As I mentioned before Number One Son has done me proud by joining the Minnesota Army National Guard to become a UH-60 Blackhawk crew chief and eventually a pilot. But before he get to wander around the wild blue yonder, wait, that’s the Air Force, he has to make it through Army basic training. Now I have no doubt that NOS will be able to handle the rigors of basic, mostly because he’s my son and I raised him right, but also because it seems that the PC powers that be have made basic too easy and essentially turning it into a 9 week summer camp. At least that’s what I’ll be saying whenever NOS tries to tell me how hard basic was. “Back in my day we had to march uphill, both ways, through knee deep snow, in the dark, all day, just to get yelled at” Actually I loved basic training. I was 17 at the time, in great shape, soccer, track, skiing, so the physical training part wasn’t a problem, but by far the hardest part was not laughing at the drill Sargents. No I don’t mean laughing “AT” the drill sargents, I mean trying not laugh while they yelled, screamed and made fun of us poor trainees. Because if they caught you laughing or even smiling while standing at attention you were in deep shit. And let me tell keeping a straight face while those guys did their thing was HARD! Oh my God those drill Sargents were funny. It was like standing at attention in the front row of a stand up comedian competition. And if they caught you smiling they jumper on you like Joe Pesci in Good Fellas. “I’m funny how, I mean funny like I’m a clown? Do I amuse you?” Ya, that smile disappeared pretty damn fast, especially when you found yourself beating your face from the front leaning rest position. I don’t remember too many of the comments, it was 1979 after all, but one of the best was when a drill Sargent walked up to a group of idle trainees, pointed at the ground and screamed, “What the hell is all that dirt doing in my hole?!” hilarity ensued. Not the best story in the world but that’s what the internet is for.
One of the first days in basic a guy in my platoon was standing at attention while having his room inspected by the instructor.
It didn’t matter how nice his room was because there was a large piece of fuzz/fluff on his shirt that immediately drew the sergeant’s attention.
Imagine a female, French-Canadian, sergeant with this accent.
“Recruit Bloggins! What is that on your shirt?! Is that a fluffy!?”
“Yes sergeant!”
“Why is there a fluffy on your shirt, Bloggins!?”
“I must have missed it, sergeant!”
“Missed it? It is so huge, how did you miss such a big fluffy!?”
She picks it off of him. “Hold out your hand.”
He holds out his hand and she places it in his palm.
“This is Mr. Fluffy. Find a home for him, like a pill bottle or something. From now on, whenever I want to see Mr. Fluffy you must bring him to me.”
And so, for the rest of basic, every time the sergeant found a piece of fuzz she would yell out, “MR. FLUFFY!” and Bloggins would have to march over to her and present Mr. Fluffy and she would formally hand him the new piece of fuzz to add to Mr. Fluffy. There was hell to pay if he didn’t have Mr. Fluffy with him at all times.
Marine Corps boot camp, one kid on firewatch failed to notice the drill instructor coming on deck (which means you immediately salute and report your post), so the DI ran up to the rifle rack, smacked it, and yelled “BAM! You’re dead.” He tried to respond, but was cut off by the DI: “You’re a ghost now, you can’t talk. Go act like a ghost.”
Then the kid had to wander around the squad-bay for the rest of his two-hour firewatch acting like a ghost, and he took that responsibility with a stride. Plenty of ridiculous “oooOOOOOoOOOOo i’m a ghooOOooost” noises and f—ing with people’s racks. We were all laughing our asses off for the next hour till our senior drill instructor got pissed.
Replacing the oxygen he stole from everyone else, by Tain01
A service member was a total f—up, to put it gently. Couldn’t be on time, couldn’t show up dressed to standards, constantly forgot professional courtesies, so on. When he was on his last straw, his squad leader pulled him aside and more or less started yelling, then stopped himself.
“No. You know what? I’m done yelling at you. It doesn’t work. Stay right here; don’t go anywhere.” He stormed off into the company building. The phrase, “stay right here, don’t go anywhere” is typically the precursor to something horrible happening when said in anger. The squad leader eventually emerged carrying a small-ish potted tree, which he handed to the service member.
“You will keep this tree alive. You will carry this with you wherever you go in uniform. You will take it to PT, you will take it to chow, you will take it to work. If anyone asks you why you’re carrying this f—ing tree around, you will tell them, ‘It’s to replace the oxygen I stole from everyone else.’ “
Probably the funniest punishment I’ve ever seen, and we’ll never see it again (because you’re not allowed to do that).
We had a guy that somehow got his watch through the indoc (They take all your crap when you first get there). Well, the Drill Instructors found out he had it when they saw him wearing it one day, so they put him in the squad bay trashcan and put the lid on it. Every time they walked by and kicked it he’d pop out with his watch and yell, “SIR THE TIME ON DECK IS ZERO-NINE-FORTY-FIVE!” and then go back into his can like the freakin’ grouch from Sesame Street.
