was a Friday night.
The 1st Sgt is called, he makes the trip to the NO jail, and tells the Airman, “If you’re not back to class on Monday you might as well pack your bags”. The kid has to call his mom to bail him out. He does make it back in time. Two days later I get his class, whereby I ask him, “Am I going to have any problems with you?” He meekly states, no, and is an exemplary student for the rest of his time there.
Jager
@Leto:
When my old roomie got back from Vietnam, he went to Hollywood, FL to stay in his grandmother’s condo. It was summer in FL, hardly anyone around, Don started playing volleyball on the beach with some local firefighters. One day a firefighter pal of his said, “We’re starting this new thing called EMTs, you ought to look into it. Don graduated in the first class in Broward County and retired 30 years later as a Battalion Chief.
SFBayAreaGal
@Leto, my recruiter was honest about enlisting in the Army. He told me it would be hard, interesting, and I would experience a different life (he was right).
At the time, the Army was letting you pick where you wanted to be stationed. If I signed up for three years I could pick my permanent station. The two closest bases to my home and family (Ft. Ord and The Presidio) were full so I was able to be stationed at Ft. Lewis, WA.
CWZ
@Leto: I still tell people that I didn’t learn anything in Air Force basic other than how to fold socks into exact thirds and how to iron t-shirts in exact 6″ squares. Oh, and the “cadet E” for the blankets or towels, or something. It’s been a long, long time.
Leto
@trollhattan: I was thinking about this some more and the current integration issue is LGBTQ members. Still. Not so much at our level, because for the most part we honestly do not give a shit who you sleep with/who you love. Do you get the job done? Is our overriding question. But it’s still politicized.
Another one is women in combat, specifically special forces. A big part of that is that most of the members don’t want any lowering of standards because what they do/what’s asked of them is just beyond crazy. It’s also, I guess, one of the last bastions of all male service, so it’s a pushback against that. Remind you of you anything? ;)
SFBayAreaGal
When I joined the Army in 1975, I actually joined the Women’s Army Corps. In 1978, the Army abolished the WAC and women were fully integrated into the regular Army. My basic training was different than the basic training that future women enlistees received.
My basic training was at Ft. McClellan, Alabama and my advanced training was at Ft. Leonard Wood Missouri.
Sab
My husband and one of his brothers were coasties. Red-headed step children for sure. Their oldest brother was a Vietnam vet wih two bronze stars. He did everything he could do to get his brothers into the Coast Guard. My husband still regrets that he didn’t make a career of it.
Leto
@SFBayAreaGal: I mean, that’s really all you can say. We were lucky in that our first duty station was about 90 mins away from my hometown, but something my recruiter said, which is also what I’ve come to say, is, “Who the hell wants to go back home?”
I mean it took me a while to realize what he was saying, but I also understand why so many kids want to go back. Same reason I did: it was familiar, it’s where I was from, it was safe. Sometimes the biggest obstacles to personal growth are ourselves. I’m eternally grateful that some of those decisions were out of my hands.
raven
@Leto: After our “hand-to-hand” combat training the DI said “don’t be goin back on the block and tryin that shit, they’ll kick your ass”!
Leto
@SFBayAreaGal: My basic training had sister flights: all female training units. We shared the same building, but had separate sleeping quarters as well as training. Same training, but they did it with all women, us with all men. I think now they have integrated training flights. Still segregated sleeping arrangements, but an integrating training regime.
@Sab: Two of my mother’s brothers were Vietnam vets. One Marines, one Army. Her dad was a WW2 vet. Two of my dad’s brothers were vets, one Vietnam for sure. My church family also had a good number of vets. Every single one of them said: Air Force. Go AF.
Leto
@raven: Hahaha! One of the complaints about our basic training was that there was no hand-to-hand combat training. The TI’s dutifully replied: we’re not the fucking Marines! You picked the wrong branch! I’ll be honest when I say that I’d seen enough American Gladiator growing up that I did kind of want to try the whole pungi stick whack-a-mole thing. But I’m also glad that I didn’t?
