Army Drops Hand Grenade and Land Nav. Competency From Basic Training

Everyone makes fun of a 2LT with a map and a compass, until they need fire support. Then all of a sudden they know who the real King of Battle is.

Certainly,

But, VERY often when that pilot is on the ground his sense of scale is way the hell off. I have had Lt's and Capts that have needed remedial training to pass SERE/Survival school. The earlier you get the pilot in training the better. The longer he flies the harder it is to judge distances on the ground in kilometers and "pace counts".

ETA: The thread is about soldiers, though.
 
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LOL. LT's would step off of the chopper in Nam and say, who is the NCO in charge. I'd say, that would be me sir. Then they'd say, they told me in the rear that you know the routine. I'm here for 90 days to get combat time on my record. Just keep me alive. I'd say, first lesson sir. You don't call in for arty or air strikes sir. I do.
 
Yup. That would be the NCO in charge.


You know.....not all officers are bad. Seems like you had Some bad experiences with a few of them......thanks for your service! Some officers realize there place in the chain of command and can lead. In a nutshell......every mission has a who what when where and why and how.

As an officer I'm responsible for the when where and why. The senior NCO is responsible for the who, what, how to accomplish that mission. Stay out of his way and generally the mission gets accomplished. When an officer starts getting into individual tasks is when he's doing the ncos job and shits gonna go south. Stay out of their way once the mission is given......back on topic
.......2lts are new at their job.....just as new as a private. I've done both sides.....12 years enlisted (made E7 then went to OCS) seen just as many privates fail land nav the infantry training center as I did OCs fail land nav at OCS. The difference is as a private you get to keep trying to pass....until you pass.......that may include a recycle back a phase in training.....but you can keep trying. At OCS......you get one retake.....and if you fail that your disenrolled from OCS.
 
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You know.....not all officers are bad. Seems like you had Some bad experiences with a few of them......thanks for your service! Some officers realize there place in the chain of command and can lead. In a nutshell......every mission has a who what when where and why and how.

As an officer I'm responsible for the when where and why. The senior NCO is responsible for the who, what, how to accomplish that mission. Stay out of his way and generally the mission gets accomplished. When an officer starts getting into individual tasks is when he's doing the ncos job and shits gonna go south. Stay out of their way once the mission is given......back on topic
.......2lts are new at their job.....just as new as a private. I've done both sides.....12 years enlisted (made E7 then went to OCS) seen just as many privates fail land nav the infantry training center as I did OCs fail land nav at OCS. The difference is as a private you get to keep trying to pass....until you pass.......that may include a recycle back a phase in training.....but you can keep trying. At OCS......you get one retake.....and if you fail that your disenrolled from OCS.

To be fair I think it's some good natured ribbing. I've had nothing but good experiences with officers in my chain of command. I've seen some dopey 2nd Lts, but that's not a knock on them. To be fair though, my experience is limited to the Marine Corps... and while I may be crossing over services at some point, I really like how selective the USMC can be with their officers, but I'm biased of course. And we are a much smaller service.

Mike
 
To be fair I think it's some good natured ribbing. I've had nothing but good experiences with officers in my chain of command. I've seen some dopey 2nd Lts, but that's not a knock on them. To be fair though, my experience is limited to the Marine Corps... and while I may be crossing over services at some point, I really like how selective the USMC can be with their officers, but I'm biased of course. And we are a much smaller service.

Mike
The army can weed out the less than stellar officers even though it's a big organization. As a company grade officer if you don't get selected for company command your guaranteed to never make it past the rank of major and they give you assignments that keep you far away from actual Soldiers.

When I was a company xo we had a maintenance platoon leader that I found in his room in the barracks reading a book at 2300 while his platoon was out on the wrecker recovery lane up to their armpits in mud training with the 88 on recovery. I asked him what was going on and he said "my guys don't need me out there". I told him your absolutely right they know what they are doing......but you should be out there learning what your Soldiers do and go through. His oers were reflective of his leadership ability and last I heard he got out after his 5 year contract.
 
2nd Lts have always been joked about but never more so than during the buildup of Vietnam which sadly and sometimes disastrously created (U.S. Army specifically) the "shake & bake" 2nd Lts with questionable qualifications and minimal training.

