More from Tim about The Basic School

Well, a few more observations from not-quite-paradise…

Some of you may have entertained the question, “what’s the difference between your typical McDonald’s-eating comfort-seeking civilian and these camouflaged killers they call Marines?” The following anecdotes may help to clarify the issue.

First, what does your typical McDonald’s-eating comfort-seeking civilian do when forced to be outside when it’s 105 degrees out? Correct. He will put on a favorite old t-shirt and shorts, sip on his icy McDonald’s Frappe, and lounge in the shade with an expression usually reserved for Somalian war refugees, while mentally applauding himself for “enduring through this inhuman weather.”

And you thought he was exaggerating - I took this during Land Nav 2

What do Marines do?

It was our Land Navigation Final Exam, and it consisted of finding between 7 and 10 red ammo boxes in 8 hours in an area that was about 5km by 4km. The fact that it was 105, high humidity, and no breeze didn’t deter us for a minute. Nor did the fact that we were in full woodland camouflage uniforms (sleeves down), or the fact that we had about 40+ lbs of gear. Unfortunately, I started on the side of the training area that had some of the worst terrain that I had ever seen. In some areas, 10 feet was the visibility limit. Worse, Quantico has apparently imported thorny vines and planted them all over the training area in order to drive lieutenants to agonizing despair. That combined with the weather, the gear (which caught on everything), and the inability to find boxes at all made me realize the weakness of the English language. “Frustration” is unsubstantial. “Irritation” has no weight. “Mind-wrenching anguish” might be a little closer to the truth. In four hours, I had found 1 box.

I would like to say that I rallied, pushed on, and ultimately succeeded in finding 7 boxes. In the end, I found 6 boxes in the eight hours allotted before ultimately succumbing to a nice case of heat cramps. Finally, after two hours of staggering through the woods, I made it to a road where I was picked up by part of a search party. The long and the short of it was that ultimately I got to visit the professionals at base medical care, and for the second time in my life I got to experience an IV. And yes, the fact that I failed Land Nav meant that I had to go on remedial on Saturday in order to pass it (it’s a requirement to graduate). To be fair, though, half the company failed, and about 30 people had to go to medical that day.

The interesting part was getting back to the BOQ and hearing some of the other stories from the day. “I wasn’t able to walk more than 100 meters without taking a rest.” “I couldn’t remember which number came after 7.” “I had tunnel vision and lost my depth perception.” “I was unable to write the letter ‘A’ when I found my box.” “I can’t remember much from the day.” “I found four lieutenants down with heat case and had to get help.”

The interesting thing about it all is that we more or less took it as a course of life. “It happened, people. Time to continue with training.” I think that’s what makes the Marines the best. Bad times don’t stop us.

Lts. Goode, Gearlds, Horner

FEX II

One of the things that helps keep life interesting at TBS is that we always have the unexpected popping up and destroying our illusions of control. Case in point: Field Exercise II. We were out in the field conducting operations for a three-day period. One day in the offense, one day in the defense, and one day to pack up and head back.

Item 1: Thunderstorms. There’s an ancient Indian curse on the highlands of Quantico that makes it rain whenever a training company is out in the field. The rule is, the more inconvenient the rain would be, the harder it will rain. We had a regular monsoon going, which gave the plants a new outlook on life, the animals a new place to find water, and the lieutenants a new reason to hate life. The second night, in a spectacular demonstration of Murphy’s Law, it began raining just after we went to sleep. I woke up in an inch of water and spent about 2 hours offering prayers as to why it would be nice for the rain to stop.

That’s when I became acquainted with corollary #1: The remarkable thing about life is that it’s never so bad that it can’t get worse. At 1:00 in the morning, we were awakened to find out that we had a surprise 9-mile hike back to base. Lucky us. Average weight of gear: 100+ lbs. Average amount of sleep over the past 48 hours: 7 hours. Average condition of boots, socks, and gear: waterlogged. The look on the average lieutenant’s face when he realized that this was serious, and actually not some sadistic practical joke: priceless. By the way, there’s a corollary #2: Nature has a cruel sense of humor. The rain stopped just as we stepped off.

Patrolling

I promised a story in the last posting that I wrote, and here it is. My squad was out learning how to patrol. Lt. McCool and I were the right flank guard, which meant that we weren’t always able to see the main body. To complicate things, we were in low visibility terrain (maybe 5 feet). He and I were supposed to keep abreast of the main unit, but due to the conditions, we were unable to see them at all. In the end, we didn’t realize that they had stopped, and we ended up 50 meters in front of them.

Quick rabbit trail. When Marines are unsure who’s around them, they will shout out a sign, e.g. “red.” The challenged individual will give the countersign, e.g. “meatloaf.” The alternate method is to have a prearranged number, for example, 11. The challenger will shout a number, and the challenged individual will give the number that will add to 11.

Well, back to the story, our sign/countersign was apple/Coors. Our number was 9. And McCool and I knew that we were ahead of the rest of the squad and were waiting for them to catch up. All of the sudden, we heard shots from the squad. With a flash of enlightenment, we realized that they were shooting at us. “Stop! We’re friends!” we shouted as we hit the deck.

“It’s a trick! Keep firing!” we heard.

“We are your right flank! McCool and Horner!” we responded.

There was a moment of silence. “Four!” I heard.

Relieved, I called out “Five!” (adds up to 9, remember).

There was another moment of silence. “Apple!” they called out, apparently not yet satisfied.

McCool and I looked at each other, both having completely forgotten the countersign. While I pulled out my notebook and frantically flipped through it looking for the answer, McCool decided that he would give it a shot in the dark. “Black!” he yelled.

I did not know what the correct answer was, but I definitely knew what it was not. There was another moment of silence.

“They’re enemy! Everybody open fire!” We both hit the deck again as the entire squad opened fire.

Suffice it to say, when it was all over, there were a number of learning points on both sides.

One final note

We had our Engineer Field Exercise about a week and a half ago. For those who don’t know, that means a whole day of playing with explosives. I will say this. TNT, det. cord, and plastic explosives are every bit as awesome to play with as you would imagine. And for the interested taxpayer, during that field exercise, we blew up exactly $5,447.47 of taxpayer money.

Thank you all for paying your taxes.

Tim with the MK-19