The little thing that held the key was the way Alpha Company ran its PT test. For me, that was one end of the stupid. The other was waitin' on us on the backside of the planet.
Earlier I'd mentioned that Alpha Company most always won the banner as training company of the cycle. And that next door the 3:30 AM, screamin' Drill Sergeant saw it as his God-given duty to change things by way of pain. What I came to learn was the man was wasting his rainbow of spit. Seemed the cadre of Alpha weren't so much better at what they did as they were smarter (or more devious).
Who won that little ribbon was based on how well each company did on teaching us trainees the art of soldiering. There was the academic side, at least that's what the Army called it, and the physical side. The academic had to do with how well a trainee could follow commands to march, turn and stand. Also how well they could stick a bayonet in a dummy and how many silhouettes they could knock down with an M-14. I recall there being more to it but that's all I remember.
It was the physical side that showed me the way. We took the PT test twice. Once for practice after about three weeks of training and once at the end of the cycle. The idea being to show the world how much we'd improved. And the more we'd improved, the better we'd been trained. Simple enough. Even made sense to me.
As I recall, the test had five events: some kind've shuttle run and dodge through a bunch of gates, a man carry of fifty or so yards, low crawl on a canvas, mat-covered slab of concrete, the horizontal ladder we'd come to know and love before every meal, and the mile run. It was the run that lit my bulb.
We ran every morning before breakfast. Couple of miles give or take. We ran it together in formation. Everyone at the same plodding pace. Can't say I enjoyed it but it sure did make that first cigarette afterward taste good and the smoke I inhaled sealed all the raw spots in my lungs that'd been burnt by fresh air and exertion. As to how good a shape I was in was a mystery.
The first four events of the test done, we gathered on the track, one platoon at a time. When it was our turn Drill Sergeant Webb gave us a go and off we trotted. Didn't take but a few yards till I moved to the front in fear I'd trip over the plodders in front of me and slowly be pummeled to an early death. Made me wonder about the condition of the army we were sendin' overseas to protect the free world. Also held my effort back for fear that running too fast was somehow immoral or even un-American. Felt like I was crawling but a glance over my shoulder showed the other forty-seven boys in green to be quickly fading to my rear. Wasn't expecting that. Come the end of the first lap there was a solid fifty yards between me and the next man. Webb called out the lap time as being about a minute, thirty-five. Not fast by any means but cigarettes and combat boots go a long way to slowing a man down.
Next lap, same time and better than a hundred yards of air between me and number two. Also was gaining on the stragglers to the front, and feelin' good. I picked it up a little. Third lap I was passing troops right and left and closing in on the man behind me. By now I knew I had a shot of maxing the run and scoring all hundred points, becoming an unsung hero and so picked it up even more. I recall my time as being around four, thirty-five. A minute and a half would get me the full hundred. Yee-haw, I cranked it out.
Coming off the last turn, a glance told me second place was near three-quarters of a lap behind. All I wanted to know was, did I make it under six minutes and six seconds? At the line Webb called out, "Seven minutes, ten seconds." What the ...? I turned to Webb and said, "Drill Sergeant, that can't be right," and he gave me a look that said, "You'd best keep your mouth shut if you have a lick of sense." So that's what I did. I didn't know what the man's scheme was but didn't care enough to bring misery my way.
Of course that's not the end of the story. We took our final PT test with a wind chill of ten below. Post record. Come the mile run the story was the same except two of the trainees from our platoon were missing. Seems they were running with another group. Now, these were boys I could've whupped with one leg tied behind my butt. Half lap or better. As it turned out my time was about ten seconds over max and again had lapped most of the rest of the platoon along the way. But that's not the point of this memory. The point was the two missing men who, as it turned out, had mysteriously gotten better than a minute faster and maxed the run. Could've been possible. More likely there was a ribbon involved and a cooperative hand on the stop watch. So, once again Alpha Company got the ribbon and the Drill Sergeant next door was to be found at the NCO Club scratching his head over a beer. Maybe figured the next cycle wouldn't get any sleep at all.