Col David Hackworth made a big deal about it with good reason.

I can remember after I received my draft notice being told that my test scores qualified me to either go to OCS or Warrant Officer Flight Training. The scores required for WOFT were significantly higher speak nothing of physical requirements than OCS. The OCS program at that point in time was totally bastardized with very mixed results. Not to say that some of the OCS grads didn't do exceptionally well but the numbers who didn't fare well were significant. Fragging in Vietnam was prevalent.
 
You know.....not all officers are bad. Seems like you had Some bad experiences with a few of them......thanks for your service! Some officers realize there place in the chain of command and can lead. In a nutshell......every mission has a who what when where and why and ho

As an officer I'm responsible for the when where and why. The senior NCO is responsible for the who, what, how to accomplish that mission. Stay out of his way and generally the mission gets accomplished. When an officer starts getting into individual tasks is when he's doing the ncos job and shits gonna go south. Stay out of their way once the mission is given......back on topic
.......2lts are new at their job.....just as new as a private. I've done both sides.....12 years enlisted (made E7 then went to OCS) seen just as many privates fail land nav the infantry training center as I did OCs fail land nav at OCS. The difference is as a private you get to keep trying to pass....until you pass.......that may include a recycle back a phase in training.....but you can keep trying. At OCS......you get one retake.....and if you fail that your disenrolled from OCS.

First let me say that like everyone who has served, I've known some very fine officers. some of which I would have followed into a fire if need be. In the post that you're

responding to, I was partly having some fun at a few young officers expense. Vietnam was a experience in time that was unusual to say the least. If you check records you will see that although the U.S was involved there for fifteen years, 50% of our losses occurred between 1968 and 1969. The luck of the draw being what it was, that's when I served. This put a strain on available man power for sure. To add insult to injury, I was told, by multiple young officers planning to make the Corps. a career at the time, that in order to advance in the Corps. they had to have combat duty on their records. To achieve this, they had to hit the bush for 90 days minimally. As a result, even if a Remington raider Lt. wanted to advance, he had to do bush time. Obviously this resulted in some young officers going to the bush that probably wouldn't have been there otherwise. On the other hand, the average Marine Corps. grunt was in the bush for 13 months. His entire overseas duty station was the bush. Not only was it not good for these guys to see young officers come and go while they had to stay, but now they had the added negative of sometimes dealing with a Lt. who couldn't correctly navigate or call in air strikes and as a result, might just get everyone under his command killed. Most Lt's were just as happy to have us do the calling in and to be honest, there were long stretches when we didn't have a Lt., which told us that the Corps. didn't find it very important for a Lt. to be with us either. I understand what you said about at OCS, you only get one retake. Please understand that in Nam there were no retakes. You drop friendly fire on your own pos. and everyone with you pays.
 
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We had great officers in Afghanistan, but I'd say most patrols our PL was a Sergeant or Staff Sergeant. Mainly because we had 2 officers for 5 platoons.

I don't at all mean it is as knock, but as I'm sure you Vietnam vets are aware, todays military is a different beast in that it's much more a professional organization as a whole. Everyone who is there wants to be there, infantry slots are first to fill up every fiscal year, and leadership has learned a lot from past mistakes. What you are describing with how they rotated 2nd Lts through in Vietnam is, frankly, terrifying. The platoon dynamic definitely changed on the patrols we had our Captain with us, but at least he was a very capable, competent, experienced leader.

Mike
 
First let me say that like everyone who has served, I've known some very fine officers. some of which I would have followed into a fire if need be. In the post that you're