Sab
@Leto: My dad was Navy V12. They sent him to med school during WWII. He reinlisted for Korea but into AF not Navy.
raven
@Leto: Pugil sticks, punji sticks were sharpened bamboo usually placed in pits and rubbed with water buffalo shit so you got blood poisoning if you got stuck. We spent millions developing the jungle boot with a metal plate in the sole so they wouldn’t penetrate. Know what Charlie did? Put them at and angle so they went in the side!!!
Ruckus
@Leto:
I was in the navy during Vietnam. We didn’t get time off till last weekend liberty. 12 weeks of seeing almost no one other than your company and company commander. Now I did get 9 days in the hospital in the middle of that but of course that week didn’t count so I had to transfer to another company a week back from my original one. Going into a new company that had been together for weeks, very few people wanted to talk to me at first. That camaraderie works both ways. We had one guy who refused to take a shower. About ten guys got together and discovered why there was lye bar soap and stiff bristle brushes in the head that we didn’t ever use for anything. Every day from then on this fellow would stand in the doorway and loudly exclaim “I’m taking a shower.” I don’t think that anyone talked to him the rest of boot camp.
No one is ready for the military because, as you say, it’s different for everyone. At the end of that hospital stay I was sent to the bad boy barracks, because that was the only place to sleep if you weren’t in a company. It was only 2 days but as I walked in I saw guys cleaning the floor with toothbrushes, their’s I’d bet. If you were really an ass, they’d assign armed marines to watch you dig a six foot hole in soft sand, fill it up and do it all over again. And again. And again. Till you figured out which was easier, get along or be an ass.
Jager
@raven:
Ours said, “if you can’t shoot ’em, go for the nuts.”
Leto
@raven: Eternally grateful to never have to encounter that.
Sab
@Sab: Dad stayed on for 20 years in Reserves. Got all sorts of medical experience he wouldn’t have had otherwise. Like work in bloodbanks.
One of the big fears they had during Vietnam was that returning vets would reintroduce malaria into the Midwest. That was a huge health issue in the 19th century. By the 20th century we had forgotten it. Lots of guys in Vietnam didn’t take their meds hoping a malaria flareup would send them home. It didn’t.
Leto
@Ruckus: We had people come into our flight about halfway through. Three guys. At the same time we also lost almost half our flight (20 guys) over a week’s time. We started with 50, but by the end of it we’d lost 22 out of our flight. I had very different basic experience than almost anyone I knew.
Ruckus
@Zelma:
The draft didn’t make the service worse. Or better. By the end of the bus or plane ride to boot camp, no one wanted to be there and I served in the navy while the draft was on and no one was drafted into the navy. We’d all volunteered. People worked, did their jobs, some stayed in, many did not. The pay is better now, the military is the same. And different. As Leto says the experience is always different for everyone, even in the same company. I hated the navy, but I worked hard and did my job, stood my watches and took it serious. So did better than 90% of the guys I served with. I bet that hasn’t changed at all. Just because we didn’t like it or want to be there didn’t mean we tried to disrupt or destroy the place. It’s an experience that I’m glad I had, even if I hated it. I met a lot of good people, learned things about myself and earned respect from most for that. The ones who didn’t respect the troops for being there and doing their jobs, those are the people who hurt the military. And in my case those were some of the lifers and some of the officers. And those same people do the same crap in real life.
Leto
@Ruckus: great summary :)
By the end of the plane ride, most of had the same though: WTF DID I GET INTO?!?! Little did we know…
Ruckus
@cmorenc:
I joined the navy in 69, just before they announced the lottery, like the day before. I have excellent timing! I was on delayed entry so I got to watch the draw. I didn’t have to wait long for my number to be pulled. #15. So I was going one way or another. Was sitting with my friends, the one in the NG was something like 125 and the other was like you, over 300. Never felt so relieved and screwed at the same time.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Caphilldcne:
One of the few things that still surprises me about trumpism is the way the people who used “the troops” as a cudgel from 2001-2017 suddenly don’t care what people like William McRaven have to say
Yutsano
@Leto: I have lots of thoughts here as the child looking in, but the best stories I can tell come from the people who I know are still in now. I don’t quite feel right telling their stories (although I know they wouldn’t mind) but they do make me think. I know I definitely made the right decision to not follow my father’s footsteps into that service.
