Soldier Basic Training

[Kershaw]

Here is an artical of a officer in my old unit. These are the type of people I served with

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128514563

 

[Paul B]

Tusi, I hang a frying pan in front of my tank to scare my fish just in case they start feeling sick. It straitens them right out.

Love the picture of Iraq. You guys dressed much better than us. I assume someone washed your clothes. We "washed" ours when it was raining while we were wearing them or if we had time we used helicopter fuel under a fifty gallon drum which we cut in half to boil clothes. That was also our "bathroom" if we were in a stable spot for a while.

Kershaw. I never saw heat or AC while I was in the army. If we hit a drill Sgt, even while they were hitting us, after they beat us we would go to jail and jail time does not count as army time in basic. If you failed basic, you did it over again.

I did basic in South Carolina. Our barracks were from WW2. They were wood and although had heaters, none of them worked. Forget AC, I am not even sure they had electricity. Then I went to Colorado and trained for Viet Nam in 4' of snow. I had an M-60 tank that I would chase buffalo around with. Once we picked up 2 girls in Denver and told them where to meet us next to the fence around the military base. I had a 577 APC and my friend had the tank. They stood on the roof of their Volkswagon and we swung the gun of the tank over the fence for the girls to grab on to and we brought them over. We spent the night out there I the very deep snow driving around "etc".

Once there, we were supposed to be in stupid war games and this Lieutenant took me in this Jeep, which had no roof, out to lay commo wire through the plains. We had about two miles of wire on the thing and we drove off into the wilderness. It was snowing very hard and after a while, while I was up to my armpits in snow and freezing to death I asked him if he knew where we were. Of course not. So we stop the Jeep and he goes out to find a hil to climb up on to see if he could see lights from anywhere as we were miles from anything and it was in the middle of the night.
He disappears and I hear HOWLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL. I am a New York kid and know nothing about animals bigger than rats so I don't know what that was but it didn't sound all warm and fuzzy. I got on the hood of the Jeep and held my M-16 which had no bullets, ready to swing and hit one of these, whatever they were. I assume coyotes or Yeti's. I was a little beyond scared because I figured Bozo got eaten.
He comes back and couldn't see any lights so I walked in front of the Jeep lifting up the wire all the way until we found our way back.
This is that battle I was in
http://www.thehistoryreader.com/military-history/fsb-illingworth/

 

[Paul B]

Iraq deployment

You guys dressed so much better than us and all carry your rifle's the same way. I could dress any way I wanted although we had no underwear as it would rot in the rain and dampness. I got used to it there. We also could carry our weapons any way we wanted or use a cross bow, nun chucks, sling shot or pea shooter if we wanted. Of course we didn't have any of those things and we couldn't call home or anywhere else as cell phones or computers were not invented.
Some guys, stupidly cut off the stock and barrel of the M-16 to make a long pistol. Of course when you did that, it didn't work on automatic any more so I assume those guys didn't make it home.
We also had all the grenades, LAWs, claymores and ammo we wanted to carry. Most nights we had "Mad Minutes" where every one on the firebase fired every weapon we had continousely out into the jungle to deter them from attacking us. Al it did was tell everyone with in 5 miles where we were. It was deafening and sometimes we did it 3 or 4 times a night. We used tanks, if we had them and all our artillery guns as well as claymores, grenades, fifty calipers, miniguns etc.
I even have a tape recording of some Mad Minutes but it is fifty years old and I doubt there is any sound left on it. It also has me and my Captain with some other guys enjoying some hot beers. On the rare occasions when we could get beers from the Air Force we had to put them in the shade for a few hours to cool them off as they were hot as coffee as was everything else.

A guy came up to us once and he had camouflage all over him with those sticks in his helmet, knives, guns, grenades, bullets wrapped all over him so he looked like Rambo. I asked him when he got in country and he told me "Last Tuesday". I said, "get away from me, your the first guy they are going to shoot. "
That happens, when you first get there you want a lot of firepower, and you can have as much as you want. But after a while, you go light and get rid of most of that stuff. I started with a I think it was an M29. It was a grenade launcher and M-16 on the same weapon. Very cool and it could do some damage. But it was heavy and made you a target so I then just carried an M-16 and if I was flying someplace a 45.

For the "bathroom" as I mentioned if we were in a semi stable clearing we took a fifty gallon drum and cut it in half with a machete. The drums had helicopter fuel in them. The medic would make a seat out of bamboo or anything he could find and at the end of the day, he would burn it. While you were on there doing your stuff, Rats would climb on your shoes and all over the place, even climb up your legs as they had no fear of people. We would have one magazine that we used for that. We would pull out the projectile and dump out half the powder. Then stick the shell into soap. We would use that to shoot the rats, this way we didn't blow our feet off or kill one of our guys. After a while the medic would get rid of the dead rats.