responding to, I was partly having some fun at a few young officers expense. Vietnam was a experience in time that was unusual to say the least. If you check records you will see that although the U.S was involved there for fifteen years, 50% of our losses occurred between 1968 and 1969. The luck of the draw being what it was, that's when I served. This put a strain on available man power for sure. To add insult to injury, I was told, by multiple young officers planning to make the Corps. a career at the time, that in order to advance in the Corps. they had to have combat duty on their records. To achieve this, they had to hit the bush for 90days minimally. As a result, even if a Remington raider Lt. wanted to advance, he had to do bush time. Obviously this resulted in some young officers going to the bush that probably wouldn't have been there otherwise. On the other hand, the average Marine Corps. grunt was in the bush for 13 months. His entire overseas duty station was the bush. Not only was it not good for these guys to see young officers come and go while they had to stay, but now they had the added negative of sometimes dealing with a Lt. who couldn't correctly navigate or call in air strikes and as a result, might just get everyone under his command killed. Most Lt's were just as happy to have us do the calling in and to be honest, there were long stretches when we didn't have a Lt., which told us that the Corps. didn't find it very important for a Lt. to be with us either. I understand what you said about at OCS, you only get one retake. Please understand that in Nam there were no retakes. You drop friendly fire on your own pos. and everyone with you pays.
Like I said I spent 12 years enlisted......and can't even imagine a program where you got a new LT assigned every 90 days or so......that's a bullshit program and can't blame a Marine or Soldier for complaining that they had to stay in theater while an officer got to go back from combat after 90 days. Total crap. but like crazymbj says.......those mistakes are long gone in today's military for the most part. When a unit deploys it goes as a unit.....and comes back as a unit.....the officers don't rotate out unless they are relieved of command. Unfortunately I've seen that happen. A horizontal engineer unit in my BN had its company commander and first sergeant relieved with 4 months of the deployment left in Iraq. Total lack of discipline in that unit and they didn't give a shit. The straw that broke the camel's back on that one was when their 4 medics were caught taking morphine from the aid station and selling it. Medics got court martials and the top leaders were relieved.......command responsibility.
 
We had great officers in Afghanistan, but I'd say most patrols our PL was a Sergeant or Staff Sergeant. Mainly because we had 2 officers for 5 platoons.

I don't at all mean it is as knock, but as I'm sure you Vietnam vets are aware, todays military is a different beast in that it's much more a professional organization as a whole. Everyone who is there wants to be there, infantry slots are first to fill up every fiscal year, and leadership has learned a lot from past mistakes. What you are describing with how they rotated 2nd Lts through in Vietnam is, frankly, terrifying. The platoon dynamic definitely changed on the patrols we had our Captain with us, but at least he was a very capable, competent, experienced leader.

Mike

Wow! You had a capable Captain on patrols! I can't speak for all Nam vets, but I can tell you, I never saw a Captain on any patrols. We had a 1st Lt. once, but only for a short time. Overall he was a good leader.
 
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Like I said I spent 12 years enlisted......and can't even imagine a program where you got a new LT assigned every 90 days or so......that's a bullshit program and can't blame a Marine or Soldier for complaining that they had to stay in theater while an officer got to go back from combat after 90 days. Total crap. but like crazymbj says.......those mistakes are long gone in today's military for the most part. When a unit deploys it goes as a unit.....and comes back as a unit.....the officers don't rotate out unless they are relieved of command. Unfortunately I've seen that happen. A horizontal engineer unit in my BN had its company commander and first sergeant relieved with 4 months of the deployment left in Iraq. Total lack of discipline in that unit and they didn't give a shit. The straw that broke the camel's back on that one was when their 4 medics were caught taking morphine from the aid station and selling it. Medics got court martials and the top leaders were relieved.......command responsibility.

I'm pretty sure that the 90 day rotation program was the norm for Marine Corps. officers in Nam. If we have any here on NES maybe they can jump in here and comment. To be honest, in 1968 and 1969, the Northern I Corps. bush, wasn't a place where anyone, officer or enlisted, would have picked as a first choice of duty stations. I was of the impression at the time that good officers were hard to come by and that the Corps. didn't want to waste them on some shithole hill like 881 north, or patrolling that particular area. At this same time the Corps. was doing some battlefield commissioning. E5's to 2nd Lt.. I served with a Sgt. that was offered a commission. Oddly enough, we grew up three houses apart from each other. The insulting hell of it was that if you took the battlefield commission, it was taken away when you rotated back to the states.
 