Ruckus
@Leto:
My first co commander was an E6 who was what I called new navy. Excellent motivator, didn’t get mad, got great results.
My second co commander was an E7, grizzled old fart, who treated everyone like I’d expected to be treated. He bullied the weak kids, which brought everyone together in hating him and helping the weak. Effective but not as much as the E6.
Leto
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: it’s almost as if they really never gave a shit in the first place…
@Yutsano: I’m fascinated by the little snippets you’ve spoken about! I have some idea about that world, via family members, but it’s another aspect that should be explored.
I think my son is in the Ruckus mold. He’ll be grateful for his service, but thankful once it’s over. Of course with the potential onset of Great Depression 2: Bread Line Bugaloo, my advice for him might change. We’ll cross that bridge in about 12 months, so…
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
That is the great equalizer. Doesn’t get it all the way done but it does seem to help a bit. But odd ducks are still odd ducks at the end of the day. My experience was that as long as the job got done, most didn’t really care about you or your proclivities. As raven stated, there were gay guys and even people I expect to be shit to them, weren’t. It was sort of we’re all in this together thing.
trollhattan
@Leto:
Right? My go-to on the odd occasion somebody skeptically brings up women in combat is Tammy Duckworth. How did her fellow soldiers feel about having her at their side?
Can just anybody lug a hundred-pound field pack? Guessing not, and there’s a job for them, too.
Leto
@Ruckus: duuuuude… I’ve been there with both. At my last assignment we had this human shaped dildo E7 who was a terrific example of the latter. Excellent with data gather/analysis. Absolutely horrific having him in charge of humans.
Leto
@trollhattan: There’s a lot of men who can’t do that! It’s why the wash out rate for most of these programs is greater than 50%. But we do have some exceptional women who can, and they should be given the chance. But that also goes into our defense posture and how we allocate resources, as well as what missions do we take on in the first place?
Yutsano
@Leto: You want to talk about women in combat? Look at Israel. Compulsory service is required for both genders, and women units were a big part of the Six Day and Yom Kippur wars. And they’ve had that since its inception. I’m personally glad that rule has been relaxed, because it gives greater opportunities for women to be generals/admirals.
Omnes Omnibus
I went into the army as a college option officer candidate, which means that I went to regular basic training and then on to Officer Candidate School. Basic was a bitch for me for two reasons: first, you had to simply turn your mind off and do as you were told which is not easy for me; second, as the only future officer candidate in my class, I was not really accepted as a part of the group. I got KP on all of the good days (pugil stick day, family day, etc.) and was told that Basic was a big deal for the rest of the guys but wasn’t for me (while true, it still sucked).
OCS was better; our class was a mix of junior NCOs, many from elite units, and college op guys like me. The SF and Ranger guys tended to look down on college op guys who better in the classroom than in the field for obvious reasons. The first bit of respect that I got from them was when were did our land navigation test and I got back half of the allotted time with a maximum score. I finished ahead of some of the elite forces guys so there wasn’t much shit that they could say. Out of my platoon of 30 people, only 16 graduated. The artillery school and airborne school were fun for different reasons.
I was assigned to a unit in Germany in the closing days of the Cold War and my unit was part of the forces designed to be a speed bump if the 30th Mongolian Horde ever decided to come across the border and go for Munich and Stuttgart. FWIW Cole was in the force designed to be a speed bump of the 20th Mongolian Horde went for the Ruhr valley. When we weren’t in the field my day to day job wasn’t that different from that of a junior management training program dude in any large organization. I loved being in Europe and tried to take advantage of it as much as possible (even when that merely meant skiing and drinking in as many countries as possible).
This might be one of the longest comments I have ever posted here, so I will wrap it up.
Ruckus
@Leto:
One morning into my second week we were woken up and walked out the back door of the barracks. There was short stretch to the chain link fence that separated navy boot camp from marine corp recruit depot. One of the guys was complaining about boot camp and I pointed to the company of marine recruits, double timing in formation with full packs and M1 Garands at the ready, over broken ground, about 2 miles from their barracks, as we were yawning from just waking up. “This. Or that?” His eyes widened and he never complained again that I know of.
