my point is, marine corps boot camp would be good if only drill instructors remember two words, "hands off"...

Question

whats so hard about that? have they not recieved enough training at drill instructor to train recruits in a professional way so they resort to primitive, childish tactics by hitting them? its a bunch of baloney that alot of u say it isnt done anymore, they told us that back in 1980 also. it is all done behind close doors. i ruffled a few of your feathers when i mentioned about having lieutenants as "observants" in each platoon just to make sure things go by the book and there is no "funny business". if someone goes to plumber school, do he need to be hit with a pipe to become a good plumber? if someone goes to electrician school, do he need to get shocked to become a good electrician? so, why do a Marine or any fighting man needs to get hit to become a good warrior? how many of u agree with hands "frickin" off of the recruits during basic? lol, i think it was so funny when my drill instructors would use the word "frickin" to replace the other word. please answer my questions str8 up

Answer 1

I am afraid that the training of our military has become watered down. certainly there is no cause for unprovoked assaults on unwary soldiers, but our fear of being too harsh has made the training grounds for our soldiers a faded picture of what they were. There needs to be a balance of harshness and civility. I am afraid that we have swung too far away from that necessary harshness of military training.

Unfortunately a similar pendulum swing has happened on the battlefields. Of course armed forces must attempt to protect the innocent. But people die in conflicts that are unintended targets. People die because the enemy will intentionally place himself in the proximity of non-combatants. Poeple die because of mistakes that soldiers might make. But if you are busy wringing your hands over how violent and brutal it might look on TV or to some imbedded reporter, then you start to forget that brutality is exactly what wars are all about. And brutality is absolutely necessary in order to win in combat. It is a reality that many Americans do not like to acknowledge; once committed to the battle, you must be willing and capable of being stronger, more fierce, more relentless, and more unforgiving than your enemy. You have to reach the primordial brutality needed to crush the life from your enemy. It is mean, it is ugly, but if you cannot acknowledge this necessity, then you cannot win in a war. It is terrible that civilians get killed, it is terrible to have to order soldiers on a mission when they might die. But again, if you are going to fight the conflict in order to win it, these things will happen.

I think some of our elite units and special ops types understand this.

I will now step down from my soapbox.

landen -- your story is nice but it has no conclusion and that was an isolated incident. I spent years around basic training grounds of Fort Dix, Fort Benning, Fort Sill and others.

Answer 2

What if a student attending plumbing school and fail to pay attention to the instructor about how to fit a pipe. When the pressure is turn and the pipe burst and smack the student in the face, down goes the student. What if a student didn't pay attention to the electronic class and cross the wrong wire. Then he turn on the juice, what do you get crispy fry electrician. There are times these young recruits doesn't pay attention to the DI's, some times a whack up side their head might save their life out there on a live training or the battle field.

Answer 3

I was watching the movie "Full Metal Jacket" for the first time with a friend of mine, who used to be a soldier. I was taking in the first part of the movie with great horror and interest, and that friend told me, "do you know why Sgt. Hartman is being so hard on him?" I shook my head. "So he survives when he gets out there."

Your Drill Instructor is doing the same thing. He or She is making sure you have the best chance to survive out there, so take it, learn from it, move on and quit bellyaching about it.

Another thing I wanted to mention is that I am a re-enactment fencer, which means I fence as they would have in period, but with certain safety regulations, because it's a sport. Unfortunately, I had a problem common to women fencers at first: I am afraid of being hit in the head. The solution? The biggest, strongest man in the group at the time took me aside outfitted with just a mask on, no weapon, no armor, nothing, and my hands behind my back, so I'm at my most vulnerable and went to town on my head. It hurt. My ears rang for a while, I had a stiff neck for days, and a headache that could melt lead, but you know what? I don't flinch anymore, and I'm a better fencer for it. Now that I'm a safety officer myself, I would not have a problem with that gentleman doing the same thing to someone else with a similar difficulty if it was requested. Pain and repetition are good teachers.

I just wanted to say, Curious, "contact counselled" is brilliant, and you are completely right, they are trying to form people they can use.