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Like I said I spent 12 years enlisted......and can't even imagine a program where you got a new LT assigned every 90 days or so......that's a bullshit program and can't blame a Marine or Soldier for complaining that they had to stay in theater while an officer got to go back from combat after 90 days. Total crap. but like crazymbj says.......those mistakes are long gone in today's military for the most part. When a unit deploys it goes as a unit.....and comes back as a unit.....the officers don't rotate out unless they are relieved of command. Unfortunately I've seen that happen. A horizontal engineer unit in my BN had its company commander and first sergeant relieved with 4 months of the deployment left in Iraq. Total lack of discipline in that unit and they didn't give a shit. The straw that broke the camel's back on that one was when their 4 medics were caught taking morphine from the aid station and selling it. Medics got court martials and the top leaders were relieved.......command responsibility.

I have no experience with being deployed as a unit. Most, no all of us were more involved with being replacements. Many wounded and kia at the time and the ranks had to be filled. I'm sure the Corps, at that time, had its hands full just trying to keep the divisions up to strength and it was a game of fill the wholes more than anything. As it turned out, we were almost always undermanned. At one time during the 60's, the Corps. was even taking draftees. Lol. I can remember being inducted in Boston. We volunteers were watching the draftee section when the Officer in charge said " every third draftee take a step forward". Then he said, congratulations, you are now United States Marines. Have you ever seen a whole group of young men cry! They cried that day. Just the thought of being Marines struck fear in their minds.That scene had an impact on me. I knew that it was my perception that Marines were different, but those guys crying woke me up to the fact that it wasn't just my perception.
Maybe I spoke to soon here. Looking back on things, I was part of the whole shit show, when they pulled the Third Marine Division out of Nam in October, 1969. They sent us to Okinawa via a troop ship that was a converted air craft carrier. The whole 3rd division sat on Qua Viet beach waiting for that ship. Before they let us leave Nam they forced us to take all of our back pay, in cash. Can you imagine the whole division with thousands of dollars in cash in their pockets, on a ship headed for civilization. I can tell you that when we hit Okinawa, it was a scene that was not soon forgotten.
 
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In my stint in army aviation '67-68' we had a few of very good platoon level Officers. The Warrant's as rule were fearless. We joked they didn't know any better, we certainly didn't. Field grade officers on the other hand lead from the rear as a rule, were very reluctant to put themselves in harms way. They were in it for career reasons, so they tended cover themselves in unearned glory at 2000'. C'est le guerre.

The only fragging incident I can recall we a few of the gun platoon boys booby-trapped a clown master sargent's tent with a trip wired claymore mine. The gods of war smiled on him as he spotted a glint of the the wire in the morning sun the next morning. That afternoon he decided to hop on the next chopper to Tan Son Nuit AFB and got orders cut to safety of the 'land of round eyes'. Interesting times [laugh]
 
In my stint in army aviation '67-68' we had a few of very good platoon level Officers. The Warrant's as rule were fearless. We joked they didn't know any better, we certainly didn't. Field grade officers on the other hand lead from the rear as a rule, were very reluctant to put themselves in harms way. They were in it for career reasons, so they tended cover themselves in unearned glory at 2000'. C'est le guerre.

The only fragging incident I can recall we a few of the gun platoon boys booby-trapped a clown master sargent's tent with a trip wired claymore mine. The gods of war smiled on him as he spotted a glint of the the wire in the morning sun the next morning. That afternoon he decided to hop on the next chopper to Tan Son Nuit AFB and got orders cut to safety of the 'land of round eyes'. Interesting times [laugh]

Yes, I've heard of fragging incidents. On the very few occasions that I heard rumors of potentially fragging an officer, I put the word out, reminded marines, that there were plenty of patrols that they could be volunteered / chosen for, if they were feeling particularly patriotic. Never lost a officer that way on my watch. Inexperience is not a crime. A damn shame perhaps, under the circumstances, but certainly not worthy of a body bag.
 
Yes, I've heard of fragging incidents.

Being on the receiving end of casualties suffering from suspicious wounds, fragging did happen. Not that often but then again such incidents were either kept quiet or covered up.......both sometimes not very well done.

Crappy movies about Vietnam (they all are in my opinion) thanks Hollyweird.....did their best to exploit the inter-turmoil amongst units (Platoon comes to mind). It did happen but from what I saw to a miniscule degree from what Hollyweird would have us think. Things that came into play for the Army were racial issues and disgruntled draftees humping the boonies. As M60 mentioned, most all units were constantly (some severely) undermanned, particularly in that three year period (67,68,69) during which Vietnam suffered its highest death tolls. Replacements couldn't get there fast enough.
 