Matt McIrvin
@Leto: I figure if they don’t want to lower physical standards, then don’t–and, yes, a lot of women will wash out; you don’t expect gender parity in that case. But some women will do just fine, and many men will also wash out.
Leto
@Omnes Omnibus: Lots of little interesting nuggets in there, and yes, I think this might be one of your longest comments. Thanks for sharing :)
@Yutsano: Oh I know. A lot of us would point out other countries who had women in their forces, and used them to great effect, but that would be breaking the American Exceptionalism model and all. While I think it’ll be overall beneficial, I also recognize the potential flip side: the Joni Ernsts of command. Ugh.
Lynn Dee
Hurry up and wait.
Leto
@Ruckus: Haha! That’s a really vivid, directly on the nose, example! But I also know that post 9/11, it wouldn’t hurt for all of us to have some basic training like that because the way we fight is different. I also recognize that I’m applying a previous war lesson to future wars. We have changed the way we do weapons training: before it was the four basic positions, nothing else. We still do those, but now we’ve incorporated a number of over/under/beside barricade positions, as well as a number of move/shoot/communicate drills. I don’t know how long those will last, because everything is cyclical, but I’m glad we have it.
Ruckus
@Leto:
In my first company we lost two while I was in it. One slashed his wrists with the band out of a techmatic razor cartridge, and me to the hospital. In my second company we didn’t lose anyone. As far as I know all branches of the military were below the staffing levels desired. Ship I served on for 2 yrs was short about 45-50. For my second year I was, as an E5, head of a department, responsible for all the internal communications of the ship, ship’s control signaling, navigation, special high frequency power generation for us and the missiles. We were supposed to have an E6 and E7 but never did. Myself, 2 E4s, 3 E3s. This wasn’t all that unusual of a staffing situation.
Ruckus
@Leto:
I had a mantra I muttered the entire day I reported in LA and took the bus to San Diego. Started it about 2 minutes after arriving at AFES at 8am. Didn’t stop til I went to sleep after midnight. It was short and to the point.
“Did I ever fuck up this time!”
Ruckus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
As a vet, it doesn’t surprise me in the least.
Leto
@Ruckus: It’s still the same. It’s actually gotten worse as more of the responsibilities have been pushed further down. What the E7 at my first duty station was doing, the same thing is being accomplished by an E5 today. Yes it shows that we’re more capable, but at the same time the maturing process needed to produce better people has been significantly reduced. People actually need some time in grade to “season” them before they’re promoted. We simply have less of that today, and I don’t know what the long term impact on us will be.
Omnes Omnibus
@Leto: @Matt McIrvin: At Airborne School, one of my fellow students was a female 2LT and a number of the instructors made it clear that they did not think she should be there (not the female marine 2LT who lived across from me in the BOQ). She twisted her ankle on the fourth jump and was hurting pretty bad. She knew that she probably wouldn’t be able to do the jog in formation that we had to do get to the hangars to get geared up; they used it to identify injuries. She was formed up and ready to try to tough it out with everyone when the Black Hat (instructor) who had been the shittiest to her called her out of formation. He said he wanted to check her ankle. He kept her just long enough that she couldn’t jog down with everyone else, so he had to give her a ride. She was able to do her fifth jump and limp off the DZ to get her wings.
It is a tradition of Jump School that the Black Hats do not salute student officers in the area of the school. They pissed her off enough that once she had her wings she went to the school and made sure that everyone one of them had to salute and call her ma’am.
Leto
@Omnes Omnibus: I love stories like this :)
Ruckus
@Leto:
Told this story here before. An E7 on my ship was a grade A turd. Useless as fuck, full of himself and the navy. Reminds me of trump a bit. He took me into a compartment one day and closed the door. I didn’t work for this guy, he was just an E7. Told me he didn’t like my attitude. Told him he didn’t get to like or hate my attitude. I have a job and I do that very well. My guys respect my leadership and the fact that I work every bit as hard as they do. My attitude doesn’t interfere with my department having 100% up time and it’s none of your fucking business. He never spoke another word to me for the rest of the time I was on that ship. No one else ever mentioned it either.
trollhattan
@Omnes Omnibus:
Great story.