 

[Paul B]

Any of you guys have any pictures of war zones, I would like to see them

 

[Kershaw]

You guys dressed so much better than us and all carry your rifle's the same way. I could dress any way I wanted although we had no underwear as it would rot in the rain and dampness. I got used to it there. We also could carry our weapons any way we wanted or use a cross bow, nun chucks, sling shot or pea shooter if we wanted. Of course we didn't have any of those things and we couldn't call home or anywhere else as cell phones or computers were not invented.
Some guys, stupidly cut off the stock and barrel of the M-16 to make a long pistol. Of course when you did that, it didn't work on automatic any more so I assume those guys didn't make it home.
We also had all the grenades, LAWs, claymores and ammo we wanted to carry. Most nights we had "Mad Minutes" where every one on the firebase fired every weapon we had continousely out into the jungle to deter them from attacking us. Al it did was tell everyone with in 5 miles where we were. It was deafening and sometimes we did it 3 or 4 times a night. We used tanks, if we had them and all our artillery guns as well as claymores, grenades, fifty calipers, miniguns etc.
I even have a tape recording of some Mad Minutes but it is fifty years old and I doubt there is any sound left on it. It also has me and my Captain with some other guys enjoying some hot beers. On the rare occasions when we could get beers from the Air Force we had to put them in the shade for a few hours to cool them off as they were hot as coffee as was everything else.

A guy came up to us once and he had camouflage all over him with those sticks in his helmet, knives, guns, grenades, bullets wrapped all over him so he looked like Rambo. I asked him when he got in country and he told me "Last Tuesday". I said, "get away from me, your the first guy they are going to shoot. "
That happens, when you first get there you want a lot of firepower, and you can have as much as you want. But after a while, you go light and get rid of most of that stuff. I started with a I think it was an M29. It was a grenade launcher and M-16 on the same weapon. Very cool and it could do some damage. But it was heavy and made you a target so I then just carried an M-16 and if I was flying someplace a 45.

For the "bathroom" as I mentioned if we were in a semi stable clearing we took a fifty gallon drum and cut it in half with a machete. The drums had helicopter fuel in them. The medic would make a seat out of bamboo or anything he could find and at the end of the day, he would burn it. While you were on there doing your stuff, Rats would climb on your shoes and all over the place, even climb up your legs as they had no fear of people. We would have one magazine that we used for that. We would pull out the projectile and dump out half the powder. Then stick the shell into soap. We would use that to shoot the rats, this way we didn't blow our feet off or kill one of our guys. After a while the medic would get rid of the dead rats.

For the first 6 months we burned are poop in a 55 but we used diesel fuel

 

[Kershaw]

For the first 6 months we burned are poop in a 55 but we used diesel fuel

I may have some I will look. But i don't think I should post on here.

 

[Thle009]

Much has changed since those days. At least for the Navy. I went through the Navy in 1996 and after our class graduated the next group was given special stress card which they can redeem. They worked just like get out of jail cards back then. I hope they wised up and took those away. We can't afford a bunch a whiny soldiers who can't survive boot camp.

 

[Paul B]

We had aspirins. If you were scared, shot, drowned or crashed in a helicopter, you got an aspirin.

 

[Mike N]

I would like to see pictures from Iraq.

Here ya go:

 

[Paul B]

That's cool. Love the camels.
Like I said everyone is dressed the same and carry the weapon the same

 

[Mike N]

That's cool. Love the camels.
Like I said everyone is dressed the same and carry the weapon the same

Yeah, even during deployments, all the stupid micro-management rules applied.

 

[Paul B]

We only had one rule, kill the bad guys and we could do that any way, dressed any way in any fashion without asking or telling anyone. That's how you fight a war. If they want the lawyers to fight, or be PC, let them go.
See how that works out.

 

[Mike N]

We only had one rule, kill the bad guys and we could do that any way, dressed any way in any fashion without asking or telling anyone. That's how you fight a war. If they want the lawyers to fight, or be PC, let them go.
See how that works out.

I agree wholeheartedly with everything you say.

 

[Paul B]

I want to thank all of you for your service. I never served myself, and i count out as a loss.

No, you are not. I myself was drafted so I don't know if I would have joined. Viet Nam was not on places I wanted to visit. It still isn't as I am never going back.

 

[Paul B]

Here are some pictures I found on the web. I don't know who put them up but I am in 4 pictures on the first page. I guess that was because I am so good looking.

http://www.77fa.org/photos177.html

 

[SBlisters]

Yeah unless your permanent duty station turns out to be located in El Paso, TX
I was almost relieved to be deployed hah.
Oh, and thanks for your service as well.

I was at stationed at Bliss too! Back in the late 90s.

 

[SBlisters]

I don't want to "be a man." I'm perfectly happy being a woman. I was in the army, but I don't come to this forum to talk about then vs now for basic training. I come to talk about salt water aquariums.

 

[Paul B]

So do I, unless I am in the Lounge which is "not" supposed to be about salt water aquariums.
I have thousands of posts on fish forums.

That's why the Lounge says this:

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And SBlisters, Thank you for your service.