So, what does that say? Says to me the Army was making and faking it up as it went along. Writing the story as they wanted it to read. Kind of like the body counts in Vietnam and the everlasting light at the end of the tunnel that never seemed to get any closer. Like all the battles we won and somehow still managed to lose the war. Like sinking in the mire of an unwinnable land war in Asia, dumping lives and money down that rat hole and telling the world we were doing it for all the right reasons.
'Course that wasn't at the top of my list of things to care about on that day. Number one was going home on leave in a week. Yup, I was a tad short-sighted when it came to my future.
We ran every morning before breakfast. Couple of miles give or take. We ran it together in formation. Everyone at the same plodding pace. Can't say I enjoyed it but it sure did make that first cigarette afterward taste good and the smoke I inhaled sealed all the raw spots in my lungs that'd been burnt by fresh air and exertion. As to how good a shape I was in was a mystery.
The first four events of the test done, we gathered on the track, one platoon at a time. When it was our turn Drill Sergeant Webb gave us a go and off we trotted. Didn't take but a few yards till I moved to the front in fear I'd trip over the plodders in front of me and slowly be pummeled to an early death. Made me wonder about the condition of the army we were sendin' overseas to protect the free world. Also held my effort back for fear that running too fast was somehow immoral or even un-American. Felt like I was crawling but a glance over my shoulder showed the other forty-seven boys in green to be quickly fading to my rear. Wasn't expecting that. Come the end of the first lap there was a solid fifty yards between me and the next man. Webb called out the lap time as being about a minute, thirty-five. Not fast by any means but cigarettes and combat boots go a long way to slowing a man down.
Next lap, same time and better than a hundred yards of air between me and number two. Also was gaining on the stragglers to the front, and feelin' good. I picked it up a little. Third lap I was passing troops right and left and closing in on the man behind me. By now I knew I had a shot of maxing the run and scoring all hundred points, becoming an unsung hero and so picked it up even more. I recall my time as being around four, thirty-five. A minute and a half would get me the full hundred. Yee-haw, I cranked it out.
Coming off the last turn, a glance told me second place was near three-quarters of a lap behind. All I wanted to know was, did I make it under six minutes and six seconds? At the line Webb called out, "Seven minutes, ten seconds." What the ...? I turned to Webb and said, "Drill Sergeant, that can't be right," and he gave me a look that said, "You'd best keep your mouth shut if you have a lick of sense." So that's what I did. I didn't know what the man's scheme was but didn't care enough to bring misery my way.
Of course that's not the end of the story. We took our final PT test with a wind chill of ten below. Post record. Come the mile run the story was the same except two of the trainees from our platoon were missing. Seems they were running with another group. Now, these were boys I could've whupped with one leg tied behind my butt. Half lap or better. As it turned out my time was about ten seconds over max and again had lapped most of the rest of the platoon along the way. But that's not the point of this memory. The point was the two missing men who, as it turned out, had mysteriously gotten better than a minute faster and maxed the run. Could've been possible. More likely there was a ribbon involved and a cooperative hand on the stop watch. So, once again Alpha Company got the ribbon and the Drill Sergeant next door was to be found at the NCO Club scratching his head over a beer. Maybe figured the next cycle wouldn't get any sleep at all.
So, what does that say? Says to me the Army was making and faking it up as it went along. Writing the story as they wanted it to read. Kind of like the body counts in Vietnam and the everlasting light at the end of the tunnel that never seemed to get any closer. Like all the battles we won and somehow still managed to lose the war. Like sinking in the mire of an unwinnable land war in Asia, dumping lives and money down that rat hole and telling the world we were doing it for all the right reasons.
'Course that wasn't at the top of my list of things to care about on that day. Number one was going home on leave in a week. Yup, I was a tad short-sighted when it came to my future.
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