A recruit in Marine corps boot camp thought he was special because he was an eagle scout. The Drill Instructor picked up on this and during Physical Training took him into the woods and made him build a nest. Then he had to squat over it in order to keep his eggs warm.
Week 1 in Army Basic Training we had a soldier ask for an omelette in chow line (which was not allowed because there was absolutely no time to make custom omelettes for every single basic training soldier). The cooks started making the omelette when a drill sergeant asked what the hell was going on. The basic training soldier replied “go around, drill sergeant, I’m waitin’ on an omelette”. Needless to say, this was the wrong thing to say and do week one in basic training. Our platoon motto was henceforth “go around, drill sergeant, I’m waitin’ on an omelette” and the basic training soldier was henceforth named PVT Omelette.
Saw a guy on a full-body waiver for exercises. The instructor gave him 1,000 smiley-frownies… (smile, then frown is 1). The hardest/easiest exercise ever.
Edit: for those who don’t know, a full-body waiver is something to the degree of: Cannot lift objects, no walking for more than 200 meters in one setting, no strenuous activities, etc. Basically making all normal physical activities out of the question.
The “suicidal” private caught messing with a girl in basic,by epochellipse
I was in a gender-mixed company in basic. The third floor of the barracks was split with females on one half and males on the other. Males were not allowed in the female half and vice-versa. My platoon was out back practicing throwing grenade bodies and a window on the female side of the third floor opened and a male snuck out of the window onto the ledge. It was immediately obvious to everyone, including our drill sergeant, that he had been in there messing around with a female and another drill sergeant must have come down the hall, forcing him to get out on to the ledge so he wouldn’t get caught. Our drill sergeant looked at the guy for a minute and then yelled really sarcastically, “don’t do it private, you have lots to live for.” Then they put him on suicide watch, and made him hand over his belts and tie and shoelaces and everything that he could hang himself with, and made him drag his newly bare mattress out into the hallway next to the fire guard desk and sleep out there every night until we graduated four weeks later. And they made his battle buddy sleep on the floor next to him for the first week.
My brother told me that when he was in basic, a Drill Sergeant yelled at this guy to “beat his face”, meaning to do push-ups. Said guy had no clue it meant that, and promptly punched himself in the face, really, really hard, and fell to the ground. The Drill Sergeant had to walk that one off and my brother said you could hear him laughing hysterically as he walked behind a building. Not totally relevant, but I figured I’d share.
Navy Basic Training. All of us are doing pushups. When the instructor says “down”, everyone counts. When the instructor says “up”, one guy in particular (the screw-up) is told to shout, “WOULD YOU LIKE FRIES WITH THAT?!” The instructor told him to get used to it cause that’s what he’s gonna be saying for the rest of his life.
Inst: Down!
Us: One!
Inst: Up!
Guy: WOULD YOU LIKE FRIES WITH THAT?!
Inst: Down!
Us: Two!
Inst: Up!
Guy: WOULD YOU LIKE FRIES WITH THAT?!
There was a pool of tears from laughter on the floor below me.
We were at the rifle range and one of the men in my platoon made some kind of stupid mistake, I don’t remember what, but the DI made him run around with his weapon above his head screaming “I AM AN IDIOT! I AM AN IDIOT!” for about an hour. Good times.
Marine basic. Had a pvt built like an ox and almost as smart. One day a visiting di walks out of the di’s hut and pvt ox runs up to him and yells, Sir pvt ox request permission to make an emergency head call Sir! Well pvt ox was standing right behind the di when he yells this and when the di turns around his smokey hit pvt ox in the face knocking said smokey to the deck. The di goes ballistic on ox yelling give me twenty, together apart, up down, on your belly on your back, left right left up apart down and this goes on for like five minutes when pvt ox jumps up and yells/spits in the di’s face,SIR, MAKE UP YOUR MIND!!! needless to say he was not seen again after this. platoon 3110 mcrd san diego-Hollyrood!!!
We were at the rifle range and one of the men in my platoon made some kind of stupid mistake, I don’t remember what, but the DI made him run around with his weapon above his head screaming “I AM AN IDIOT! I AM AN IDIOT!” for about an hour. Good times.
Marine basic. Had a pvt built like an ox and almost as smart. One day a visiting di walks out of the di’s hut and pvt ox runs up to him and yells, Sir pvt ox request permission to make an emergency head call Sir! Well pvt ox was standing right behind the di when he yells this and when the di turns around his smokey hit pvt ox in the face knocking said smokey to the deck. The di goes ballistic on ox yelling give me twenty, together apart, up down, on your belly on your back, left right left up apart down and this goes on for like five minutes when pvt ox jumps up and yells/spits in the di’s face,SIR, MAKE UP YOUR MIND!!! needless to say he was not seen again after this. platoon 3110 mcrd san diego-Hollyrood!!!