I work with a guy who went to the Point, then into Airborne and was stationed in Germany at the ass end of the Cold War. Small world.
Omnes Omnibus
@trollhattan: If he was artillery, I might know him.
Ruckus
@Leto:
We “trained” with 22 bolt action rifles. Said training consisted of being shown the weapons and firing them in an indoor range. I got Expert Marksman. But then I could already shoot and was familiar with guns. We didn’t do any obstacle course work, it was being rebuilt. Really, what we learned in boot camp was how to take orders, salute, and say yes sir. I went to school for nearly a year after that to learn my job. I carried a loaded 45 pistol on in port watch and had been doing that for a year before we “qualified” with the weapon. And that considered of us being out to sea, being handed a racked weapon and 2 clips, which we had to fire into the wake of the boat without killing anyone. I rapid fired both clips and handed the open weapon and empty clips back to the gunner’s mate and I was done.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruckus: Not directly related to your story, but the rank not mattering thing brought it to my mind. My battalion was participating in a joint English/French/American exercise that ended with a Time on Target shoot. A TOT means that all the guns involved fire so that their rounds land on one target at the same time. Since the guns are in different places, they have to fire at different times to make it happen. Well, my commander parked himself at my fire direction center; as a battery commander, he had two firing platoons of four guns each. He parked at mine because my counterpart was a little Nazi Aryan poster boy whose next job was as an aide to Tommy Franks. I was a much more cavalier type. The other platoon fired. Within a few seconds, the commander was asking me why I wasn’t ordering my guns to fire. I told him it was still 30 seconds until time. He was going crazy; he knew I had embarrassed him, the battalion, and the American army by firing late. The thing was he couldn’t order me to fire. In the artillery on a firing point once the guns are in position to fire, the fire direction officer is in charge.* At the right time, I signaled the guns to fire and they did. As they did so, the other guns from the battalion also began firing. My commander drove off to the other platoon’s location. I never did ask what the commander said to the other guy.
*Technically, the FDO could kick a general off of his firing point; it would be a bad idea, but it was within the FDO’s power. Everything, good or bad, that the guns did was on the FDO.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Leto: I made a point of flying out(as did the kid’s sister) her her graduation from BMT. We went out to the riverwalk after graduation and then a movie the next day.
Betty
@cmorenc: My brother was assigned to run the PX at Olmstead, south of Miami, in 1968. Lots of scuba diving and drag racing. He did mention some times feeling guilty knowing that his buddies went to Vietnam. That job also started him on very successful career. You never know, as Leto explained.
Leto
@?BillinGlendaleCA: We did the same with our kid. Toured the Alamo, ate some food that he wanted to, raced go-karts. It was nice.
Yutsano
OT: anyone else get hit by that 520 error?
WaterGirl
@Yutsano: I did not. When?
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
Even in the military, sticking one’s nose in where it doesn’t belong is not a good thing and quite likely makes things worse.
satby
Just want to say thanks to Leto and Avalune for this series. Really informative.
Leto
@satby: I’ve been told we’re a full service blog, so just doin’ my part in these times ;)
Ruckus
@Betty:
Had a friend whose older cousin got drafted in 66 I think it was. After he got out he told us he went to boot camp, then to army language school in CO. They kept him there as an instructor. 2 yrs in the army, spent almost all of it in CO.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Ruckus: The kid spent about 4 years of her 6 1/2 at Lackland where she started out(as do all Air Force enlisted folk).
One thing that struck me when I went to her BMT graduation is what a fugly terminal that they have at San Antonio, and that was before I saw a drug bust when I went out for a smoke waiting for my luggage to arrive.
Yutsano
@WaterGirl: About a minute before I posted that. Reported in the next thread as well.
Caphilldcne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: agreed. It’s basically whatever argument they think they can make stick for whatever short term goal they are pursuing – often it’s just own the libs.