Beaujock, think of it like intensive job training, except it's your life you're training for.

Answer 4

The physicality of soldier training dates back to the earliest recorded warrior schools. If you pu$$ify the training, you will get that exact result in the graduates from the programs. It should be hard, mean and unforgiving. Because to be a warrior on a battlefield, you must be hard mean and unforgiving. All this sensitivity training in the military is a bunch of cr@p.

Soldiers and marines are there to kill people and break things. War is violent and ugly and your comrades need to know that you are capable of being violent and ugly before you are looking through your sight at some kid with an RPG pointing at your platoon sergeant and the LT... or better yet, all you've got is your Kbar... are you going to kill him? I mean he's just a little kid? OOPS, you hesitated too long. Now the platoon leadership is dead and you are being over run....

Boot camp primitive? Mean? Too violent? D@mn right... if it's too much go home and cry to momma.

Answer 5

"if someone goes to electrician school, do he need to get shocked to become a good electrician?"

Actually, YES. It teaches him to respect the electricity.

If you don't like the treatment there, don't go. The Marine Corps is not a bunch of whiney brats. They are hard charging killing machines, HOORAH. They don't need to be treated like babies, they need to be taught what will keep them alive. Boo-friggin-hoooo. Go cry me a river.

The Army's basic training is WAY too easy now and that is one of the major things wrong with the Army today. There is not enough discipline in the soldiers coming out of basic. A couple smacks to the head, some loud yelling, drilling into the late hours of night and up at the crack of dawn for more.... these are things that make a soldier. The first time I heard a soldier tell me "Excuse me Sergeant, but I think I am too stressed so I have to take a break" I wanted to choke the living snot out of him, his daddy, and his drill sergeant.

Get a grip on what the heck a soldier (or Marine in this case) is supposed to do. They are not 9-5ers, they are SOLDIERS. They FIGHT in WARS. They SHOOT PEOPLE. Holy Christmas, get a friggin clue.

Answer 6

My oldest grandson is a Marine. He enlisted in December of 2005. He told me that his training was some of the toughest stuff he ever had to go through but he also told me, although I knew if from my own time in the Army Infantry, that the whole idea is to teach Marines to obey command INSTANTLY and without thinking. That's something that could save his life in a combat situation. I know because it saved mine in Vietnam. I suppose that sometimes you just have to get someone's attention in order to get the message across, and depending on how big of a knothead they are, the method the Drill Instructor has to use should vary to meet the requirement. I also don't understand this whole problem that some people have with language. We're taliking about lifesaving training for use in combat situations where someone's intent is to take your life and you're concerned about how the Drill Instructor addresses you? Whoa!

Answer 7

Well, first of all Semper Fi fellow marine. I was in basic a little over 4 years ago and when the DI's hit or slap or push the recruits it was usually when we were doing something that required us to think because they wanted us to be able to do anything while anything and everything was going on around us. It was primarily to remove the effect of distraction. Now, I never saw or heard of someone getting the butts kicked by a DI. But, I guess it could have happened. Besides, marines are the toughest branch of the military. If our guys can't take a little slap or punch what are we really even doing in the marines to begin with.

Answer 8

>>if someone goes to plumber school, do he need to be hit with a pipe to become a good plumber? if someone goes to electrician school, do he need to get shocked to become a good electrician? so, why do a Marine or any fighting man needs to get hit to become a good warrior?<<

Looks like you answered your own question. How do you train a warrior without judiciously applying violence? You don't.

Answer 9

If you are too sensitive to withstand Marine Boot camp perhaps you should join the girl scouts. Do you think the enemy is going to recognize or give a rats *** about invading your personal space? Perhaps we should adopt the timeout practice. Would that make you feel better? While I was never hit myself in Basic (AF) I can understand the services that are training you to be tough and handle what could potentially kill you if you are not able to follow orders.

Answer 10

Quit whining and complaining. Do what you're told IMMEDIATELY and they will keep their hands off. The whole point of boot camp is to get you to follow orders. Do that and you'll have a much easier time.

By the way, How are you getting all this Internet time if you're really in boot camp?