Being on the receiving end of casualties suffering from suspicious wounds, fragging did happen. Not that often but then again such incidents were either kept quiet or covered up.......both sometimes not very well done.

Crappy movies about Vietnam (they all are in my opinion) thanks Hollyweird.....did their best to exploit the inter-turmoil amongst units (Platoon comes to mind). It did happen but from what I saw to a miniscule degree from what Hollyweird would have us think. Things that came into play for the Army were racial issues and disgruntled draftees humping the boonies. As M60 mentioned, most all units were constantly (some severely) undermanned, particularly in that three year period (67,68,69) during which Vietnam suffered its highest death tolls. Replacements couldn't get there fast enough.

Yes, almost forgot the racial issues. I had a friend named Willy. Blackest black man I ever saw. Willy was a great Marine. Man didn't know fear. He did succumb to racial pressure though. When they pulled the Third Marine Division out of Nam and sent us to Oki, the racial issues escalated. Willy came to me one day with his hat in hand. He was clearly sad. He said that he couldn't hang with me any longer because the brothers were against it. We had pulled each others bacon out of the fire more than once. Willy and I never spoke after that day. Wherever Willie Jones is, I hope all is well for him. Damn color issues.
 
Yes, almost forgot the racial issues. I had a friend named Willy. Blackest black man I ever saw. Willy was a great Marine. Man didn't know fear. He did succumb to racial pressure though. When they pulled the Third Marine Division out of Nam and sent us to Oki, the racial issues escalated. Willy came to me one day with his hat in hand. He was clearly sad. He said that he couldn't hang with me any longer because the brothers were against it. We had pulled each others bacon out of the fire more than once. Willy and I never spoke after that day. Wherever Willie Jones is, I hope all is well for him. Damn color issues.
My brother in law's family took some hits.
The eldest brother (Marine) was killed.
His other brother was staged in Hawaii ready to ship out (Marine as well), when some racial issue broke out on the base .
Six brothers grabbed him and used him like a trampoline.
He spent a year in a wheelchair in a V.A. hospital before he could walk again.
 
My brother in law's family took some hits.
The eldest brother (Marine) was killed.
His other brother was staged in Hawaii ready to ship out (Marine as well), when some racial issue broke out on the base .
Six brothers grabbed him and used him like a trampoline.
He spent a year in a wheelchair in a V.A. hospital before he could walk again.

Sorry to hear about your brother in laws. I hope that the one that got attacked and put in the wheel chair is ok now.
Makes you wonder what's wrong with people. If they wanted to fight that badly, you'd think that they could have waited until they got deployed to Nam. If they'd already been there, they should have had their fill of that kind of behavior.
 
Kinda brings to mind a very close friend of mine who was a medic that just arrived in the 'Rice Bowl' about the same time I did. Most all of his divisions medics were either killed or WIA. He was one of the company's three replacement medics. In his first major contact they ran into a major NVA force waiting in ambush. He was very bright and was the equivalent of a NP, 48 weeks medical training; the other two medics went to 8-12 weeks basic medic school.

The 'old timers' scanned for weakness or possible lack of nerve especially in NFG medics. His description of the initial ambush was 'mental macaroni'. Many guys were either killed outright or screaming medic. He was so scared, he said he couldn't move for a few long seconds, when he popped his head up he saw one of the enraged grunts shoot one of the frozen scared medics dead. The one medic the grunts tabbed as the most likely to get shot by his own men was the first one up and rushing into a hail of fire to treat the wounded. My friend said to from that time on me every time I heard 'medic up 'in the back of my mind was the image of the 'friendly fire' incident was forever in my mind. I simply said Danny (not his real name) "I understand the logic of survival, it be what it be, war is madness ".

Some many 30 years later he got in contact with members of his unit that survived their tours. He told me he tried to bring up the incident & what he saw, but no-one said anything. My reply to him was 'Well you can look for absolution but you can't always find it'....ya done good medic"

Since he can't tell his story I've taken the liberty of passing it down for prosperity, or whatever the eff...
 
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